Russian Middle-Aged Women - "Zhenshchiny" - How Are They?

Middle aged women are very different in Russia. Some of them are very intellegent and well educated and have a nice life and a strong family, some are very miserable and poor.

During the period of big changes in Russia in the 90s, people had to adapt to a new way of life. The generation that was born in the 50s or 60s faced the biggest challenge perhaps. There was one kind of life before and suddenly they had to change... it was like having two completely different lives.

Middle aged women don't seem as provoking as the young women are, even though they also wear outstanding clothes, transparent tops, short dresses. There is a contrast between the women who follow the latest western fashion and the ones still wearing clothes as in the eighties.

For example, the ladies working in Sheremetyevo international airport in Moscow, wearing khaki uniforms are particularly funny as they didn't change them since Soviet times.

Most of middle class women live in Soviet flats in the cities with their family, and sometimes with their parents or parents in law. They don't travel often, except for going to their family datcha, or little wooden country house (if they have one). They spend time there in the Summer, close to nature, growing vegetables, making hand crafts, swimming, looking after their children.

Many Russian middle aged women go camping with their families, they're used to conditions not as comfortable as in the West.

Russian women working in cities can be very stressed and shouting for nothing. Some women still have the 'Soviet style of working' e.g. they don't care about being polite, or about selling more or less, because anyway they get paid the same.

It changes slowly and workers are trained to do services in a more kind way. But still if you ever phone for train times for example, you're likely to have the phone hooked on your ear before you had a chance to ask your second request.

In villages the ambience being generaly much more calm, the temperament of ladies is calmer too.