Observations on Russia

When considering the amazing rise to power and riches of Roman Abramovich, Chelsea FC owner and oligarch extraordinaire, many words spring to mind. "Boring" is not one of them. Unless you're Russian, that is. The "billionaire from nowhere" (as a book on Abramovich to be published later this year is titled) arouses nothing but a sort of exhausted disdain from everyone I know in Moscow, in marked contrast to everyone in London, which is fascinated by every minute titbit of his life (about which virtually nothing is really known).

Abramovich has five yachts, one the size of a Channel ferry. He has signed his sons up for Eton. His wife shops exclusively at Harrods. And, as Forbes magazine has announced, Moscow has 33 billionaires (a list on which Abramovich comes only second) to New York's paltry 31. To the British, Russian oligarchs with money to burn could not be more exciting or exotic and every little detail is good dinner-party fodder. In Moscow, however, they have better topics of conversation. Rags-to-riches oil tycoons are far less interesting than the rumour that the David Beckham-Rebecca Loos affair was dreamt up by Rupert Murdoch to increase his newspaper circulation figures (a friend phoned me to ask if this was true).

To the average Russian, the staggering fortunes of the oligarchs are yesterday's news. "Their existence is a fact of life and not intriguing," says Ljuda, a teacher, "People are used to it." Another friend says with a yawn: "People over here are used now to large-scale frauds, business affairs, huge money going past them."

Many Russians simply refer to oligarchs as criminals, tutting that Abramovich should have put his money into some sort of state pension fund rather than offloading it on a foreign football team. The implication is that none of these great fortunes has been accumulated by the most moral behaviour - always a convenient excuse: "We could have had their millions, but we decided not to - we're too honest."

A journalist who works on a Moscow tabloid has a better explanation for oligarch fatigue: good old-fashioned jealousy. "It's not about the money," she sniffs. "It's the fact that he is a part of English society, that everyone over there has been taken in by him. His children are going to get an English education, he is like an Englishman whose home is his castle. Most Russians would rather not think about this. It is not interesting." The British themselves, she thinks, are obsessed with Abramovich only because he has something (Chelsea FC) that rightfully belongs to us and we secretly resent that. Swiftly changing the subject, she then tells me with great excitement that a Russian edition of Hello! magazine has been launched.

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