THE RUSSIAN GAME

This has got nothing to do with the Ukraine war – nor is the game restricted to Russians – it’s just that that’s where I’ve encountered it, and this name is the name that I’ve given it. There may be other names.

Essentially, this is how it works:

A pretty Russian girl meets a foreigner (a gullible foreigner) and they fall in love. They have some memorable sex and then suddenly she gets a call from her ageing parent back in Russia, begging her to come home because the aged P (to quote Dickens) is Ill and alone.

So off she goes.

Within a short while Gullible Western Lover receives a desperate communication from Desirable Russian Lover to say that Babushka is practically in extremis, dirt-poor and in need of expensive medical treatment and medicine and Desirable Russian Lover is at her wit’s end. 

“Please, please, please, send money!” Gullible Western Lover digs deep and complies.

Not long thereafter Gullible Western Lover receives another, even more desperate call, and he digs even deeper.

Then he receives another message saying that Babushka seems to be on the mend due to the amazing ministrations of a saintly priest of the Russian Orthodox Church. This is the first that  Gullible Western Lover hears of the deep spiritual attachment of Desirable Russian Lover to The Church (despite the fact that she was a stripper at Mavericks when they met in Cape Town (she has previously explained that she was forced into that by a vicious slave trader, who subsequently set her free after duly performed services).

Shortly thereafter Gullible Western Lover receives more communiques from Desirable Russian Lover, each of which contains some oblique reference to the Priest, who has now been excommunicated from The Church but is still a wonderfully spiritual man and has set up a health spa with the financial assistance of an oligarch, who is a generous benefactor.

Then a long break in correspondence, which deteriorates into a monologue by  Gullible Western Lover, who is getting increasingly antsy.

Then a single, short, final email from Desirable Russian Lover to say that she has married the Oligarch, that this correspondence is causing marital discord and has to end but she is sure that Gullible Western Lover will rejoice in the knowledge that she is happy.

End of game.

Thanks for playing.

My blog: https://hjfriedland.blogspot.com/

_________________ 

© Harry Friedland, July 2022