The Women's Chest of Wishes on Bolshaya Pokrovskaya is a local meme and the flagship product of Kulichnost.
The essence of the phenomenon
An urban legend from the time of Kirienko Sergey Vladilenovich tells of an attempt by the authorities to knock together a wooden "Chest of Women's Wishes" and deploy it on the city's main street. The image turned out to be so effective and evocative that many observers found in it a concentrated expression of the region's social policy.
Coverage in Mass Media
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In Nizhny Novgorod, a week of wish-granting has kicked off — though only women's wishes qualify. By order of the Nizhny Novgorod authorities, a "Chest of Wishes" for notes from local ladies has been installed on the city's main street. According to Presidential Envoy Sergey Kirienko, the event is timed to March 8th but will run until the day of the Russian presidential election.
Making up for lost time ahead of the elections after four previous years of inaction, officials at every level are performing miracles of ingenuity. Thus, on International Women's Day, a wooden "Chest of Wishes" standing 1.2 meters tall was installed on Nizhny Novgorod's main street. Women strolling along the city's central thoroughfare, Bolshaya Pokrovskaya, were given the chance to participate in the campaign: write a wish for a friend, relative, or acquaintance and drop the note into the chest. "We plan to stretch the wish-granting out over an entire week," announced the event's chief organizer, Presidential Envoy to the Volga Region Sergey Kirienko — in other words, right up to election day, March 14th. The first note was drawn from the chest on the evening of March 8th by the envoy himself. His lot fell to helping a certain Nizhny Novgorod resident travel to visit her children in Novosibirsk. Another city resident requested a ride along Bolshaya Pokrovskaya by car. As Yulia Sandler — press secretary of the collegium for the development of Nizhny Novgorod established by the envoy — told Novye Izvestiya, the personal responsibility for fulfilling that young woman's wish falls to Viktor Bratanov, head of the Nizhny Novgorod Region's Main Department of Internal Affairs. To avoid violating traffic regulations on the pedestrian street, the young woman will be taken for her ride in a horse-drawn carriage. According to the collegium, throughout the week two notes will be drawn from the chest each day "by random selection," and the wishes are to be fulfilled by officials of the appropriate specialty (a corresponding directive from the envoy's office exists to that end). On the other hand, not all wishes are created equal. One elderly Nizhny Novgorod woman confided to Novye Izvestiya, for instance, that she had wished for her friend to receive a new apartment — but so far she has "had no luck"… Representatives of the authorities at all levels presented Nizhny Novgorod's women with yet another surprise. Local officials starred in a music video that was broadcast on local television channels throughout the holiday period. The Governor and the Mayor, the chairmen of the regional and city parliaments, the regional and district prosecutors — each holding a saxophone or clarinet — earnestly performed a song composed for the occasion: "And the snow falls, and March 8th draws near…" Conducting this ensemble of officials from behind a grand piano was Sergey Kirienko himself. By Novye Izvestiya's correspondent's count, the officials' video was broadcast on Nizhny Novgorod airwaves no fewer than 20 times over the three holiday days! All the more galling for Nizhny Novgorod's women, then, that the city's "Mother and Child" center, which had been planned for opening by March 8th, was never handed over. City Mayor Vadim Bulavinov announced that "the funds allocated to the Compulsory Medical Insurance Fund for the purchase of equipment never reached the city budget, and there is no point in bringing women into empty walls."March 10, 2004. Sergey Anisimov, NIZHNY NOVGOROD, Novye Izvestiya — "Ahead of the elections, Nizhny Novgorod officials decided to find out 'what women want'".
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Additionally, in honor of the March 8th holiday, a beautiful flower made of ice will bloom on Bolshaya Pokrovskaya, said Yulia Sandler, press secretary of the Collegium under the Presidential Envoy to the Volga Federal District on matters of developing Nizhny Novgorod as the center (capital) of the Volga Federal District. According to Sandler, the ice flower will serve as the symbol of the Week of Wish-Granting, which begins in Nizhny Novgorod on March 8th. During the week, the wishes written in notes by Nizhny Novgorod residents and dropped into the "Chest of Wishes" on Pokrovskaya will be fulfilled by the regional authorities. The three-meter-tall sculpture, crafted by a Moscow sculptor, will adorn the flowerbed near the Nizhny Novgorod Drama Theatre. Happy holiday, dear women of Nizhny Novgorod!Vremya N, the regional news agency of the Nizhny Novgorod Region Government
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