Russian culture question

[tricours.livejournal.com]

One thing that I've remarked several times when reading the blogs of Scandinavians or other westeners who've spent some time in Russia, is that they comment on how Russians don't smile. I've read lots of "I went home for the holidays and once again I was met with a smile when I went to the store to shop" etc. etc. Also one girl commented that some railroad personnel at a station where trains come in from Finland greeted her with a smile because "that's what they know westerners expect as good service". Do clerks and shop personnel in Russia not smile? As a clerk in Sweden or Norway it's practically written in your contract that "YOU SHOULD ALWAYS SMILE AT CUSTOMERS" ;)

At the same time, I met this Russian travel agent who's lived in the Caribbeans for the last 10 years and who thought service in Norway was completely awful. But perhaps he was comparing it to that of the Caribbeans, and not to the Russian one?

Comments

[alamar.livejournal.com]

Yeah. In Russia, smiling is linked to fun. That's why when people smile on you, you feel something is funny-wrong with you :)

I can't say I smile, by default, when I meet my friends.
I think that's just a cultural preference.

With service, frankly, I want clerks to be as invisible and also as natural as they can be. I don't want them to simulate certain feelings. And 'natural' in Russia doesn't involve smiles.

[vakhitov.livejournal.com]

I must confess. When I deal with salesmen, officials etc., I prefer a simulated smile to a honest aggression. In fact, I often smile first.

[alamar.livejournal.com]

Surely, aggression is bad and I would prefer made up smiles.

But: Them simply doing their work without any emotions involved is even better.

[vakhitov.livejournal.com]

Well, then I would prefer a simulated smile to no apparent emotions. After all, they're not my friends or relatives.

[alamar.livejournal.com]

I prefer my friends to have emotions about me, not clerks :)

[vakhitov.livejournal.com]

I must have not expressed myself very clearly. By "apparent emotions", I meant, uhm, the actual face expression of the clerk. I don't generally care about his or her real emotions (though I might in some specific cases.)

The difference is, I want sincere emotion expression emotions from my friends and relatives. And I prefer smiling in business situations, whatever the real emotional state is. If I see that the smile is not sincere in the latter, I register this fact, but it doesn't bother me the slightest. The smile works on a somewhat lower level. Call it biological.

[alamar.livejournal.com]

Doesn't work for me.

[vakhitov.livejournal.com]

Doesn't work for me

People are different, indeed :-) Anyway, this shows that not all Russians treat smiling the way that the author has described.