Sochi 2014′s health obsession creates a ‘Drylympics’

Russia has been taking its Olympic healthy streak well beyond what the [Olympic] charter requires [which includes proscribing alcohol sales inside the venues]. Not only is there no beer sold at Sochi’s Olympic venues, there are no fried foods, no hot dogs (Russians love hot dogs!) and no potato chips. The snack stands were selling brioche at the stadium last night along with cucumber and turkey sandwiches. That was about it.

For anyone who has spent any time living in Russia, this feels like an aberration. The Russian word for an appetizer — zakuska — means chaser, because you are meant to consume it with vodka. A typical Russian “salad” consists mostly of mayonnaise, of which there is no low-fat variety sold. Other classic dishes tend to be doubly fried, then covered in cheese and more mayonnaise and, for that little bit of freshness, hit with a fistful of dill. Apart from a few insanely expensive shops and restaurants in Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia does not do organic.

Worst of all, most of the male population smokes, which helps explain why the average lifespan for a Russian man is 64 years, roughly the same as in Madagascar. But Sochi is trying to be different, at least during the Olympic Games. At the door of the brand-new train station in Adler, the town in greater Sochi where most of the Olympic stadiums have been built, a gentle voice comes over an intercom to tell the travelers approaching the metal detectors, “Sochi is a smoke-free city. Please refrain from smoking in public places and all Olympic venues.” In Moscow, you can smoke by the bathrooms of the Bolshoi Theater, not to mention in restaurants and bars. But in Sochi’s Olympic Village, smoking inside is prohibited, and a pack of cigarettes is far more difficult to find than a pair of stray dogs.

Roustam Tariko, the billionaire liquor magnate who owns Russian Standard vodka, sums up the sense of this nicely: “The Games are all about health.” Last year, his company sold 26 million cases of booze, he told me. But at an Olympic opening party last week, his promotional booth was confined to a back room, behind two layers of security, and well out of sight. He might have liked to be a sponsor of the Games, he said by the bar, swaying a little with the music and a vodka caipirinha. “But we have to keep a low profile here.” (Time)