As if adapting to the new customs, traditions, food and language were not enough, your Russian wife will have to adapt to your friends. You may not think of it as a big deal, since your buddies are probably great and you can’t even come up with a single thing which your new Russian wife may not like. However, speaking from my own and from my Russian female friends’ experience, I can assure you that adapting to your friends may be quite challenging, as well as it might be challenging for your friends to get used to your Russian wife.
As if adapting to the new customs, traditions, food and language were not enough, your Russian wife will have to adapt to your friends. You may not think of it as a big deal, since your buddies are probably great and you can’t even come up with a single thing which your new Russian wife may not like. However, speaking from my own and from my Russian female friends’ experience, I can assure you that adapting to your friends may be quite challenging, as well as it might be challenging for your friends to get used to your Russian wife.
It is very possible that some of your friends will not be thrilled with an idea that you found yourself a so-called mail-order bride (at first anyway). Some of them probably heard horrible stores of Russian marriage scams or not any less horrible stories of Russian women who marry Americans just to get out of the country. Unless they were seriously considering finding a Russian wife, most likely they never did all the research on Russian women and Russian culture, so they don’t know what the real reasons for Russian women marrying foreigners are.
You can either tell your friends to mind their own business, or to educate them a little on Russian culture and the mentality of Russian women. Give them links to Russian-American websites and blogs and assure them that not every Russian woman who posts her profile online is a scammer.
During the cold war, both American and Soviet governments did a lot of damage to destroy each other’s reputation, so it is not surprising that many people still think that Russia is very poor and very cold and that all women can’t wait to get the heck out of there.
It is up to you whether to justify your choice to marry a Russian woman to your friends, but for the sake of your Russian wife, I suggest you educate your friends a bit.
Her first year of living in the U.S. will be hard. The last thing she will need is for your friends to question her motives or to ask her how much vodka she can drink in one sitting.
For me, getting used to my husband’s friends was one of the biggest challenges during our first year of marriage. Since they were his friends who he loved, he didn’t even think that I may feel uncomfortable among them.
His friends, even though most of them were educated people, were saying things such as “I know Russia is very cold” and some of them expressed disbelief when I said that central and Southern Russia are not that cold at all and the climate where I was from is very similar to the climate in the U.S.
Some friends were making innocent in their own eyes, but hurtful for me, jokes about “commies”. Now when I am confident and comfortable with all these people, I would probably just laugh at the jokes or make such jokes myself, but back then I was very sensitive and every joke or vodka comment for some reason felt like a personal attack.
I strongly recommend you instruct your friends not to ask questions about Siberia, vodka, or bears and not make any politically incorrect comments. Russians for the most part are very patriotic and hearing jokes or ignorant comments about their country while being away from their country is a painful experience for many. At least in the beginning.
If you educated yourself on how to help your Russian wife to adapt to life in the United States, you know that you should pay attention to your English, try not to use slang and speak clearly. Your friends may not think of it when talking to your wife, so when you get together with them, make sure you translate (from slang to clear, proper English) for her if she doesn’t get something.
Again, speaking from my and my friends’ experience, things will get better, usually after a year or so and your Russian wife may like your friends and get their jokes as well as you do. Don’t take it personally if she doesn’t crave spending time with your friends in the beginning and if she is uptight with them. She will eventually warm up. And those of your friends who had issues with you marrying a Russian woman and were questioning your sanity, will warm up as well and possibly not only stop questioning your choice, but even want to find a Russian wife for themselves.
