TOMSK, November 18. /TASS/. The Tomsk department of the Russian Pension Fund has calculated the size of a "pension allowance" for Russian Father Frost who is celebrating his 174th birthday on November 18.
The chief magician in Russia is entitled to a pension allowance worth 17,000 rubles per month on condition that he has really reached the age of 174, the press service of the Pension Fund told TASS on Tuesday.
"No one knows exactly how old Father Frost is. Given that the first mention of Father Frost dates back to 1840, when he was mentioned in a book of fairy tales by Vladimir Odoyevsky, Father Frost has turned 174 now," said spokeswoman from the public relations department of the Tomsk Pension Fund Marina Bokhonnaya.
"If Father Frost were an ordinary pensioner he would have been paid his pension allowance for 114 years now. If he had been living in the Tomsk region his average pension allowance would have been a little higher. We calculated his pension allowance on the pattern of an average pension paid to local people beyond 90 years old, without taking into account such obligatory data as Father Frost's 'work record' or his 'work place'. If Father Frost had been living in the north of the Tomsk region he would have been entitled to the 'northern coefficient' which guarantees extras to an average pension and a free return ticket to a place of rest anywhere on the Russian territory, including a sledge driven by reindeers if one wants," the spokeswoman said.
November 18 is a traditional birthday of Russian Father Frost which he celebrates in the town of Veliky Ustyug believed to be his home place, as a legend goes. Usually, it has been snowing hard in Veliky Ustyug on Farther's Frost birthday, and a real frost usually sets in by that day.
Anyway, asked how old he is today, Father Frost invariably says, "I am as old as the world".