HARVESTING IN RUSSIA

It is typical of Russia nowadays - just as it was centuries ago - for villagers (which are undoubtedly the majority of the country's population) to feed themselves more "off the land" than "off the salary". Salaries remain small, in many places they are being either delayed or "paid in product" (i.e. instead of cash you get the equivalent value of products that your plant manufactures), and rural Russians do not have much choice but grow their own fruits and vegetables, poultry and cattle - to feed themselves.

Russians have always been thankful to the soil for all the "gifts of the land" - as they often gratefully call fruits and vegetables - that it is giving them. Harvesting, baskets of ripe fruits, berries, mushrooms and other "gifts of the land" have become a prominent "theme" of traditional nesting doll painting. The doll before you is one of the Russian ways to say "thank you" to the rich Russian soil.