Elon Musk appeared to be blown away by the bizarre invention of a teenage Russian motorist; the billionaire enlisted the help of Google Translate to express his emotions better.
"Ha ha, awesome," Tesla's founder tweeted in Russian in response to a video posted by the Russian channel NTV.
NTV tagged Musk in a post that showed an 18-year-old driving backwards across Russia's Stavropol in a customised Lada-1600 with a surreal rear-engine design.
хаха офигенно
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) 13 февраля 2019 г.
"And how do you like this, Elon Musk?" reads the caption, mimicking a popular Russian meme where users ask the visionary entrepreneur for his opinion on all sorts of absurd inventions.
A couple of hours before, Musk's rumoured ex-girlfriend Claire Boucher, better known by her stage name Grimes, engaged in a more explicit public display of affection for Russian culture.
The Canadian pop star filmed herself performing a song by Yanka Dyagileva, a Russian poet and former member of the iconic punk band Grazhdanskaya Oborona (Civil Protection), one of the most prominent figures of the so-called Siberian underground.
Trying 2 learn this Янка song
— ༺GRIMES༻ (@Grimezsz) 13 февраля 2019 г.
🕊
Я повторяю десять раз и снова
Никто не знает как же мне хуёво
И телевизор с-потолка свисает
И как хуёво мне никто не знает
..sum mess ups… been a few yrs since I last tried singing in Russian 🖤 pic.twitter.com/8Wg6QdeN4U
Yanka died in 1991 under mysterious circumstances at the age of 24, but her legacy apparently lives on. "[I have been] trying to learn this Yanka song," Grimes tweeted, adding that it has "been a few years" since she last tried singing in Russian.
Grimes' Twitter was quickly flooded with messages of support from Russian fans, some of whom recommend that she practice swearing in Russian.
I'm from Siberia and I listened to your music for the first time today and was wondering why are snippets of Russian in you album arts and videos. But most fascinating is that my parents kinda knew Yanka personally and I have couple of pictures at home.
— Sonya (@pyon_machine) 13 февраля 2019 г.
More Russian plz
— bailey (@trippinbails) 13 февраля 2019 г.
oh my god you are a real angel please release a song in russian!!!!!! pic.twitter.com/tjK7T3mnmO
— . (@esordys) 13 февраля 2019 г.
