ONLY one thing gives a Russian as much pleasure as drinking himself under the table with a bottle of vodka - and that is steaming his naked body until he is as pink as a shrimp, lashing himself with birch twigs and leaping into ice cold water. Afterwards he will probably decline spirits and, for once, prefer a good cup of tea.
This is the bizarre Russian ritual of the banya or steam bath. It's a bit like a Finnish sauna, only wetter. In a small wooden cabin, clouds of steam are produced by flinging water onto hot stones. The bather sweats until he can take the heat no longer, then rushes out into river, lake or artificial plunge pool.
The banya is as quintessentially Russian as the Orthodox Church or the secret police. The turn of the century artist Boris Kustodiev has a famous painting of a plump nude with long golden tresses, coyly covering herself with a bunch of birch branches and glowing in the steam of the banya. Titled Russian Venus, it captures the very soul of this mysterious country.
Last week, Russians were especially likely to visit the banya, as they were preparing for Easter, which fell one week later than in the west this year under the Orthodox calendar. The day before Good Friday is called Clean Thursday in Russia because the faithful wash themselves and cut their hair in readiness for the most important Christian festival of the year.
To avoid the queues, I decided to be clean on Wednesday and went to the banya with a friend called Ivan and three of his children. There is absolutely nothing sexual about the banya. In the overpowering heat, you have not the slightest interest in anyone else's body. And so it is normal for families or friends to bathe together.
Banyas in Russia are as varied as dachas. Just as the country cottages where Russians spend their summer holidays range from wooden huts set among cabbage patches to mansions with private grounds, so banyas can be log cabins on the edge of lakes or elaborate city sports complexes.
Moscow's most famous banya is the Sandunovskiye Baths, with mosaic's and stained glass windows all around the swimming pool. Arkady Renko, the detective in Martin Cruz Smith's novel Gorky Park, goes here to observe the baddies discussing business.
In real life, too, these baths are said to be popular with the mafia, which is one reason why Ivan and I avoid them. The other is that the pool, which looks like a cathedral, is for men only. So we go to a more democratic bath house in a working class suburb where, for 150,000 roubles or $30, we can hire a suite for a morning.
Ivan, a scientist, comes here every week, sometimes with as many as 15 friends to help to spread the cost, for $30 is a lot of money to a Russian. In addition to the banya and plunge pool, we have a rest room with leather armchairs for tea drinking afterwards.
I come equipped, or so I think. I have a towel and some shampoo. But that is not enough. You should also have rubber flip flops to protect your feet from the hot floor of the banya, a wool ski cap to save your hair from the withering heat, and, of course, the birch twigs, which you should have gathered in the summer and stored, so as to be able to whip yourself and your friends throughout the rest of the year.
It sounds odd, masochistic even. But going backwards and forwards from heat to cold really does leave you feeling wonderfully refreshed and relaxed.
Ivan swears by it. "Go to the banya regularly and you will never need a doctor again," he declares. "All the poisons in your body come out as you sweat, and you are left new as a baby. The steam cures everything, even chronic ailments".
Doctors might quibble with that. For example, they generally say the banya, with its shocking contrasts, is not good for people with weak hearts. But they do recommend it otherwise.
The one taboo in the banya, at least with Ivan, is talking politics. I tell him that some colleagues of mine, thinking Russians might be franker while wearing their birthday suits, recently went to the banya to canvass the bathers on their voting intentions in the coming presidential elections.
"What a ridiculous idea," snorts Ivan, who rarely reads a newspaper except a new publication on banya life called the Banya Times. "In the steam, you don't have a thought in your head. And certainly not about those ghastly politicians."