3. «Hookah Master» as a term. Hookah Master as a psychotherapist.

In many countries when you visit a shisha lounge and place an order to have a shisha smoke session you will dont even see the guy who will pack a bowl for you. Russian lounges have made it really different taking idea from bartender culture. The main job of Shisha Master is to ask his guest questions to find out their needs and prepare the perfect bowl with 100% guest taste expectations. Some lounges even go far about it and train their ShishaMaster to be the guests psychotherapist: a guy who can talk with you about your hard work day. I belive the pioner of such an idea been Garik Konovalov in 2013 when he have launched his chain of lounges «Unique Hookah Places» across all the Russia. Its been hard to find their lounge (you could get in only with personal invitation) and the main value of visiting been — talks with shisha masters. Moreover Garik have proposed an idea to celebrate The International Day of Shisha Master on 1st July. You can send him a message in Instagram and ask why its 1st July (nobody knows including me). 

2. No foil, HMD smoking.Reza Bavar (read my interview) — revolutionized global shisha market with his concept of Kaloud Lotus. His technology has become one of the integral attributes of Russian hookah culture. Technology. Not his product. And thats the drama

3. «Hookah Master» as a term. Hookah Master as a psychotherapist.

In many countries when you visit a shisha lounge and place an order to have a shisha smoke session you will dont even see the guy who will pack a bowl for you. Russian lounges have made it really different taking idea from bartender culture. The main job of Shisha Master is to ask his guest questions to find out their needs and prepare the perfect bowl with 100% guest taste expectations. Some lounges even go far about it and train their ShishaMaster to be the guests psychotherapist: a guy who can talk with you about your hard work day. I belive the pioner of such an idea been Garik Konovalov in 2013 when he have launched his chain of lounges «Unique Hookah Places» across all the Russia. Its been hard to find their lounge (you could get in only with personal invitation) and the main value of visiting been — talks with shisha masters. Moreover Garik have proposed an idea to celebrate The International Day of Shisha Master on 1st July. You can send him a message in Instagram and ask why its 1st July (nobody knows including me). 

An 8-sided column at the bottom and an 8-sided column at the top hold the globe in the middle.Each facet of the column will represent a specific hookah culture from a specific region of the world.

We travel across the different countries and we understand that different regions of our planet have a different shisha cultures concepts. Since Im from Russia, I will give an example of Russian shisha culture specifics:

1. Combination of Chineese tea with a shisha smoking.Reason: first shisha lounges in Eastern Europe region originaly grows from Tea Rooms (specific place where you can rest and drink a big range of tea selection especialy from China). This year we are gonna celebrate 20 years of «Shisha Lounges of St. Petersburg» community, which been founded by Oleg Knyaginin. Place where we gonna celebrate it? «Tea House» — on of the first shisha lounges in St. Petersburg