THE RUSSIAN KISS
“Love, even the enemies of you, for one must know how majestic you can be…”
The socialist fraternal kiss is a special greeting that was used in the USSR and eastern european countries since the October Revolution of 1917. The greeting consists of a hug followed by three kisses on the cheeks. If the people greeting each other were close, it was common for the third kiss to be given on the mouth instead.
The russian custom of greeting people with three kisses on the cheeks precedes the founding of the Soviet Union by centuries, going back to ritual traditions of the Orthodox Church in the beginnings of the Czardom in Russia. The greeting, then, was an allusionto the Holy Trinity. The custom was retaken by the russian worker’s movement at the end of the 19th century, in contrast to the custom imposed by the Czarist regime, where subjects and subordinates had the obligation of kissing the hands of the nobility and aristocracy. By putting the greeters on equal footing, the worker’s greeting became a symbol of equality, fraternity, and solidarity, being incorporated in the etiquette of the bolshevik revolutionaries and being used as an expression of unity amongst the working class.
After the October Revolution, the ritualization of the gesture was consolidated, turning it into a protocol greeting between members of the soviet government—even if the adhesion wasn’t entirely consensual, at first. The symbolic gesture of comradery and socialist solidarity was exported to other countries through the Communist International, becoming especially popular in East Europe. Being more reserved, the socialists of Asian countries adopted a modified version, exchanging the three kisses for three hugs. Cuba, on the other hand, adopted the custom of the three kisses on the cheeks, but did not adopt the kiss on the mouth, due to the amorous implications that a kiss on the mouth had in the western world. The greeting was also adopted by other socialist leaders in the Third World and by autonomy movements aligned with the socialist ideal, such as the Palestine Liberation Organization and the African National Congress.
In the Soviet Union, the intensity of the fraternal greeting served as an indicator of the degree of alignment and commitment between leaders. The omission of the greeting used to mean that the relationships with another country where shaken—a notable example being the absence of hugs, kisses, or even the word “comrade” on diplomatic meetings with the chinese after the Sino-Soviet Split. Leonid Brezhnev was by far the greatest adept of the fraternal kiss, starring in a series of anecdotes about the habit—including a well-known story in which Fidel Castro, in his visit to the Soviet Union in 1974, disembarked the plane already smoking a cigar, as to prevent any “excessive intimacy” from the soviet leader.
After the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the subsequent “westernization” of the russian culture, the habit was abandoned, although it still persists to this day between older citizens and more isolated populations in Russia.
I equally hoped that it could have lasted little longer if it wasn’t for the cold war, but yet, a regret-worthy thing is a memorable one.
