The other day my twin sister sent me a video of Russian drivers.  It was insane.  Are all the drivers, car & trucks, and pedestrians, looped on vodka?

Today I read about Russian circuses, and how parents pay $10-20 to have their children’s pictures taken next to Siberian tigers and snow leopards.  Even though one of those kids got his head bitten off.  The parents defended their actions by saying life is full of risks and without taking risks, you really wouldn’t be living. Hmmmm.  They even cited Mikhail Lermentov’s example—he wrote the first Russian novel, A Hero in Our Time  in 1841, before the more famous Dostoyevky and Tolstoy published their famous novels.

From the New York Times Wednesday, July 10th:

“When asked about the risk, Andrei Y. Logulov, a thin, clean-cut chemical engineer who was encouraging his daughter, 11-year-old Diana, to approach Chanel for a picture, shrugged like so many other Russians in so many other contexts.

“Of course this is risky,” Mr. Logulov said, “but risk is everywhere in life. A brick could fall on your head in the street, for example. And this is just a small risk.”

Placing children beside carnivorous beasts — even for a fleeting second as the trainer steps aside for a photograph — illustrates a deep-seated and widespread quality in Russian culture: This is a nation of inveterate risk takers.

In the 19th century, the author Mikhail Lermontov was so amazed by this quality of fatalism he created a character in the novel “A Hero of Our Time” who played Russian roulette with a single-shot pistol”.

I don’t like circuses very much and find them depressing, making graceful tigers and other animals do silly tricks; I  much prefer Le Cirque de Soleil, which never uses animals.

Here is the video of Russian drivers.  It is harrowing to watch.  See if you can get through it.  I started screaming OMG at about mid-point.