A cup of hot water in Russia - literally, or poor translation

I think the Trans-Siberian railway carriages also had hot water available. Don't know if it's still the case.

I think the Trans-Siberian railway carriages also had hot water available. Don't know if it's still the case.

Yes, all Russian sleeper cars still have a water boiler. Given the Russian fondness for tea, it is unthinkable that this will ever change.

Given the Russian fondness for tea, it is unthinkable that this will ever change.

It isn't unthinkable to me that a day will arrive in Russia when a train catching fire causing numerous deaths, because of a malfunctioning boiler, would actually result in their removal regardless of the Russian fondness for tea. After all, we saw only recently in China that the authorities reacted to crashes of their new high speed trains.

Sorry, I don't buy it.

a) Russians aren't Chinese. In your accident scenario, Russians would either shrug their shoulders sadly and say "вот такая судьба" (such is fate / that's the way it goes) or the government would start rumors of foreign sabotage (as they did recently when a prototype of a new Russian commercial aircraft crashed in Indonesia) or both. In any event, the boilers would remain.

b) Even if the massive old coal-fired boilers gradually disappear as old rail cars (in some distant future) are retired, Russians will still unequivocally demand their hot water on long rail journeys. They're fatalists, but not pushovers in the matter of beverage availability. (Ask M. Gorbachev about the success of his anti-alcohol campaign.)

re#16: There's also chifir/чифир, a very highly concentrated tea drunk straight to achieve a massive caffeine-high, on beyond No-Doze or Red Bull.

Chinese airports have hot water dispensers all over the concourses, by the way. It's hard to find cold water.

#22

train catching fire causing numerous deaths, because of a malfunctioning boiler

Only sleeper cars have boilers. These trains do not travel fast, so there is no danger of a derailment or crash due to a boiler fire.
Furthermore, water is heated by electricity, not gas, so there is noting to explode.

Russians would either shrug their shoulders sadly and say "вот такая судьба" ... Russians will still unequivocally demand their hot water on long rail journeys. They're fatalists, but not pushovers in the matter of beverage availability.

I think there's a chance Russians will change one day. That's why, as you perspicaciously pointed out on another thread, never say never. I was astonished to learn just the other day that Italian visitors to England 400 years ago used to remark what over-emotional romantics the English were, and how every greeting and goodbye between the sexes was marked with a lot of kissing, even when you hardly knew them. Apparently we didn't really gain our stiff-upper-lip grin-and-bear-it don't-kiss-and-hug-standoffishness characteristics until the period from around about the time of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, reaching its apogee in the first world war.

Furthermore, water is heated by electricity, not gas, so there is noting to explode.

Malfunctioning electric water heaters have a long history of causing fires.

And one day the sun will explode. And, rather sooner than that, humanity will be wiped from the face of the Earth, likely by a catastrophe of its own device.

However, I do not expect to live to see the day. Nor will I live to see the day when hot water isn't freely available on Russian trains. Suggesting otherwise seems--forgive me--extremely silly. It'd be like Brits agreeing to ban bathtubs because there's a one in a million chance of slipping in one and dying.

Nevertheless, bathtubs are disappearing from British homes. When people would rather have two ensuite showers than one big bathroom, bans are not necessary.

iviehoff, I fear you've been watching Ian Hislop.