Do such Americans and Russians exist? :) Most Russians get what little they know about the US through TV, which largely accounts for the distorted images people have about the country (because of Hollywood movies: obviously, everybody in the US has a giant house except for black people, who are all criminals, and, as my roommate Elena said while watching Sex in the City, "Americans talk about money _all the time_!").
My point was only that the benefits of knowing English in Russia are rather small, unless you work for an American or UK company, almost all of which are in two cities: Moscow and St. Pete. Russia is a center of influence and power in a way in which, say, Germany and Japan are not. The countries of the former Soviet Union, the Baltic States aside, orbit around Moscow; the countries of the EU do not orbit in the same way around Berlin.
For most Russians, Westerners are strange exotic beasts from the dark side of the moon. They almost never meet them. Ukrainians, Belorussians, Kazakhs, Turkmen, Armenians, Georgians, Latvians, even Serbs or Croats -- yes; Americans, no. And all those groups speak Russian. I have had people simply refuse to believe that I am an American. "Impossible! What are you really, a Czech?" (Thinks of something really exotic) "A Pole?"
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