Today business is good. Timur draws many repeat customers and can afford splashy advertisements on the sides of buses in Harbin. But it wasn't always easy. Chinese and Russian palates are very distinct, and at first the restaurant struggled.
There were many sources of early confusion. "Some of our first patrons, after dinner they would ask for 'Russian girls", she recalls. "I would explain, 'No, we don't have girls here'."
Now she can laugh about it. "Today everyone in Harbin knows we are a classy restaurant."
Food aside, she discovered that both Russian and Chinese patrons enjoy live music and dance performances, the more extravagant the better.
"Many came for entertainment, or just for something 'exotic,' but discovered they liked some dishes," she says.
Esmanovich stands to attention when loud orchestral music booms over the stereo, and in waltzes the happy couple.
The bride's auburn hair is pulled back in an elegant tight bun; a white veil brushes her shoulders. The groom smiles brightly, attentively. The guests assemble around the long table. They holler especially loudly as the couple begins to kiss.
After dinner, the show starts. Two Russian dancers and a singer, draped in sequins and lace, alight on a raised stage.
They kick and cavort through traditional high-stepping Russian folk dancing, sultry ballads and Madonna cover tunes.
The common refrain is the audience's raucous cheering.
A majority of today's Harbin Russians are from the poorer eastern half of the country. Some, such as Esmanovich, have lived in southern Chinese cities (she spent two years in Shanghai), but new business opportunities lured them north.
Denis Pedyash is a PhD candidate in economics at the Harbin Institute of Technology. A native of Vladivostok, he has lived in three other Chinese cities.
"For me, Harbin is the most beautiful," he says, describing the colors of sunset over St. Sophia Cathedral, the green domes outlined against a pale pink sky. "My heart is at home here." Also, he adds, "I like winter."
Usually Russian wedding celebrations last late into the night. But tonight's revelers are tired from traveling, and the banquet begins to wind down before midnight.
Outside a wind stirs, lifting red rose petals and rice grains sprinkled earlier by guests to carry them through the streets of Harbin.
(China Daily August 4, 2008)
