Posted on 10 March 2010 by admin
The eternal catchphrase “There is no sex in the USSR” is almost as symbolic of Soviet austerity as clapped out Trabis. Coined during a televised conference between American and USSR audiences in response to a question about sex in the Soviet media, it was quickly hijacked. Of course in reality even the thin walls of hastily constructed shared apartment block flats couldn’t dampen ardours; however sex and Socialism did not overtly mix, and the facts of life went undiscussed on the whole.
Sex was imagined in the USSR as a necessary means of reproducing the labour force. Working mothers for example were exactly that, workers first and then mothers. Mother’s Day was even prohibited in the USSR as a bourgeois relic, although International Women’s Day was celebrated on March 8. Big families were encouraged; there were 454,142 Mother Heroine orders awarded, which celebrated all mothers bearing and raising 10 or more children. It was awarded upon the first birthday of the last child, provided that nine other children (natural or adopted) remained alive. Children who had perished under heroic, military or other respectful circumstances were also counted. These women received special benefits such as free bus rides and cheap or free food.
Sharing a home with parents or parents-in-law whilst waiting for an apartment must have been a bit of a passion killer but ‘leisure intercourse’ certainly was occurring, as standard issue contraceptives of the time testify. Officially they were known as ‘Product No. 2′ (because Product No. 1 was a rubber gas-mask made in the same factory), and were chronically unavailable as they proved profitable black market goods. Data from 1989 seems to prove the short supply of condoms: although women were officially discouraged from having abortions, they were legal and were the chief form of birth control in the country, with an estimated 8 million taking place each year. Abortions were free for working women and cost 2 to 5 rubles for other women, depending on where they lived. Despite their availability, an estimated 15 percent of all abortions in the Soviet Union were illegally performed in private facilities. The approximate ratio of abortions to live births was nearly three to one.
Images courtesy of English Russia.com
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Posted on 05 March 2010 by admin
Even though this Lonely Planet USSR was published in the very early 1990s, apparently the editors had been backpacking around the region for decades before.
Travellers and tourists to the Soviet Union must have some amazing stories to tell – please email yours in to share, as there are not many to find on the internet!
All images courtesy of English Russia.com
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Posted on 22 February 2010 by admin
Posted on 21 February 2010 by admin
In 1990 McDonalds got a permission from the Communist Party of Soviet Union to open its first restaurant in Soviet Russia in Pushkin Square, Moscow. It was not only the first McDonalds, but generally the first fast food place in Russia ever. Everyone wanted to visit this ‘pearl of capitalism’, so there were literally mile-long queues of diners. With 27 cash registers and seating 700, Moscow-McDonald’s was for a long time one of the brand’s busiest branches in the world.
According to information from the time, the expansion of McDonald’s Canada to Russia was accomplished after thirteen years of difficult negotiations and an investment of $50 million. What’s more, profits were split 50-50 between the company and the Russian government. Business was conducted entirely in Russian rubles that were nearly worthless outside the country, so to take any profit out of Russia McDonald’s would have had to buy Russian products with rubles and then export them to Europe or North America for sale. In fact, the company spent the rubles to buy farmland and put up office towers, a distribution center and a factory in the Moscow suburbs. In 1993, the company built its first office building, just two blocks from the Kremlin and tenants like Coca-Cola and Upjohn moved in.
According to a publication called The Agribusiness Examiner:
‘McDonald’s here [in Russia] has been able to avoid some problems that have troubled it in the West. The “Super Size Me” controversy, and accusations that fast-food chains like McDonald’s promote obesity, are not issues for Russians, some of whom demand mayonnaise with 40% fat content. Nor does McDonald’s low pay seem to bother many here – Russian wages average $250 a month. Some even argue that McDonald’s is identified in the public mind with glasnost and perestroika, the policies of openness and restructuring under Mikhail S. Gorbachev in the final years of the Soviet Union.’
Do you remember McDonald’s-Moscow opening?
Images courtesy of English Russia.com
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Posted on 18 February 2010 by admin
Although taken 50 or so years ago, when Lithuania was part of Soviet Union, these photos look touchingly contemporary.
Republished with kind permission from English Russia.com
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Posted on 05 February 2010 by admin
Apparently, diamonds and pearls stolen from Tsar Nicholas II by the Bolsheviks were smuggled into Britain via hollowed-out chocolate creams in order to fund a communist newspaper… Krupskaya chocolate continued the association: it was named after Lenin’s widow, but has just received a thoroughly capitalist rebrand. Read more
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Posted on 01 February 2010 by admin
Fyodor Lukyanov’s recent article in The Moscow Times (The Well of Soviet Nostalgia Is Running Dry, 20 Jan. 2010) was an interesting analysis of current attitudes towards fast-fasding memories of communism. Is the “well of Soviet patriotic symbols” really running dry, I wonder?
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