A gift to remember

• Last Updated: November 02. 2009 8:40PM UAE / November 2. 2009 4:40PM GMT

There are many advantages to being a world leader. Never having to wait for a commercial flight and the adoration of your constituents to name but two. And as Vladimir Putin understands, there are also gifts.

When he served as the Russian president, Mr Putin was so used to receiving gifts that when the owner of the New England Patriots, an American football team, removed his team’s championship ring to show Mr Putin, he took into his hands, gazing at it admiringly. Then Mr Putin put it in his pocket. How could anyone ask for it back?

But Mr Putin knows the joy of giving too. The other day when visiting a factory, a worker asked for a memento. Mr Putin unclasped his Swiss-made Blancpain Aqua Lung watch – available to those of us who aren’t world leaders for a cool Dh50,000 – handing it to the lucky citizen.

As we report today in Arts & Life, the giver has become the gift. The Russian Federation of Body Builders thought long and hard as to what to give the Terminator, the Governor of California, and a man who used to prance around a gym in skimpy shorts. The answer was a bronze bust of Mr Putin. It’s not the gilded figurine he may have wanted in his acting days but Arnold Schwarzenegger’s poll numbers show that he may need every reminder to stand strong.