Posted on 02/24/2016 7:57:30 PM PST by Beave Meister
I had never heard about this story before, but a clever and competent reader shared it on our Facebook page, and I thought some of yâall might enjoy it too.
Back in 1989, card-carrying Communist and Politburo member in the Soviet Union Boris Yeltsin visited Johnson Space Center, and then took a tour of a grocery store in Clear Lake, Texas. According to a Houston Chronicle reporter, Yelstin was far more affected by the grocery store visit than he was the space center.
He apparently was stunned by the aisles and aisles of supermarket products, and told the other Russians in his entourage that if Russians saw what American grocery stores looked like, when in their homeland they had to wait in line for most everything, âthere would be a revolution.â
(Excerpt) Read more at chicksontheright.com ...
I was stationed in Germany when the wall fell, as well. They cancelled our leave, so we never made the trip to the East.
I do remember stories of the first Soviet leaders touring our base under Glasnost and Perestroika. One of our officers was surprised when a Russian General asked why America had such an enormous number of officers. While their entourage had a significant number of officers, there were many NCOs, but the General wasn’t looking at the personnel. Turned out, he was looking at the parking lot and assumed every car was owned by an officer!
And Captain Block!
Shoulda took him to a liquor store. Shelves stocked with multiple brands of vodka and other liquors woulda really blowed his mind.
An excerpt from an interview with Viktor.
https://web.archive.org/web/20010111004300/http://fullcontext.org/people/belenko.htm
A friend of mine from Sweden visited in winter and was amazed at the selection of vegetables available. He lived in an upscale suburb of Stockholm and still couldn’t get lettuce and other perishables.
I was in Prague in Nov. ‘72 and the banana had arrived. All the street vendors had bananas for a few days, then none.
I was thinking the same thing when I read it.
We can complain about Mexico but it is one of the reasons we have “fresh” vegetables all year.
This one has my vote for Thread Title of the Week.
Yes. And South America to fill in the gaps. In the equatorial zone, they grow crops year round. Vineyards, for example, are divided into 6 areas and one zone is pruned back every 2 months. This gives an almost continuous supply of fresh grapes.
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