With Easter only a couple of days away, there’s no better time for Christians to draw closer to God, and a Russian luxury goods company wants to help rich folks do just that with a collection of gold-plated iPhone 7s engraved with religious symbols and prayers, and blessed by an Orthodox bishop.

Caviar Phone has been creating limited edition gold-plated smartphones for a few years, even making international headlines in 2014 for a Putin-themed iPhone aimed at rich Russian patriots. But what really caught my eye was its Caviar Credo collection featuring the same type of gold-plated iPhones but this time engraved with Orthodox symbols like crosses and holy icons, and prayers like “Our Father”. Credo also includes Apple smartwatches with similar decorations.

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A resident of St. Petersburg, Russia, decided to teach his wife a lesson for legally changing her name without his permission, by having her precious car filled with concrete.

In a bizarre video filmed with a mobile phone, the man, whose name has not yet been revealed, can be seen directing a cement truck as it backs up towards his wife’s car and positioning the chute through the window, before ordering the driver to fill it up with concrete. The video quickly went viral online, transcending Russian borders and leaving viewers wondering what on Earth made this guy do a thing like that.

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26-year-old Anna Cherdantseva, from the city of Ufa, in Russia’s Bashkortostan Republic is a full-time sofa tester, spending up to 10 hours every day trying out new sofas for comfort and safety.

Last month, Russian furniture giant MZ5 Group announced that it was taking application for a new position – full-time sofa tester. Although all new products are tested in a specialized laboratory, management decided that in order to better meet the needs of consumers it needed some feedback on real-life use of its sofas. In just a few days, MZ5 received over 5,000 job applications from people eager to spend most of their time sitting and lying on sofas.

“We were selected candidates in several stages,” MZ5 Group spokesperson Anastasia Russkih said. “Initially we checked their CVS, and then we let them tell us why they wanted the job.” Eventually, the furniture company shortlisted just 7 candidates, out of which Anna Cherdantseva, a 26-year-old marketing expert, proved to be the most suitable for the job.

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For the last 8 year, about 200 residents of Strunino, a small town in Russia’s Vladimir Oblast region have not had to worry about buying bread, thanks to the generosity of a local grocery store owner who has been giving it away for free.

Mamoud Shavershyan came to Russia, from Armenia, 25 years ago. He worked as an engineer, before setting up his own business, a small grocery store no different than other such stores in Strunino. But everything changed one day, 8 years ago when, sitting behind the counter, Mamoud saw an old lady counting dozens of coins to pay for a couple of loaves of bread. He found it humiliating for the pensioner and ended up giving her the bread for free. That day, he made the decision to print coupons that pensioners in Strunino could exchange for white or black bread at his store. To make sure that people knew about his offer he advertised it a local paper.

But that was only the beginning. Soon, Mamoud extended his generous offer to people with disabilities, large families with low income, and the generally poor. News spread like wildfire, and soon poor people from neighboring villages started coming by his shop to receive coupons. Today, the “Eric” grocery store in Strunino gives away around 2,000 loaves of white bread and 1,000 loaves of black bread, every month. They also regularly donate gingerbread to local kindergartens, and to coupon holders during holidays. And for their kindness, Mamoud and his family are “rewarded” with insults, racial slurs and accusations of theft…

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Game2:Winter is an upcoming reality TV show where 30 participants will compete against themselves and the dangers of the Siberian wilderness – including brown bears and extreme temperatures – for a prize of $1.7 million. But the most shocking thing about this show is that, just like in the Hunger Games, “everything is allowed, fighting, alcohol, murder, rape, smoking, anything.”

News about this seemingly brutal reality show first broke out about a month ago, but reports were coming mostly from obscure news outlets and the whole idea seemed so extreme that I was pretty sure it was nothing more than a prank. Then I read that contestants had to survive until April 1st, 2018 – April Fools’ Day – and I was convinced it was fake. But the news never really went away, and now the Siberian Times newspaper announced that this Russian real-life version of the Hunger Games is actually happening, and it promises to be just as ruthless.

Ever since watching the hit TV series ‘Lost’, 35-year-old Yevgeny Pyatkovsky, a millionaire from Novosibirsk, Russia, had been wanting to create a reality show about surviving in the Siberian taiga, with little, to no help from the outside world. Now, thanks to technological advancements in surveillance equipment and online streaming, he is ready to make his idea a reality.

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With Women’s Day just around the corner, social networks like Instagram and VKontakte have become flooded with ads from Russian entrepreneurs offering women in Moscow the chance to rent impressive 101-rose bouquets and designer shopping bags for 10-minute photo shoots.

If your boyfriend is cheap, but you want to spark the envy of all your girlfriends without actually breaking the bank, or if you just want to make your boyfriend jealous, and you live in Moscow, Russia, there are a number of online services that you can use to have a gorgeous bouquet and an expensive-looking gift delivered at your doorstep for a 10-minute photo session. You can then post the pics online on March 8 and watch everyone go green with envy.

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The machine-dominated world envisioned by James Cameron in “Terminator” once seemed like pure science fiction, but now, not so much. Just a few days ago, a Russian programmer from Perm unveiled his 3D-printed version of the T-800 robot featured in Cameron’s famous blockbuster, and while it can currently only move its head, it is equipped with a “brain” that allows it to speak and even answer various questions, by looking up the answers on the internet.

Perm-based programmer Alexander Osipovich knew he wanted to one day build his own Terminator robot as a child, after watching the 1984 movie featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger. In 2009, while studying programming at university, Osipovich started working on a program that would one day act as the brain of his real-life T-800 machine. Over the next two years, he developed multiple versions of it in Visual Basic, and in 2011 he decided that technology had come far enough to allow him to fulfill his childhood dream.

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Alexander Batyokhtin, a 41-year-old man from the Siberian village of Sosnovka, spent six weeks shaping around 12 cubic meters of fresh snow into a three-meter high church, where his fellow villagers can now to say a prayer and light a candle.

There is no real church in Sosnovka, or in any of the nearby villages, for that matter, and people who want to visit a place of worship have to drive for tens of kilometers to the city of Omsk. This is often an impossible task for the sick and the elderly, and it was this unfortunate situation that inspired Alexander to use the most abundant resource in his village to build a temporary church. He had worked in construction for years, and even though he was forced to retire after being diagnosed with a serious illness, the man was determined to offer Sosnovka a place to celebrate Christmas and Epiphany in properly.

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A young tattoo artist in Yekaterinburg, Russia, has been getting a lot of criticism on social media after a video of him inking his pet Sphynx cat recently went viral. To make matters worse, the owner admitted that this was not the animal’s first tattoo, and probably not the last.

The owner of the hairless cat admits that he is basically forcing the animal to share his passion for tattoos. “Of course, I feel sorry for tattooing her, because it’s not something she wants,” he says in the video. But apparently the temptation to turn the Sphynx into a walking, meowing work of art is too great. Bes already sports a large tattoo on her back, featuring a woman, a deck of cards, a prison tower and a cigarette, and in this video her owner adds a star as well.

The Yekaterinburg artist said that tattoos are a bit harder to do because the cat’s skin is a bit different than a human’s, but added that he doesn’t believe the procedure is harmful for the cat. “This isn’t her first tattoo,” he says. “She just goes under and doesn’t feel a thing. She always wakes up fine from the anesthesia and behave normally after that.”

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For years, Ussuri Bay, on Russia’s Pacific shoreline, was a dumping ground for glass bottles and waste from a nearby porcelain factory. But nature found a way to turn lemons into lemonade, and today, all those unwanted materials have been shaped into a colorful glass beach.

The story goes that many years ago, truckloads of glass and porcelain were dumped in Ussuri Bay, but instead of what should have been a landfill for unwanted waste, Steklyashka beach is actually one of the most stunning tourist attractions in the world. Years of erosion have rounded and polished the pieces of glass and porcelain into beautiful pebbles of various colors and have turned this place into a wonderland reminiscent of California’s Glass Beach.

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A young woman from Moscow, Russia, has come up with an innovative way to supplement her income – charging single men a hefty fee for laying in their bed for an hour to warm it and fill it with her positive energy, thus guaranteeing a good night’s sleep.

21-year-old Viktoria Ivachyova is a human be warmer for hire, charging a whopping 4,900 Russian rubles ($82) per night, or 102 700 ($1700) per month to lay down on strangers’ beds and make sure it’s nice and warm when they turn in for the night. Believe it or not, she has already had 10 customers, and with the amount of free publicity she’s getting these days in national media, the unusual service is bound to become more popular. In fact, Viktoria is already planning on putting together a team of female bed warmers to keep up with demand.

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After failing to deliver on the contract he had signed with Russian online gift store Pich Shop, a 21-year-old entrepreneur agreed to be auctioned off to the highest bidder and marry a complete stranger for at least one year, in order to avoid being sued.

A week ago, a strange listing showed up on PichShop.ru – a young man named Aleksandr Kramarenko available for marriage, with a 1 year warranty. The “product” was listed as “in stock” and featured a detailed description – including age, height, weight, zodiac sign and interests – and photos (both dressed and topless). The listing mentioned that Aleksandr was going to be auctioned off to be married to the highest bidder, and invited women no older than 35 to bid for the chance to become his wife for at least one year. The minimum bid was set at 10,000 rubles.

This all sounds a bit too corny to be true, and, to be fair, such pranks are not exactly uncommon around the holidays. Some of them are actually pretty elaborate and end up attracting a lot of media attention, which translates into free publicity for companies, but this particular story seems legit.

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The MEGA shopping center in Krasnoyarsk has become the first in Russia, and probably the world, to have its very own church, where busy shoppers can drop by and pray, take confession or simply get in touch with their spiritual side.

It all started in spring of this year, when the shopping center management reached out to Archpriest Georgy Kozgov, asking for “the spiritual nourishment of security guards and visitors.” To make his job easier, they even offered him a room within the shopping center where he would regularly perform Confession and Communion, or have spiritual conversations with guards and shoppers. But as more and more people learned about the Father Kozgov and asked to see him, it soon became clear that the small room he had been operating out of was just too small for the huge demand of spiritual guidance.

Vladimir Skvortsov, manager of the security guard firm under contract with the MEGA shopping center was the one who approached management about offering Archpriest Kozgov a bigger space where he could conduct even more religious services and cater to more people. And that’s how the unusual shopping center church of Krasnoyarsk was born. It is located on the fourth floor of the MEGA center and is equipped with just about anything a Christian Orthodox church needs, including a sanctuary, hand-painted icons, wooden benches for visitors, as well as church tools made by prison inmates.

“There are no churches in this area of the city, and in our team, as everywhere else, there are people in need of spiritual guidance,” said Vladimir Skvortsov, manager of the center’s security guard firm.

“There are many people in need of spiritual guidance. After all, where there is trade, there is always a lot of negativity,” Father Kozgov added. “And now there is a place where everyone can be cleansed spiritually.Everyone who has come to my church has been very pleased.”

Divine Liturgy is performed at the church every Saturday morning, if you happen to be in the area, and feel like taking a spiritual break from weekend shopping.

Sources: Varlamov, Primechanyia

A regional Russian official was recently expelled from the ruling United Russia political party for recording a bizarre workout video at the workplace – a creepy funeral parlor – and posting it on her Instagram account. You can say that she gives the phrase ‘dying to lose weight’ a whole new meaning.

Anastasia Myakina was head of United Russia’s faction in the Shelekhovo District Assembly in the Irkutsk Region, as well as the manager of a state-owned local funeral parlor. Until recently, she was considered a successful business woman in her home town, but then she made the grave mistake (pun intended) of recording a short workout video at the workplace. In the bizarre footage, which has gone viral online, she can be seen smiling as she squats in front of the camera, with tombstones, funeral caskets and wooden crosses in the background.

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Russian authorities in the city of St. Petersburg recently came under fire after it was discovered that they had used digital editing software like Adobe Photoshop to fake the cleanup of a local lamp post.

Last week, a resident of St. Petersburg submitted a request on the local government official website asking that a lamp post covered with obscene advertising stickers be cleaned. This Tuesday, an employ of the St. Petersburg administration responded to the complaint, letting the person know that the job had been done, even posting a photo of the cleaned up lamp post as proof. It had apparently been scrubbed of advertising materials, but after taking a closer look, a number of users noticed that the infrastructure element depicted in the photo didn’t look quite right.

Zooming into the picture, it was revealed that the lamp post in question had been given the “spray can” treatment to create a two-tone speckled grey effect over the stickers. And as if the shoddy digital cleanup wasn’t obvious enough, someone even noticed a bizarre “blob” of white digital spray paint suspended in mid air by the right of the infrastructure element.

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