Contest Anyone?

It's our anniversary, so we're celebrating with a contest!

Fifty-five years is a long time for a magazine to be bumping around this uncertain world. And while we've only been stewarding Russian Life for the past 16 years, we do take unmeasured pride in the fullness of our heritage, even those wayward years when the magazine (then known as Soviet Life) was overcome with propagandistic fervor (oh, wayward youth!)...

In any event, to celebrate our 55th anniversary, we're holding a contest. Appropriately, there will be 55 prizes, including a Kindle (pictured, right) as the Grand Prize. That means some pretty good odds of winning for everyone.

How do you enter? Simple, between October 1, 2011 and October 31, 2011:

• Join Russian Life as a new subscriber
• Buy someone a new Russian Life gift subscription (in which case you BOTH will be entered)
• Renew an existing subscription to Russian Life

It's that easy. What is more, if you do more than one of these things, each one gets you a new entry. So, for example, if you come on as a new subscriber and buy a gift for someone else, you will get two entries and your friend will get one!

The prizes are an amazing array of gifts that are of interest and value to Russophiles, readers and travelers. We are still compiling the final list, and will drop it in here as soon as it is complete (with photos and links!). But here's an initial taste:

• New generation Amazon Kindle with built-in wi-fi
• Fine Russian linens, courtesy of Russia House Collection
• Newly published works of Russia-related non-fiction and fiction
• Tshirts and totebags (with Russian imprints, of course!)
• Vermont maple syrup from Morse Farm, just 5 minutes up the road from us (personally, we consider this to be the top prize!)
• Little Pim's Wake up Smiling language learning DVD for children
• Oxford Russian-English Picture Dictionary
• DVDs of Russian films (with subtitles)
• Music CDs
• The last laminated Russia Wall Map in the known world
• ...and much, much more!

Enter early and often! And help us spread the word through Facebook and the Twitterverse!

{The full, official rules are posted here...}