Credit: Dangerous Minds / Public Domain

So, fun fact, the word vodka is based on the Slavic word for water.

It’s true, in Russian, the word for water is ‘voda’ and ‘ka’ is typically a diminutive added to the end of words. Thus, when you’re next at the bar, and you order a vodka, you are ordering a “li’l water”. What’s more, the name is doubly accurate because vodka has the cultural place in Russia that water has in most cultures. It’s more than mere booze; it’s the national drink. One of the great gifts Mother Russia has bestowed upon the world, and the lubricant for a culture that has shaped the world in countless ways.

Which checks out. After all, this is Russia we’re talking about. You’ve got to have something that can tug smiles from people beset by hardship, no matter what time in their history you point to. You’ve got to have something to warm the body through the kind of winters that have singlehanded repelled the mightiest of invasion forces. What’s more, if it’s going to be a drink getting you through those winters, it might as well be one that doesn’t freeze.

All this to say that Russia has the kind of relationship to vodka that we Brits have to tea. It’s perhaps not quite as ever-present in the culture as a brew is over here, but it’s still thought of in the same high regard. One can only imagine the state of either nation if something as ludicrous as “running out of our national drink” were ever to happen, but that’s obviously bollocks. Such a thing would just never happen, there’d be too much infrastructure in place preventing Russia from running out of vodka, right?

Right!?

Nope, Russia actually ran out of vodka once.

It sounds mind-boggling. Like Brazil running out of football, the Swiss running out of neutrality, or France running out of seething hatred for their government, but it’s true.

What’s more, once you find out the circumstances, it actually becomes completely understandable. For a situation like this, you need two scenarios. The first is a long, long period of national hardship. When basically anything the country produces is being produced at an absolute minimum. The kind of minimum where any amount of consumption above the standard amount would bring everything to a crashing halt.

The second thing you need is a reason to celebrate. Now, it might not feel like it, especially over the last ten years, but periods of national hardship do tend to go hand in hand with reasons to celebrate. I’m sure another one will be coming any decade now. However, May 9th, 1945, represented the ultimate form of both aspects for Russia. The six years prior had been a living hell for basically every country in the world, but few nations had suffered quite like them. On May 9th, the news broke that Germany had surrendered, and the Second World War was over.

Despite having such a reserved, humourless reputation, people party like Russians, and the scenes of national jubilance have been rarely seen in the nation’s history. They didn’t end any time soon either, and when the nation woke up on May 10th, they did so to a country that had quite literally been drunk dry. Did that stop the celebrations in any way, though?

Absolutely not. Just the way it should be.