Geno Женя #71

[schneefink]

I was only planning to look some things up, but Geno is so interesting. For the December meme, a question by snickfic: I would like to know about being able to read Geno in Russian. :D I assume he comes across differently in a language he's fluent in. Tell me ALL your Geno-in-Russian thoughts.

I'm not sure I'm a good person to ask this? My Russian is average, but by no means excellent, and I only find Geno's Russian interviews when they're linked on Tumblr. genobest does some partial translations and I follow the links for the rest. I've tried to watch some of his TV interviews but they're hard for me to understand.

Overall the media's approach to him is different. In Pittsburgh some just don't appreciate him enough: he's the second-best player, the one that's less media-friendly, who takes stupid penalties sometimes and often gets accused by some (stupid) writers of being inconsistent and lazy. In Russia that doesn't happen: he's one of the best hockey players on the planet, they love both listing his accomplishments (including world championship medals more often than NHL individual awards) and saying that it's unnecessary because everyone knows him, he's part of what they call the most beautiful couple in sports, and they clearly adore him.

The kind of questions the media asks also seem to be a bit different. Russian media asks a lot more personal questions: his favorite books (various) and movies (comedies), about his girlfriend (and his girlfriend about him), his opinions on family (he wants one) and gender roles (conservative) and gun ownership (only if registered and with a doctor's certificate) etc. More gossip-y. I don't think he likes it very much, he started at least two interviews with a request to concentrate on hockey questions instead of personal ones. It only worked to some degree. But then again sometimes he doesn't seem to mind, it probably depends on his mood.

He's more comfortable talking in Russian, of course. He agrees to more and longer interviews than he would in English and gives much longer and more detailed answers. I got the impression that he uses slightly different kinds of humor: in English he's often very deadpan about it, so much so that some people weren't sure he was joking in his comments about Flower's 300th win. In Russian he laughs more and makes his jokes more obvious. It might be a sample size thing though.

He also sometimes, though not often, says things to the Russian media he probably wouldn't say in English. For example at the beginning of the season, when Johnston had him play wing a few times, he made it clear in a Russian interview that while of course he does as he's told, he dislikes changing position, especially so often. I don't think he would have said that to US reporters, especially because they had that whole "Geno faked an injury in training camp because he's pissed at management for trading Neal and doesn't like the new coach" storyline going on. And he also wouldn't have commented on Voynov's situation the way he did in Russian, that of course he doesn't know what happened but that hopefully the situation will be resolved to Voynov's advantage, and strongly implying that the police and media probably misinterpreted/overreacted.

Reading about his relationship is sort of… I'm not not going to read it, because I can't deny being a tiny bit curious, but I wish it wasn't there for me to read, if that makes sense. That's his private life, I don't need to know that, even though it does give me a better picture of him as a character. (Though not always person=character. Being in RPF fandom is complicated and I'm still working on it.) Of course it makes complete sense for him to have a more conservative view on gender roles. He's Russian, and gender roles in Russia are complicated and fascinating and from my PoV a bit old-fashioned. I might wish his girlfriend didn't get the impression that he doesn't take her (impressive) career seriously, and I might be skeptical about his claim that being a hockey player's wife is incompatible with having a career or even a job of her own, but it's none of my business.

There are other little details that I enjoy finding out about, like that the Pens have adopted some Russian swear words, that he can't cook, has water pistols at his house, that he and Sid go for dinner sometime and Sid asks him about Russia, that he's emphatically not a morning person and in general loves to relax, is not political at all, likes the team name "Penguins" because he thinks penguins are interesting birds and names like "Sharks" are more stupid, will miss Orpik and worries about losing contact with him, how he defends Sid and praises him to the Russian media a lot even when they're not even really criticizing him, etc. etc.

Concluding thoughts about Geno, I hope he gets better linemates soon. He's playing so well right now, it's a joy to watch, and a lot of it is wasted with two 4th line guys on his wings. He still produces, but the potential…

Comments

[vicki_rae]

Thank you. This is fascinating.

[schneefink]

Glad you think so too :) I might try to do the same for Ehrhoff one day, but there's less material because he's not as famous. (Brief look: German media assumes their readers know little about hockey/the NHL (sometimes I doubt how much they know themselves), and love to emphasize his connection to his hometown team - also called penguins, btw - and that Ehrhoff plays for the national team whenever he can.)

[snickfic]

It delights me so much to know that back home people appreciate Geno as he should be appreciated. And there are tons of details here that make me so happy. RUSSIAN SWEARS IN THE LOCKER ROOM. :DDD

[schneefink]

To be fair that particular tidbit is from an older article, 2008 or so iirc, when they still had more than one Russian on the team and presumably more Russian was spoken in the locker room, but I loved it so much I had to include it :)