SWITCH on Russian television these days and if you do not get a game show - or the wonderful satire of game shows, where contestants forfeit their clothes for incorrect answers - you are likely to be bombarded by positive energy from a white witch. For these magicians have become as common on the Russian airwaves as televangelists in America.
It really is quite fascinating for those who remember Soviet TV, with its stodgy diet of war films and grain harvest reports. I find myself goggling uncontrollably.
The other night I tuned in to see the blackclad, bouffant haired Angelica cleansing a patient from the effects of the evil eye. A pop singer who had already been cured dedicated a song to the witch. And then three telephone numbers came up on the screen. "Depressed, tired, suffering from aches and pains? Perhaps you have been cursed. Ring for help," viewers were told. I decided to give it a try.
Two numbers turned out to be incorrect. "Not another idiot asking for Angelica," said an irritated woman at the other end. The third number was engaged for ages and when I finally got through a tart secretary said: "Angelica will call back if she is interested in meeting The Irish Times."
She didn't.
However, this poor public relations performance turned out to be very useful when I approached Liliana. Angelica, once Liliana's student, is now her main competitor.
"Of course we can do better than Angelica. Come at six and Liliana will see you in person," said Olga Spartakovna, one of the 14 secretaries who work at the first All Russian Academy of Practical Magic and Hypnosis.
The academy, which occupies a labyrinth of rooms in the basement of a large building in central Moscow, holds regular courses each turning out dozens of students capable of curing ills from depression to obesity, failure in business to failure in bed, according to the methods of Liliana.
Liliana received me in a plush office with an aquarium and crystal balls, leather swivel chairs and a fax. "Oh you are so annoying, she snapped to someone on the telephone before turning on the charm for me. "I heal by original methods, absolutely unique in the world ... "she intoned.
Perhaps. If her obesity cure works, she had not bothered to apply it to herself. She is mountainous, with a lion's mane of dyed blonde hair and pink painted talons.
Liliana, who trained in music and conventional medicine in Soviet times, when making money from witchcraft would have been illegal, said her grandmother had passed on the art of using energy to heal. "I can transmit black or white energy but I only ever use my powers for good because I believe there is a higher form that sees and judges us. I love my enemies," said the witch, an Armenian who fled from the Azeri capital, Baku, during ethnic tensions there in 1988.
Along with adverts for real estate and preparations to exterminate cockroaches, the Russian press is full of offers: kalduni (witches) to cast spells, including those which would rain down misfortune on say, unfaithful spouses or cheating tradesmen.
"Why does evil fall on us?" asked Liliana. "It is because of bad karma. Either we are paying for the sins of our past lives or someone has put a curse on us. Believe me, there are black magicians working in Russia today, putting the evil eye on people for money."
So what does she do? Unfortunately, I am not allowed to watch the healing ritual because the patient in the waiting room, a shy Georgian girl who thinks she is being persecuted by her neighbours, fears even the neutral eye of an observer. But I am told the cure involved finding the client's "energy hole", then Liliana wafts herbs and church incense to surround the person with good energy and finally gives him or her a talisman to take home for long lasting protection.
"It is important to believe," said the witch who has studied psychology. "Some people are sceptical but one session with me usually convinces them."
Liliana's grandmother used to accept chocolates as a sign of gratitude from her patients but clearly the modern witch prefers other forms of payment. Since the poor are given discounts, businessmen seeking supernatural aid to financial success must be the source of the academy's obvious wealth.
One session with Liliana was not enough to convince me. I think she is a charlatan. But the spiritual and ideological vacuum in postcommunist Russia is being filled by more disturbing things than her hocus pocus - satanism, neo fascism, white power racism. The worst she is doing is lightening the pockets of the gullible. And it makes amusing late night television.