In the baltics people don’t trust banks and banks don’t trust customers

Financial Times published today that Lithuania faces a sharp contraction of economic growth next year, but is determined not to follow the example of Hungary and Latvia and turn to international institutions for emergency help. As Lithuania's incoming prime minister said on Thursday, "The economic and financial situation in the three Baltic states is becoming really quite difficult. Kubilius predicts a 1.5 per cent drop in Lithuania's gross domestic product next year. His government would aim for a budget deficit next year of about 0.6 or 0.7 per cent of gross domestic product.

The global credit crisis is forcing a rapid economic slowdown in the ex-communist states of central and eastern Europe, particularly in countries dependent on international financial flows, says the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

The worst performance is expected in the Baltic states, with recession in Estonia and Latvia next year. Bank clients and policymakers remain nervous. "People don't trust banks and banks don't trust customers," said Mr Spredzis, manager of Skandi Auto (which operates four showrooms selling Mitsubishi, Hyundai and Bentley models) to FT. Andrius Kubilius, the Lithuanian premier-elect, said this week that he was "sitting on a ticking time-bomb". In Estonia layoffs have hit white-collars as well, when there was slightly more than 2,500 unemployed in this category a year ago, then today the number has nearly doubled, ERR News reports. Nearly fifth of 25,000 unemployed are highly educated, wrote Marge Tubalkain-Trell in BalticBusinessNews.

Central Europe and the Baltic states as a whole are predicted to see growth almost halve from 4.3 per cent in 2008 to 2.2 per cent. In south-east Europe the forecast fall is even greater, from 6.5 per cent to 3.1 per cent. In Poland, the second biggest economy after Russia, the EBRD predicts a decline from 5.3 per cent to 2.8 per cent.

Российских женщин (Russian women)

Today I read that Russian women are completely different from Western or American women. 

This is due to the environment they live in, what they see from a young age, and what they are taught by their families. They have a completely different set of values and things that are important to them. What they value and hold high in importance, they will most likely never compromise. Here are some ways in which Russian women differ from most women.They don't care about age. As explained above, Russian women would much rather be with a well established and kind older man than a young man who is quick to get angry or lose his temper and who is not financially secure. Age is simply not as important as the quality of the relationship.

I think this is too much a simplification. And really sounds a bit stupid to me, even if it can be true in some cases.

And what about the image above?

Anyway, according to the latest data, in Russia there are only 88 males for 100 females (87 in Ukraine, 88 in Belarus, 92 in Kazakhstan, 92 in Moldova) - Pocket World in Figures: 2004 edition, The Economist, 2003.

So, less men. Still, russian women say that there are some very good ones. The problem is Russian family model. Sexism is a natural part of it, writes Elena Petrova - the creator of Russian Brides Cyber Guide.

In capitals (Moscow and St. Petersburg) the situation is better, they are more westernized, but in regions it's still very chauvinistic. If you are a single woman, you're worth nothing. Any man can offend you. You must have a strong boyfriend (or lover - even if he is married) to protect you. So a woman is not considered as somebody respectable unless she is married, and even then, she will be considered in regard at to who is her husband. A widow / ex-wife of a person with high social status (who can be a high-level criminal as well) is still considered according to his social status and gains respect according to it. Even being married to a guy who has many lovers a woman gains higher respect that if she were single.

If it was not clear: 

This leads to the situation when single men have a choice of available women, and worthy men quickly get spoilt. You probably will not believe me but in Russia it's women that are cherishing men, and not the other way around.

She thinks that society considers women looking for a husband abroad as looking for a better life and money - "selling themselves for money"; in some extent it can be viewed like this, but mostly Russian women's search abroad is the result of absence of suitable men in Russia.

So lets think twice next time.

Autumn in Sapiega hospital, Vilnius

Autumn in Sapiega hospital, Vilnius, originalmente cargada por karinga.

and Vilnius can be yelow too

(Thanks Inga, always on time)

Not so rich. But still oligarchs.

The Guadian published an article titled Twilight of the oligarchs. Communism's collapse made Ambramovic and others multi-billionaires, but now Russian capitalism is in trouble. Can their colossal fortunes survive the downturn, or is this the end of an era?

Something strange is happening in Russia — the country that invented the word oligarch back in the 1990s to define a new kind of state-connected entrepreneur. In the new post-credit-crisis world everyone can concur on one thing — that Russia's oligarchs are in trouble.

Over the past five months, according to the financial news agency Bloomb erg, Russia's wealthiest 25 individuals have collectively lost $230bn (£146bn). Tycoons like Oleg Deripaska — Russia's richest man and friend, we now know, of British politicians — have seen their fortunes vaporised. On paper, Roman Abramovich, the Chelsea FC owner, has suffered a $20.3bn wipeout. Alisher Usmanov, the Arsenal shareholder-tycoon has lost $11.7bn, Bloomberg estimates.

Analysts say that private jets could soon be going for bargain basement prices, while some super-rich are scrambling to sell off their villas in Sardinia and Surrey. In Moscow, elite nightclubs have relaxed their strict entry rules — there aren't enough customers. The capital's top restaurants, meanwhile, have stopped accepting credit cards.

Not that Russia's oligarchs are in the mood for entertaining. Since hosting Peter Mandelson and George Osborne on his yacht in Corfu this August, Deripaska has slithered into a classic Westminster political scandal. The aluminium magnate's British-related woes do not stop there: a former business partner, Michael Cherney, is suing him for $4bn in the high court. Rumours suggest he's even been forced to lay off his servants. A spokesman said Deripaska does not comment on private matters.

Is, then, the era of the oligarch now over?

For a few, then, Russia's wild capitalist party isn't quite over yet. "I'm not worried about it. I have my husband to worry about that," said Tatyana Nekrasova, 24, her blond hair tied into a neat bun, as she emerged from Gucci clutching an 11,000-rouble shirt. She admitted, however: "I have a lot of friends who have investments. They've lost them. They're in a state of shock."

Paradoxically, Russia's often-surreal ride from communism to capitalism appears to be going full circle. Under Boris Yeltsin a small, favoured group of businessmen was allowed to acquire the country's newly privatised assets at auctions for a fraction of their real value. Last week Putin offered a $50bn state loan to Deripaska, and other cash-strapped oligarchs, struggling to pay back debts to the west. In effect, the Kremlin is poised to renationalise many of Russia's strategic industries.

Nobody is in any doubt as to what befalls oligarchs who disobey the Kremlin. In 2003 Putin arrested Russia's then richest man, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and broke up his Yukos oil empire. Khodorkovsky was convicted of tax evasion; his real crime was to seek to influence politics and to challenge the president. The former tycoon is serving eight years in a Siberian jail and was recently placed in solitary for not sewing properly.

New accounts about South Ossetia

Newly available accounts by independent military observers of the beginning of the war between Georgia and Russia this summer call into question the longstanding Georgian assertion that it was acting defensively against separatist and Russian aggression, writes C. J. Chivers and Ellen Barry in the Herald Tribune.
The accounts are neither fully conclusive nor broad enough to settle the many lingering disputes over blame in a war that hardened relations between the Kremlin and the West. But they raise questions about the accuracy and honesty of Georgia's insistence that its shelling of Tskhinvali, the capital of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, was a precise operation. Georgia has variously defended the shelling as necessary to stop heavy Ossetian shelling of Georgian villages, bring order to the region or counter a Russian invasion.

Yes they can

Democrat Barack Obama has defeated Republican John McCain to make history as the first black to be elected U.S. president.

The next president will inherit horrendous economic problems that will limit the scope of his ambitions. Obama, in his final rallies, was already tempering his early promise of change with warnings about how he would have to curb some of his more ambitious plans, trying to lower expectations that he would be able to move quickly on healthcare and education reform, The Guardian says.

Is Russia celebrating? Georgia’s President Mikheil Saakashvili said the victory of either Barack Obama or John McCain would satisfy him, Interfax reported.

But The friendship of John McCain and Mikheil Saakashvili is no news. Two policymakers even water-skied in 2006.

Who did the Kremlin favor to be the next U.S. President? Was it John McCain, the hard-nosed hawk who grew to maturity during the Cold War? Or was it Hillary Clinton - the militarily well-studied Senator from New York? Nope - it seems that, according to this op-ed article from Russia’s Kommersant newpaper, Barack Obama was the best bet for Russia - although only marginally so. Konstantin Kosachev who is chairman of the Duma’s Foreign Affairs Committee, writes, ‘Barack Obama looks like the candidate that can be expected to take the greatest strides toward Russia, since unlike McCain, he’s not infected with any Cold War phobias, and unlike Clinton, he won’t be tied down by the old habits of his advisors’, wrote Konstantin Kosachev in The Kommersant before the election.

Wliliam Kern thinks that For Russia, Obama’s the Best of a Bad Lot

But McCain has long criticized Russia, particularly for what he sees as its backsliding on democratic reforms and human rights. "For many years, I have warned against Russian actions that undermine the sovereignty of its neighbors," he said. "Unfortunately, we have seen in recent days Russia demonstrate that these concerns were well-founded."

Worst day in the life of a geek: no internet connection

Can you be proud to be a geek? Is it cool to be a freak? Enjuto Mojamuto is a low cost cartoon and one of the stars of Muchachada Nui, a humor program made for/by people in his 30`s. Enjuto can be translated like "dry" or "without muscles". He has not many friens and spends 100% of his free time in front of computer. When internet is not working he feels anxiety and fear. He is really freak but... is so easy to understand him!