Russian men tend towards Western women

Russian women are often considered some of the most beautiful in the world, yet it seems more and more men in the country are looking elsewhere for love, using dating agencies with international clients.

Happy and excited, Christine and Artur Tumanov are taking their first steps into married life. International marriages like theirs no longer raise eyebrows. In fact, they are on the increase.

It is not uncommon for Russian woman to attract a Western partner, but now it’s the Russian men who are turning the tables, with more and more of them signing up to dating agencies.

“Men who come to us looking to find a Western partner want to marry a beautiful, young, successful woman, who is willing to travel, and free of the Russian mentality of fatalism,” says Irina Lebedeva from “Tet-a-Tet” dating agency. “These women are more independent, they like to go out, they are more free spirited, less pretentious. They are more likely to be willing to live together, as opposed to getting married.”

However, with Russian women outnumbering Russian men by almost ten million, some of them aren’t happy with the increasing trend.

When asked on the streets about the matter, one Russian girl noted, “Of course, I am upset. We have very many good women and girls, who are lonely and looking for a young man, or husband. They are clever, good-looking, they want a family. But here we are actually short of men and, naturally, we don’t want them to go.”

Easier international travel and the recent financial crisis may have contributed to more men looking for wives abroad, but for Christine and Artur it comes down just to love.

“When you fall in love with someone you can’t prefer where they live. So when I met him and I fell in love, I wasn’t just going to forget about him because he lives in a different country,” Christine Tumanova says.