It was like some opening into a doorway of dreams in Russian-Ukrainian fairy tale fantasy dreams,” the first-row guest told reporters backstage.

A Russian-Ukrainian fairy tale? Sounds good to me.

Many a Russian woman who found herself choosing between furs or ugly, bulky, shapeless jackets for a Russian winter will appreciate the fashionable efforts of the designers to make something warm and Russia-inspired (that is, if she can still afford it). The usual array of Russian/Eastern European models made these collections made even more relevant in a cute way.

But now that the designers got their fashion inspirations right, they need to get their weather facts straight.

Citing Newsvine: “Kenzo sent out oversized felt coats and voluminous striped knits that were fit for a Siberian winter.”

Here is a photograph of Kenzo outfit  taken by style.com’s Marcio Madeira’s (btw, it is modeled by a Belorusian):

Siberia is warming up, but is this fit for a Russian winter? I don’t think so.

It is now the time of the year when it becomes especially obvious how far Russia has come in terms of consumerism. Around New Year’s, Russia’s consumerist equivalent of Christmas, stores are abuzz with customers looking for gifts for their near and dear. With online shopping still undeveloped, the number of customers in the stores is a good indicator of the current economic situation. The unemployment rate has skyrocketed,  petrodollar flow has decreased, stocks are down,  grocery prices went up, and the ruble is being slowly devalued. Yet, the atmosphere is not quite as morbid as I expected. Most stores have not resorted to the unprecedented sales of the US, although many of them have experienced a reduced flow of customers. While the ones selling furniture, expensive clothing, and electronics struggle to stay afloat, the ones offering make-up and sometimes jewelry are — surprisingly — experiencing a wave of consumerism.

In the somewhat pretentious chain make-up store to which I went in hopes of checking off some items of my gift lists, the dreaded krizis was seemingly ignored. The intrepid crowds were joyfully choosing between Chanel, Dior, and Givenchy.  But the displays with more modestly priced brands were even more crowded. The customers were scouting the store for the yellow sales labels, but once they identified them, they often bought multiples of the good. At the register, many were flashing the “gold” discount card,  which one gets after spending an equivalent of $340 at the store (may I remind you that the average monthly salary in Russia in 2008 is reported to be around $700 (in the pre-crisis exchange rate)?.

That sight reminded me of the article I recently read that discussed the “lipstick effect” apparent in Russia right now (here’s a link for the Russian speakers). In short, the “lipstick effect” is an increase in the demand for perfume and make-up during the times of financial instability. Since people can’t afford much, they resort to buying fun affordable goods such as a new shiny, candy-flavored lipgloss. This theory does appear to  be very true right now. Some friends of mine who would have bought more expensive gifts before opted to get perfumes for their male friends or make-up for their females friends instead. Men’s perfumes have been flying off the shelves, a buyer acquaintance of mine confessed. They are replacing the pricier cashmere sweaters, iPods, or cell phones, traditional New Year’s gifts for husbands, boyfriends, fathers, and sons.

Further research suggests the lipstick effect is felt worldwide: from the US to India to New Zealand, “small luxuries” are substituting “extravagant purchases.”  Consumerism is an inherent part of the 21st century, and it is quite understandable that people would go for cheaper goods on which to spend their disposable income when the times are tough. As the name suggests, these effect is primarily facilitated by women. And could you blame them for that? In the times of unemployment and the gloomy Russian winter, inexpensive bright lipstick may be the only available kind of retail therapy.

Although I couldn’t find any quantitative research on the lipstick effect in Russia, I would expect it to be even stronger than in other developed countries. First, there is an entire social strata — young, single, well-educated, middle-class women — who gladly spend their money at the make-up counter. Many of them make enough money to have some disposable income left after paying their bills. But it is not enough to buy an apartment or to take out a mortgage: the salaries are still low, and property prices some of the highest in the world (although the property bubble has been bursting recently). There is not much of an investment culture: years of communism and the volatile post-communist market did not exactly help develop one. Saving for retirement is still a foreign concept to many. So these women resort to renting and spending the rest of the money on make-up, hair cuts, pedicures, and salon anticellulite services.

Then, of course, there is the mentality: the “if you’ve got it, flaunt it” attitude is still de rigueur for many. I know plenty of women who would rather buy a mink coat and be on the potatoes-only diet for the next year or two than buy a regular coat and good food . This ostentatious approach causes producers of luxury good all over to swear by the Russian consumers. Those not rich enough to afford haute couture go for the hot finds of the numerous glossy magazines instead: the new mascara brush, the new season nail polish, the new miraculous anti-wrinkle skin cream. Considering the ridiculously low men to women ratio and a common belief that a woman has to a) get married to be successful; b) wear a lot of make up and be always perfectly groomed to catch a man — you get a perfect beauty industry consumer. There are more beauty salons in place in an average Russian provincial town than I have ever seen anywhere. Just a few months ago, everything was overpriced, but women were happy to pay. I remember running out of lipgloss and finding it to be three times as much in Moscow as I paid in NYC. A friend of a friend reportedly used to make a living by taking Russian upper middle-class women to Berlin, where they would stay at nice hotels, eat at fancy restaurants, and shop excessively. With plane tickets and visa costs, they still spent way less than they would have if they bought the same things in Russia.

Now that incomes are down, purse strings are tightened. The sun has set on expensive salon treatments. The beauty parlors, especially the more expensive ones, attract fewer customers, but women are not about to stop getting highlights. A friendly shop assistant reported a drastic increase in the demand for their home hair-dye kits. Likewise, women are not about to stop exfoliating, moisturizing, and de-wrinkling. Some internet forums featured  women admitting abandoning the more expensive foreign skin care lines and resorting to the reasonably-priced Russian and Belorussian ones instead (which is generally deemed “ok to do, if you don’t admit it publicly and still have a compact and lipstick by a fancy brand to use in public”).

I happen to like a certain hair conditioner that is made in Belarus. Every time I go to Russia, I attempt to buy several bottles — it does wonders for my hair, it’s very cheap, and it’s patriotic (Russia and Belarus are supposedly one state, no?). It is very popular, but I usually have no problems locating it. This time around, it was nowhere to be found. Previous L’Oreal and Schwarzkopf customers were now making an extra effort to find something cheaper and at least of the same quality, and that conditioner happened to be their best bet. Remember Chanel’s Black Satin hysteria two years back? This is actually worse: instead of the civilized waiting lists at Bloomingdale’s, women are said to bribe shop assistants to keep these conditioners for them when they next become available.

If I had several million dollars to spare, I would be very happy to invest in buying up a skin care factory — preferably in Belarus, for the workforce is cheaper there — and to hire chemists, package designers and advertising experts, pay for a  celebratory article in some glossy magazine, and promote my products as de luxe — there will be a high earning potential (and workplaces, too). Do you want to know why I think that? Here is a story:

A sales assistant at that make-up store helped me pick a few gifts, and I commented on the limited selection  of the Chanel nail polishes, given that the new line named after Russia just came out. Oh, she was very worried about it, she said. In fact, she wanted it for herself so badly that she had booked train tickets to Moscow to go to the headliner Chanel store, where said nail polished are still available. The dark red version was her favorite, and she was looking forward to finally being able to wear it.

I later found out that a sales assistant in that shop makes around $400 a month. The cheapest return trip to Moscow would cost around $60; that nail polish retails for $38 in the US, and it probably costs more in Russia. It looks like Russian women are still ready to drop a quarter of their salary on the nail polish. Forget Gazprom. With the oil prices plummeting, make-up may be the way to go.

Oh no, I thought. I am hallucinating from the hot Kiev weather and too many meetings with depressed and depressing Ukrainian political scientists.

A Ukrainian friend had another friend visiting from a European country where women in general, save for the Sex and the City fans, don’t fetishize high heels and mini skirts. He is a really nice but somewhat naïve guy who hadn’t traveled outside Europe before. He is really enjoying his stay in Kiev. He doesn’t mind hot weather, lack of air conditioning, or disastrous public transportation. He was warned about the mysterious Russian (in this case Ukrainian) soul and is very open minded. But taking him to a red lights district (if there is one in Kiev, of which I am not sure) is too extreme. What was my friend thinking?

“Where have you seen them?”

“On the metro every morning there are tons of them. Where are they going so early?”

And then it hit me. He seriously thought all the made-up ladies in revealing clothing he saw on the metro at 9am were in the business of selling their bodies. But they were just on the commute to work — which most likely didn’t involve selling their bodies.

The conversation above took place several days ago. Today, another friend told me a very similar story about a Dutch guy who asked the same question. This is just sad. The last few days have been really hot, so light, transparent and short clothing are a necessity.  Most men on the streets, Ukrainian and foreign alike, don’t seem to mind. They probably don’t mind women wearing clothes like that at work.

Call me crazy, conservative, and non-Slavic, but I can’t wear a mini skirt and glittery, strappy sandals to work. Ironically, I spend enough time shopping, matching clothes, and collecting high-heeled shoes for my friends to make fun of me. Most of the time, I tend to be on the overdressed side. But not by Kievan standards. For the past few weeks, I have been feeling quite underdressed.

Being fashionable is not a universal concept. I don’t mean the glossy magazines kind of fashion that originates on the runways of Paris and Milano. I mean the street fashion that is born on said runways, gets processed through Chinese sweatshops and local mentalities and then is dispersed through the stores. That’s the kind of fashion one sees on people on the streets. In the US, it might mean a lot of sweatpants and sneakers, in Hong Kong, lots of bold prints, and in Russia and Ukraine, it inevitably spells high heels and short skirts in any and all weather.

By Ukrainian standards, I am hopelessly old-fashioned. My casual heels are not high enough, my work pants are not tight enough and my skirts are never short enough. My hair is not blond enough and my lipstick is not bright enough. And most importantly, I don’t even own enough golden jewelry — a must for most Slavs — to make an impression.

Without any doubt, there are many Slavic women whose clothing always satisfies the strictest of the Western dress codes.  But the overall sense of fashion is on the fancier side. On the metro tonight, I saw a woman wearing loose, high-waisted, old-fashioned jeans, a very baggy T-shirt, sneakers and a baseball hat. She wore a plain ponytail, no makeup, didn’t carry a purse, and had short unpolished nails. I thought she was a foreigner. Sure enough, she took out her cell phone and began speaking in English with a thick British accent.

Do you want to know how I identified her foreign identity? She stood out too much. It is quite a pervert fest on the underground sometimes. I see young — and not so young — women in skirts so short that their underwear shows when they sit down. There are transparent tops worn with no underwear. There are delicate white pants worn with too much black underwear. There are lacy corsets worn as outerwear. Judging by briefcases, laptop cases, and A4 bags, most women who dress like that are headed to their desk jobs.

Slavic women pride themselves on looking good at all times. I believe it’s a reasonable approach to dressing oneself. However, it still remains a mystery to me why women would wear something really uncomfortable to work. A micro skirt may get attention, but an even slightly longer one would be more comfortable to work in.

A friend recently refused to walk further than a nearby café (we were supposed to go for a walk), because her feet hurt. She said that because of her new shoes, she hadn’t been able to walk further than a metro stop recently. She was not planning to get rid of the shoes, because they were “sooooooooooo fashionable.”

Another friend refused to go for a walk, because she was tired of having to make sure her mini skirts don’t ride up. She didn’t want to get any pants, because “skirts are the only right way to get a guy.” By the way, these two friends successfully attend some of the Ukraine’s most prestigious colleges and come from very good backgrounds.

The July edition of the Ukrainian Elle features an editor-in-chief’s letter that praises Ukrainian women’s ability to stay sexy and all times. According to it, if one is dressed up 24/7, it means you’re always ready for a reception with the President, an art exhibition, or a meeting with a really hot guy (that was a gist of the article; I have a copy if anyone needs it).

Dear Elle: please also write about the importance of dressing appropriately for walks when promising a visiting friend you’ll take her for one. I am tired of going sightseeing by myself.

The spring finally seems to be settling it here in New Haven, and as I was putting away all my winter clothes I came across a pair of winter boots that have made me very confused about men.

I went to Russia for the winter break last year, and brought along all the warmest clothes I had. However, because I had been living in Hong Kong at the time, my “warmest jacket” was actually a very thin blazer. Once I walked out of the airport in Moscow, I realized I had forgotten just how cold Russian winter can get. So I ended up rushing to the mall. Since I got really cold on the way there, I was looking for the warmest shoes and jacket possible. I faced a dilemma: either facing my own death by hypothermia or buying something that involved animals dying. Any shoes or jackets available had fur on them.

I managed to choose a jacket with the smallest amount of fur possible (still, why would anyone to have mink trimming on their pockets?). No such luck with boots: the warmest ones had sheep skin on the inside and lots of fluffy rabbit on the outside. I felt really bad for those rabbits, but I really, really, really wanted to make it through the winter break. So I bought those boots.

The winter was even colder this year. I went to Russia this winter break and made really good use of my warm clothes. I then decided to take some of them to New haven, since the weather forecast was not very promising for a hot weather aficionado like me.

To be honest, I was afraid that in the US some PETA activist would attack me, cut off the fur, and accuse me of crimes against animals. It would have been totally fair, but I did not want to throw the boots away having only gotten to wear them for a month total. I consoled myself with the thought that wasting one’s shoes is environmentally unfriendly anyway. And so my boots had their Yale debut… and Yalies (male ones, at least) turned out to be rather less environmentally conscious than I had thought.

For the first week of the semester, I observed the same intriguing male behavioral pattern. Guys I barely knew came over and announced my boots were “cool.” Then they reached over and tried to “pet” the dead rabbits’ fur. When it happened for the first time, I got scared. Here I was, sitting in a lecture browsing through the syllabus and this guy was trying to touch my shoes! Creepy, and strangely enough, it happened more than once.

My boots were complimented by some of the roughest and most unsentimental of men—those you would never imagine paying attention to anyone’s shoes. This list includes several policemen, coffee shop baristas, dining hall workers, an immigration official at JFK, and my teaching assistant.

Women never seemed to pay any attention to the furry masterpieces of the Italian shoemakers. I heard a couple of “oh your shoes are cute, nice to see you, bye’s” from friends, but that was it. So what was it that made so many (supposedly straight) men pay attention to my footwear? Did it make them feel like they were back in the Stone Age, when men would go off and hunt and their womenfolk would make fur shoes out of bear skins? Were they confused to see something that did not look like the ubiquitous “Uggs?” Did these boots have magic powers? I don’t have an answer.

Glossy magazines tell women they should wear strappy stilettos to attract men. I say, forget that and try furry flat-soled winter boots instead—just go for something synthetic, so the animals will fall for you, too.