The Soviet Union was a slave state. How did lepers live in the Soviet Union
On December 30, 1922, the formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was approved at the First All-Union Congress of Soviets.
In December, the Union, in July - the government.
The agreement on the formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was signed on December 29, 1922 at a conference of delegations from the congresses of Soviets of the RSFSR, Ukrainian SSR, BSSR and ZSFSR and approved by the First All-Union Congress of Soviets. December 30 is considered official date formation of the USSR, although the government of the USSR and the allied ministries were created only in July 1923.
From 4 to 16.
IN different years the number of union republics within the USSR ranged from 4 to 16, but for the longest time the Soviet Union consisted of 15 republics - the RSFSR, the Ukrainian SSR, the Byelorussian SSR, the Moldavian SSR, the Armenian SSR, the Georgian SSR, the Azerbaijan SSR, the Kazakh SSR, the Uzbek SSR, the Kirghiz SSR, Turkmen SSR, Tajik SSR, Latvian SSR, Lithuanian SSR and Estonian SSR.
Three Constitutions in 69 years.
For nearly 69 years of its existence, the Soviet Union has changed three constitutions, which were adopted in 1924, 1936 and 1977. According to the first, the All-Union Congress of Soviets was the highest body of state power in the country, according to the second, the bicameral Supreme Soviet of the USSR. The third constitution also initially had a bicameral parliament, which, in the 1988 edition, gave way to the Congress people's deputies THE USSR.
Kalinin led the USSR the longest.
Legally, the head of state in the Soviet Union in different years was considered the Chairman of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and the President of the USSR. Formally, the longest head of the USSR was Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin, who for 16 years held the post of Chairman of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, and then for eight years was the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
The flag was approved later than the Constitution.
In the Treaty on the Formation of the USSR, it was determined that the new state has its own flag, but it was not given a clear description. In January 1924, the first Constitution of the USSR was approved, however, there was no indication of what the flag looked like. new country. And only in April 1924, the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR approved a scarlet cloth with a red flag as a flag. five pointed star, hammer and sickle.
In America - stars, in the USSR - slogans.
In 1923, the coat of arms of the Soviet Union was approved - the image of a sickle and a hammer against the background of the globe, in the rays of the sun and framed by ears of corn, with an inscription in the languages of the union republics "Proletarians of all countries, unite!". The number of inscriptions depended on the number of republics in the USSR, just as the number of stars on the US flag depends on the number of states.
universal anthem.
From 1922 to 1943, the anthem of the Soviet Union was "The Internationale" - a French song with music by Pierre Degeyter and words by Eugene Pottier, translated by Arkady Kots. In December 1943, a new national anthem was created and approved with lyrics by Sergei Mikhalkov and Gabriel El-Registan and music by Alexander Alexandrov. Alexandrov's music with a modified text by Mikhalkov is currently the anthem of Russia.
A country the size of a mainland.
The Soviet Union occupied an area of 22,400,000 square kilometers, being the most big country on the planet. The size of the USSR was comparable to the size North America, including the United States, Canada and Mexico.
The boundary is one and a half equator.
The Soviet Union had the longest border in the world, over 60,000 kilometers, and bordered on 14 states. Curiously, the length of the border modern Russia almost the same - about 60,900 km. At the same time, Russia borders on 18 states - 16 recognized and 2 partially recognized.
The highest point of the Union.
most high point The Soviet Union was a mountain in the Tajik SSR with a height of 7495 meters, which in different years was called Stalin Peak and Communism Peak. In 1998, the authorities of Tajikistan gave it a third name - Samani Peak, in honor of the emir who founded the first Tajik state.
Unique capital.
Despite the tradition that existed in the USSR of renaming cities in honor of prominent Soviet leaders, this process did not actually affect the capitals of the union republics. The only exception was the capital of the Kirghiz SSR, the city of Frunze, renamed in honor of the Soviet commander Mikhail Frunze, who was a local native. At the same time, the city was first renamed, and then became the capital of the union republic. In 1991, Frunze was renamed Bishkek.
The Soviet Union in the mid-1950s - early 1960s made a kind of "scientific and technical hat-trick" - in 1954 it created the world's first nuclear power plant, in 1957 it launched the world's first artificial satellite into orbit, and in 1961 launched the world's first manned spacecraft. These events took place respectively 9, 12 and 15 years after the end of the Great Patriotic War, in which the USSR suffered the greatest material and human losses from the participating countries.
The USSR did not lose wars.
During its existence, the Soviet Union officially participated in three wars- the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940, the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 and the Soviet-Japanese war of 1945. All these armed conflicts ended with the victory of the Soviet Union.
1204 Olympic medals.
During the existence of the USSR, athletes of the Soviet Union took part in 18 Olympics (9 summer and 9 winter), winning 1204 medals (473 gold, 376 silver and 355 bronze). According to this indicator, the Soviet Union to this day ranks second, second only to the United States. For comparison, the third-placed Great Britain has 806 Olympic awards with 49 participations in Olympic Games. As for modern Russia, it takes 9th place - 521 medals after 11 Olympiads.
First and last referendum.
In the entire history of the existence of the USSR, the only all-Union referendum was held, which took place on March 17, 1991. It raised the question of the future existence of the USSR. More than 77 percent of the referendum participants voted for the preservation of the Soviet Union. In December of the same year, the heads of the RSFSR of the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR announced the termination of the existence of a single country.
Happy New Year 2017 to all users of the USSR website. I wish you and your family and friends all the best and prosperity. May the new year bring only good, kind, eternal!
Probably, they will argue for more than one decade, and maybe more than one century. If in the first years after the collapse of everything Soviet, many tried to get rid of everything as quickly as possible, then recently there has been almost an opposite trend. Those who cared about the Soviet Union are trying to preserve what is left of it. For example, courtyard dominoes or dovecotes. Rodion Marinichev, correspondent of the MIR 24 TV channel, recalled how they lived in a country that no longer exists.
Collectors today are ready to give more than one thousand rubles for a penny. Although a quarter of a century ago it was an ordinary means of payment. The Soviet ruble is one of the main monuments to a country that no longer exists. Many still remember the prices by heart, because they have not changed for decades. “The fare was 20 kopecks, Prima cigarettes were 14 kopecks. A fifty-kopeck piece was worth lunch, and you still had 20-30 kopecks left for the cinema, ”recalls Vladimir Kazakov, an expert on numismatics of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.
The average salary in the USSR during the times of "developed socialism" is 130 rubles. Those who tried to save kept their money in jars, books, underwear and only then, closer to the 1970s, did people increasingly begin to use passbooks.
In the film "Love and Pigeons" Soviet life and way of life is shown so truthfully that people often say about this picture: that's how it was in the USSR. The main character Vasily Kuzyakin, by the way, written off from real person, - the most popular hobby: pigeons.
The country began to get involved in breeding pigeons soon after the Great Patriotic War. The dove is known to be a symbol of peace. The hobby turned out to be so serious that dovecotes began to appear in almost every yard. Small dovecotes were even built according to standard designs. The most avid lovers of pigeons built real mansions for them.
In the sleeping Moscow district of Nagatino, Uncle Kolya's exemplary dovecote today is almost exotic. He started the construction back in the 1970s, when he returned from the army. He says that in his youth it was not a pity to save money for these birds. You don't have lunch a couple of times - and you buy a dove. And then you will also compete with the neighboring yard: whose pigeons are more dexterous. “Earlier, if you saw that the parties were flying, then that’s it, you need to raise your own, otherwise someone else is flying! And all Nagatino in pigeons, ”recalls Nikolai.
There were enough yard hobbies in the USSR. There were also chess, backgammon and dominoes. Today's knuckle lovers treat their hobby as a professional sport. Even a special table, for such championships are held. In the USSR, Alexander recalls, everything was much simpler. playing field could serve as someone's work briefcase, a box, or just a piece of plywood. “Played in the parks on benches,” says the executive director Russian Federation domino Alexander Terentiev.
Patriarch's Ponds were once a favorite place for domino players, as, indeed, most city parks. Domino entered life so firmly that they sat down for it at any free moment. For example, at lunchtime. "IN work time met, people from other workshops came, - says the champion of Russia in dominoes in 2015 Alexander Vinogradov.
I had to spend a lot of time in someone's company and involuntarily. Indeed, in the middle of the last century, more than half of the country's population lived in communal apartments. Establishing a common life was sometimes difficult. Writer Vladimir Berezin recalls: as a child, he almost never washed in the apartment.
"In a small two-room apartment two families lived. In the bathroom, the housekeeper of the second family was sleeping on boards. I found a bathhouse culture that united people of completely different social origins,” says Berezin.
For most Soviet citizens - almost a second home. At least until the end of the 1960s - the era of Khrushchev and, albeit small, but separate apartments with all amenities. Many went to the baths with their own bowls and soap. Under steam in the same company, a worker and a doctor of science often met.
Bath attendant with 30 years of experience Takhir Yanov remembers well the long queues at the famous Sanduny. Everything has been preserved there since that time. Lovers of the first couple still come at dawn, just like in the Soviet era.
Queues are a special Soviet phenomenon. They originated in the 1920s, then became longer, then shorter, then longer again.
According to the data of the USSR State Statistics Committee for 1985, men spent about 16 minutes on working days, women - 46 minutes on the purchase of goods or services. On weekends, even more: men - almost an hour (58 minutes), women - one and a half (85 minutes). In the queues, they got acquainted, solved cases, and sometimes even fell in love and dispersed.
“There was a couple in front of me: a guy and a girl. They declared their love so much that I was even tired of listening. Finally it was their turn. They gave something just a kilogram or a piece. The girl took over, and the young man took over. And she says: "Bunny, give me money." He once-times in his pockets, and it turned out that he forgot the money in the hostel! And this Bunny immediately turned into “a sort of bastard,” recalls singer Lyubov Uspenskaya.
Singer Lyubov Uspenskaya remembers both childhood hungry years and Soviet word"blat". She managed to plunge into abundance only in the 1970s, when she left for the West. But, in the end, I realized: I did not experience such joy anywhere else as in the Soviet Union.
"On New Year you get a Christmas tree, some kind, the simplest and ugliest, and what a joy it was to decorate it. And now we do it like an automatic machine, ”says the singer.
A swift farewell to the Soviet life began in the 1990s, but many have not broken with it until now. Today it is something like an exotic that not everyone wants to lose.
They tell me how we, it turns out, shitty lived in the Soviet Union. How bad it was. Like there was nothing in the stores. As the regime did not allow a normal life. What villains were the leaders. Etc.
All this sounds from TV screens and on the air of the radio, creeps into the brain from newspaper pages and magazine pages, generally hovering in the air. But something inside me opposes this mythology, simple worldly logic leads to completely different conclusions.
Let's try to break it all down.
I was born in the 60s. Even whole year managed to live under Khrushchev. I didn’t feel the famous “Khrushchev thaw”, and my parents talked about cornmeal, hominy, “kuzkin’s mother” for America and other delights of a “stagnant” time. I can't say anything about it. I did not realize then because.
Kindergarten
When the time came, they sent me to kindergarten. Such a good factory kindergarten. And they fed deliciously - fresh fruits and vegetables in the diet, and they took them to the sea in the summer, and there were plenty of toys. Most importantly, everything is FREE for parents.
But that part of childhood that has lasted so long is ending too.
School
The school was spacious and bright. Later, a new building was added to the post-war building, as well as a gym and an assembly hall. All conditions in general. I remember free milk for elementary school students at the first break and breakfasts for 15 kopecks at the second break. Children from large, single-parent families and whose parents had low wages ate for FREE. Either at the expense of different trade unions, or in some other way. Breakfast and lunch were provided.
At school there was just a bunch of all sorts of circles, where those who wished were literally driven. As you already understood, naturally all this is FREE.
I remember that the parent committee sometimes collected money from parents - for new curtains in the classroom. And all repairs were carried out at the expense of the STATE.
Summer rest
In the senior classes in the summer we were taken to a collective farm, to a labor and recreation camp (LTO). Now they can say: exploitation of child labor. And we really liked it. They harvested when cherries, when beets or tomatoes. Or weeded something. Lunch at the field camp - romance! And after dinner - sport games, trips to the country club, guitar and other pleasures. For us and our parents, everything was FREE, and the collective farm even paid some extra pennies to the school. We were allowed to take from the field "for personal use" up to half a bucket of cherries every day or a bucket of tomatoes. Also kind of like an impromptu salary.
A couple of times I was lucky enough to visit a pioneer camp. The camp was also a factory camp, and the factory was of all-Union significance. Therefore, the children in it were from all over the Soviet Union. So many new friends! With whom we corresponded over the years.
The best schoolchildren were awarded vouchers to Artek (Gurzuf) or to the Young Guard (Odessa).
Sports and leisure
For this, there were departmental and state sports schools, houses of culture and, of course, the Palace of Pioneers. Any sport sections, mugs, cultural and musical all sorts. And don't say it's all FREE. Periodically, coaches and leaders of circles came to the school for "recruitment" - enticing them into these sections.
I also went in for sports. different types until you choose what you like. In all sports sections, sports uniforms were issued for classes. No one demanded to come to circles with their chess, brushes with paints and other equipment necessary for classes.
For athletes in the summer there was a sports camp. It looks like a pioneer, only up to 3 workouts a day, on the beach. We went to competitions monthly, sometimes even 2-3 times a month. Travel, accommodation, meals - AT THE STATE'S EXPENSE.
My passion for music led me to create a vocal and instrumental ensemble (VIA) at school. There were some musical instruments at the school, and the SCHOOL BOUGHT what we lacked. They rehearsed, as it should be, "in a closet behind the assembly hall." Sometimes they competed. True, I had to sing at competitions not what I liked, but patriotic or Komsomol songs.
university
I will not repeat myself, but education in any universities was free. After high school, all graduates were waiting for work. Moreover, it was necessary to work for 3 years. Excellent students with red diplomas received the so-called "free diploma", that is, the right to choose a place of work. In universities, as well as at school, sports and cultural leisure were also fully provided. Plus a hostel for non-residents.
Army
Because I entered military school I know firsthand about the army. The army was what we needed. It had both power and strength, and the most modern weapons. And the BATTLE READINESS, now it’s even hard to believe, is such that after a nightly wake-up call, the entire unit would go to a spare area or an exercise area without any problems, sometimes hundreds or even thousands of kilometers away. It was only later, when serving in the Ukrainian army, that the exercises began to be carried out “on the maps” - they (the exercises) are called command and staff. Or even on computers. The imagination draws a general with a joystick in his hands. But what to do when they don’t give money for full-fledged combat training, with shooting, flying, military campaigns, etc.. The salary (in the army they call it a cash allowance) was very decent, and the service itself was very prestigious. The officer was treated with great respect in society.
Housing
This question has always been before citizens, since the population tends to grow, create new families - cells of society that need new living space. With this in the USSR it was easy. You work or serve, you stand on the apartment register (in the queue for housing). And sooner or later you GET an APARTMENT, square meters, depending on the number of family members. It was possible to stand in line for three years and ten years. Many factories themselves built housing for their workers - entire villages or districts. And with all the infrastructure: schools, kindergartens, shops, roads.
Job
Standard of living, shops, prices
The USSR is often depicted with empty store shelves. This was not to be seen. Not all goods could be bought easily. It was called "deficiency". Imported goods were highly valued. Moreover, it does not matter from which country, capitalist or socialist. The main thing is that it is not like ours.
For food, clothes, household items, my parents, ordinary workers, always had enough wages. Large purchases - TV, refrigerator, furniture - were made on credit. Buying a car - that was the problem! And the price is unattainable, and special queues, quotas, etc.
Goods quality
This is worth talking about separately. We still use many goods produced in the Soviet Union. Made soundly, firmly, thoughtfully, conscientiously. There were also defective things, but not so much. But our light industry constantly lagged behind fashion. First of all, because this very fashion was not a legislator. That's why I worked late. And we were chasing imported clothes, buying “branded” things at exorbitant prices from black marketers.
Medicine
The quality of Soviet medicine is still being debated. In many of its industries, our specialists were the best in the world. This applies to ophthalmology, cardiac surgery. Yes, we had therapy. In some ways lagged behind, not without that. In any case, medicine in Ukraine has not become better, but you have to pay for everything. But preventive medicine, professional examinations for various categories of citizens and, especially, for children - so here the USSR was ahead of the rest.
Industry
The Soviet doctrine of isolation from the rest of the world required complete self-sufficiency in all industries. Therefore, heavy industry, medium engineering (rocket building) was created and brought to the world leaders, and, of course, the strong point of the entire system is the defense industry. Hundreds of research institutes (NII) under the name "mailbox number such and such" worked for the defense industry. Salaries were higher there, and there were more benefits.
Light industry, producing consumer goods, in this situation was always in the tail. Both in terms of quality and quantity of products needed by the population.
Ideology
Ideology permeated all life Soviet man. IN kindergarten- poems about Lenin. At school - Octobrists, then Pioneer and Komsomol. At first everything was real and with youthful fervor, then, in the 80s, with the formalism of Komsomol and party meetings. Permitted and unpermitted topics for conversation. Discussion in the kitchen only with close relatives of “political topics” and fear of the KGB, which I never had to face. Films banned from viewing, records of rock bands and "samizdat" books.
It was difficult to understand that all this crushed, stifled freedom of speech. There was no other reference point, no example for comparison. Therefore, such manifestations of Soviet reality were perceived as certain rules of the game. We knew the rules and played by them. Sometimes pretend, sometimes seriously.
Decay
After Gorbachev's perestroika, accelerations and other political and economic leapfrog, the collapse of the USSR came. And in 1991, at the All-Ukrainian referendum, I, like millions of citizens living on the territory of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, voted for the independence of Ukraine. In those years, thanks to skillfully launched rumors, we all firmly believed that half of the Union was feeding Ukraine. And after the separation, we will ride like cheese in butter. Separate and live their own lives.
If we omit the period of the dashing 90s, when wild capitalism was raging, the deriban of state, public property flourished, inflation and social depression were rampant, now everything seems to have calmed down. Everything is plundered, divided, settled down and brought to the capitalist unfair denominator.
What did we get?
We give children to the few kindergartens that survived from the reprofiling, built back in the Soviet Union. And we pay, we pay, we pay… For all the time of independence, a dozen kindergartens have been built.
Then school and requisitions, requisitions, requisitions. Poor quality of education and paid tutors. Educational circles for money, sports for money, if we can afford it. And if not, then children are brought up by the street, with drug addiction and juvenile delinquency. By the way, so many schools have been built since independence that there will be many fingers of one hand.
If you're lucky, your child will go to university on a budget, if not, then go to private educational institution. Somehow, he will get a specialty, but it is unlikely that he will get a job. And a young specialist will go to trade in the market or work as some kind of office bug, or as a promoter, merchandiser and other riffraff involved in the sale of goods.
And in 90 percent of cases it will be unrealistic for a young family to earn an apartment, they will wait until "grandmother will free the living space."
Factories in Ukraine have either been plundered, destroyed, or passed into private hands and work for "uncles", and not for the public pocket. Accordingly, social programs, construction of housing and sanatoriums for workers and employees are not involved.
Unbiased statistics show that less than fifty kilometers have been built in Ukraine in 20 years railways. Against several thousand kilometers of railway in the Ukrainian SSR during the Soviet Union.
Ideology, on the other hand, we now have the most that neither is, free. And you can say whatever you want. Because everyone is deeply “in the drum” about what and how you talk. Freedom of speech at its finest. And now we have parties like uncut dogs, for every taste. But interests common man none will protect.
And how chic it is in our stores. In bulk: imported clothes, electronic equipment from Europe and Asia, products with GMOs and other chemicals from all over the world!
conclusions
So it turns out that we have acquired as a result of independence. Freedom of speech and abundance of clothes. The first, of course, is a valuable acquisition. Today we can no longer live without freedom of speech. You get used to it quickly, but it is already impossible to get used to it.
Opponents may say that Ukraine will still rise from its knees, develop its economy, and so on. For me, it sounds like a fairy tale, because the age is no longer the one to believe in fairy tales.
The main thing that we have lost is social protection, the protection of the state, the state's concern for its citizens. The social model of the state, when the state provides citizens with a decent education, medicine, pensions, social programs, has been replaced by a liberal one. Liberal is from the word liber ("free"). Citizens are given freedom - do whatever you want, within the law, of course. But the state also takes care of its citizens. Freed up. Live as you want. Learn how you want, get treatment, live where you want or don't live at all.
So, I shitty lived in the days of the Soviet Union??? Reconvince me, please. I do not live in poverty now, I do not have depression and I do not complain about life. But I don't want to believe this lie. The Soviet Union cannot be returned, but why blame it? As if that makes it easier for someone.
We continue to use everything that was created, built and produced in the USSR. We wear out, like old clothes, factories, roads, schools and hospitals, without producing anything in return. Is it still long enough?
5 (100%) 1 vote
“We were lucky that our childhood and youth ended before the government bought FREEDOM from young people in exchange for roller skates, mobile phones, star factories and cool crackers (by the way, soft for some reason) ... With her own consent ... For her own (seemingly) good…” is a fragment from a text called “Generation 76-82”. Those who are now somewhere in their thirties reprint it with great pleasure on the pages of their Internet diaries. He became a kind of manifesto of the generation.
The attitude towards life in the USSR changed from a sharply negative to a sharply positive one. Behind recent times There are a lot of resources on the Internet about Everyday life in Soviet Union.
Unbelievable but true: the sidewalk has an asphalt ramp for wheelchairs. Even now you rarely see this in Moscow
At that time (as far as photographs and films can tell) all the girls wore knee-length skirts. And there were practically no perverts. An amazing thing.
Excellent bus stop sign. And the pictogram of the trolleybus is the same in St. Petersburg today. There was also a tram sign - the letter "T" in a circle.
All over the world, the consumption of various branded drinks was growing, and we had everything from the boiler. This, by the way, is not so bad. And, most likely, humanity will come to this again. All foreign ultra-left and green movements would be delighted to know that in the USSR you had to go for sour cream with your own can. Any jar could be handed over, the sausage was wrapped in paper, and they went to the store with their string bag. The most progressive supermarkets in the world today at the checkout offer to choose between a paper or plastic bag. The most responsible environment classes are returning the yogurt crock to the store.
And before, there was no habit at all to sell containers with the product.
Kharkov, 1924. Tea room. He drank and left. No Lipton bottled.
Moscow, 1959. Khrushchev and Nixon (then Vice President) at the Pepsi stand on the American national exhibition in Sokolniki. On the same day there was a famous dispute in the kitchen. In America, this dispute has received wide coverage, we have not. Nixon talked about how cool it was to have a dishwasher, how much stuff there was in supermarkets.
All this was filmed on color videotape (supertechnology at the time). It is believed that Nixon performed so well at this meeting that it helped him to become one of the presidential candidates for next year(and after 10 years and the president).
In the 60s, a terrible fashion for any machine guns went. The whole world then dreamed of robots, we dreamed of automatic trading. The idea, in a sense, failed due to the fact that it did not take into account Soviet reality. Say, when a potato vending machine pours you rotten potatoes, no one wants to use it. Still, when there is an opportunity to rummage through an earthy container, finding some relatively strong vegetables, there is not only hope for a delicious lunch, but also a training in fighting qualities. The only machines that survived were those that dispensed a product of the same quality - for the sale of soda. Still sometimes there were vending machines for the sale of sunflower oil. Only soda survived.
1961st. VDNH. Still, before the start of the fight against excesses, we did not lag behind at all in graphic and aesthetic development from the West.
In 1972, the Pepsi company agreed with the Soviet government that Pepsi would be bottled "from concentrate and using PepsiCo technology", and in return the USSR would be able to export Stolichnaya vodka.
1974th. Some boarding house for foreigners. Polka dots "Globe" top right. I still have such a jar unopened - I keep thinking: will it explode or not? Just in case, I keep it wrapped in a bag away from books. It’s also scary to open it - what if I suffocate?
From the very right edge, next to the scales, you can see a cone for selling juice. Empty, really. There was no habit in the USSR to drink juice from the refrigerator, no one was chic. The saleswoman opened three-liter jar poured it into a cone. And from there - in glasses. As a child, I still found such cones in our vegetable shop on Shokalsky Drive. When I was drinking my favorite apple juice from such a cone, some thief stole my Kama bike from the store's dressing room, I will never forget.
1982 Selection of alcohol in the dining car of the Trans-Siberian train. For some reason, many foreigners have a fixed idea - to travel along the Trans-Siberian Railway. Apparently, the idea that you can not get out of a moving train for a week seems magical to them.
Please note that abundance is apparent. No exquisite dry red wines, which today, even in an ordinary tent, at least 50 types are sold. No XO and VSOP. However, even ten years after this picture was taken, the author was quite satisfied with Agdam port wine.
1983 The worm of consumerism has settled in the naive and pure souls of the Russians. True, the bottle, young man, must be returned to whom she said. I drank, enjoyed the warm, return the container. They will take her back to the factory.
In stores, Pinocchio or Bell was usually on sale. "Baikal" or "Tarhun" was also not always sold. And when Pepsi was exhibited in some supermarket, it was taken as a reserve - for a birthday, for example, to be displayed later.
1987th. An aunt sells greens in a dairy store window. Cashiers are visible behind the glass. The very ones that had to come well prepared - to know all the prices, the quantity of goods and the department numbers.
1987th. Volgograd. In the American archive, this photo is accompanied by a comment of the century: "A woman on a street in Volgograd sells some sort of liquid for the invalids of the Great Patriotic War (the Soviet name for World War II)." Apparently, at the same time in 87, they translated the inscription from the barrel, when there was no one else to ask that WWII invalids were served out of turn. By the way, these inscriptions are the only documentary recognition that there are queues in the USSR.
By the way, in those days there was no struggle between merchandisers, there were no POS materials, no one hung wobblers on the shelves. No one would have thought of giving away free samples. If the store was given a beach ball with the Pepsi logo, he considered it an honor. And exhibited in the window sincerely and for nothing.
1990th. Pepsi vending machine in the subway. Rare copy. Here are the machines that are on the right, they met everywhere in the center - they sold the newspapers Pravda, Izvestia, Moskovskiye Novosti. By the way, all soda machines (and slot machines too) always had the inscription “Please! Do not omit commemorative and bent coins. It is understandable with bent ones, but commemorative coins cannot be omitted, because they differed from other coins of the same denomination in weight and sometimes in size.
1991st. Veteran drinks soda with syrup. Someone had already scratched the Depeche Moda logo on the middle machine. Glasses were always shared. You come up, wash it in the machine itself, then put it under the nozzle. Fastidious aesthetes carried folding glasses with them, which had the peculiarity of folding in the process. The photo is good because all the details are characteristic and recognizable. And a payphone half-box, and a Zaporozhets headlight.
Until 1991, American photographers followed the same routes. Almost every photo can be identified - this is on Tverskaya, this is on Herzen, this is about Bolshoi Theater, this is from the Moscow hotel. And then everything became possible.
Recent history.
1992 near Kyiv. This is no longer the USSR, just by the way I had to. A dude poses for an American photographer, voting with a bottle of vodka to trade it for gasoline. It seems to me that the photographer himself issued the bottles. However, a bottle of vodka for a long time was a kind of currency. But in the mid-nineties, all plumbers suddenly stopped taking bottles as payment, because there were no fools left - vodka is sold everywhere, and you know how much it costs. So everything has gone to the money. Today, a bottle is given only to a doctor and a teacher, and even then with cognac.
With food in the late USSR, everything was pretty bad. The chance to buy something tasty in a regular store was close to zero. Queues lined up for tasty treats. Delicious food could be given "in order" - there was a whole system of "order tables", which were actually centers for the distribution of goods for their own. In the order table, he could count on tasty things: a veteran (moderately), a writer (not bad), a party worker (also not bad).
Residents of closed cities in general, by Soviet standards, rolled around like cheese in butter in Christ's bosom. But they were very bored in the cities and they were restricted to travel abroad. However, almost all of them were restricted to travel abroad.
Life was good for those who could be of some help. Let's say the director of the Wanda store was a very respected person. Super VIP by recent standards. And the butcher was respected. And the head of the department in " Children's world»respected. And even a cashier at the Leningradsky railway station. All of them could "get" something. Acquaintance with them was called "connections" and "ties". The director of the grocery was reasonably confident that his children would go to a good university.
1975 year. Bakery. I felt that the cuts on the loaves were made by hand (now the robot is already sawing).
1975 year. Sheremetyevo-1. Here, by the way, not much has changed. In the cafe you could find chocolate, beer, sausages with peas. Sandwiches did not exist, there could be a sandwich, which is a piece white bread, at one end of which there was a spoonful of red caviar, and at the other - one coil butter, which everyone pushed and trampled with a fork under the calf as best they could.
Bread shops were of two types. The first one is with a counter. Behind the saleswoman, there were loaves and loaves in containers. The freshness of bread was determined in the process of questioning those who had already bought bread or in a dialogue with the saleswoman:
- For 25 a fresh loaf?
— Normal.
Or, if the buyer did not cause rejection:
- Delivered at night.
The second type of bakery is self-service. Here the loaders rolled up containers to special openings, on the other side of which there was shopping room. There were no saleswomen, only cashiers. It was cool because you could poke the bread with your finger. Of course, it was not allowed to touch the bread; for this, special forks or spoons were hung on uneven ropes. The spoons were still back and forth, and it was unrealistic to determine the freshness with a fork. Therefore, each took a hypocritical device in his hands and gently turned his finger to check in the usual way how well it was pressed. It's not clear through the spoon.
Fortunately, there was no individual packaging of bread.
Better a loaf that someone gently touched with a finger than tasteless gutta-percha. Yes, and it was always possible, after checking the softness with your hands, to take a loaf from the back row, which no one had yet reached.
1991st. Soon there will be consumer protection, which, together with care, will kill the taste. Halves and quarters were prepared with technical side. Sometimes it was even possible to persuade to cut off half of the white:
Who will buy the second one? - asked the buyer from the back room.
No one gave packages at the checkout either - everyone came with his own. Or with a string bag. Or so, carried in the hands.
The grandmother is holding bags of kefir and milk (1990). Then there was no Tetrapac yet, there was some kind of Elopak. On the package was written “Elopak. Patented." The blue triangle indicates the side from which the bag must be opened. When we first purchased the packaging line, it came with a barrel of the right glue. I found those times when the package opened in the right place without torment. Then the glue ran out, it was necessary to open it from two sides, and then fold one side back. The blue triangles remained, but since then no one has bought glue, there are few idiots.
By the way, at that time there was no food packaging additional information- no address, no phone number of the manufacturer. Only GOST. And there were no brands. Milk was called milk, but differed in fat content. My favorite is in the red bag, five percent.
Dairy products were also sold in bottles. The contents differed in the color of the foil: milk - silver, acidophilus - blue, kefir - green, fermented baked milk - raspberry, etc.
Joyful queue for eggs. There could still be Krestyanskoye oil on the refrigerated display case - it was cut with wire, then with a knife into smaller pieces, wrapped immediately in oil paper. In the queue, everyone stands with checks - before that, they stood in line at the cashier. The saleswoman had to be told what to give, she looked at the figure, counted everything in her head or on the accounts, and if it converged, she gave out the purchase (“let go”). The check was strung on a needle (it stands on the left side of the counter).
In theory, they were obliged to sell even one egg. But buying one egg was considered a terrible insult to the saleswoman - she could yell at the buyer in response.
Those who took three dozen were given a cardboard pallet without question. Whoever took a dozen was not supposed to have a pallet, he put everything in a bag (there were also special wire cages for aesthetes).
This is a cool photo (1991), here on background You can see video tapes.
Good meat could be obtained through an acquaintance or bought in the market. But everything in the market was twice as expensive as in the store, so not everyone went there. "Market meat" or "market potatoes" is the highest praise for products.
Soviet chicken was considered to be of poor quality. Here is the Hungarian chicken - it's cool, but it has always been in short supply. The word "cool" was not yet in wide use (that is, it was, but in relation to the rocks)
Until 1990, it was impossible to imagine that a foreign photojournalist would be allowed to shoot in a Soviet store (especially on the other side of the counter). Everything became possible in 1990.
Outdoors at the same time, the color of the meat was more natural.
There are two chickens on the counter - imported and Soviet. Import says:
- Look at you, all blue, not plucked, skinny!
“But I died a natural death.
The USSR was a multinational country with the proclaimed principle of friendship among peoples. And this friendship was not always just a declaration. Otherwise, in a country inhabited by more than 100 different nations and nationalities, it was impossible. The equality of all peoples in the formal absence of a titular nation - this is the basis for the propaganda myth about "a single historical community - the Soviet people."
Nevertheless, all representatives of a single historical community were required to have passports, in which there was the notorious "fifth column" to indicate the citizen's nationality in the document. How was nationality determined in the USSR?
According to the passport
Passportization of the country's population began in the early 1930s and ended shortly before the war. Each passport necessarily indicated the social status, place of residence (registration) and nationality. Moreover, then, before the war, according to the secret order of the NKVD, nationality was to be determined not by self-determination of a citizen, but based on the origin of the parents. The police had instructions to check all cases of discrepancy between the surname and the nationality declared by the citizen. Statisticians and ethnographers compiled a list of 200 nationalities, and when receiving a passport, a person received one of the nationalities from this list. It was on the basis of these very passport data that mass deportations of peoples were carried out in the 1930s and later. According to the estimates of historians, representatives of 10 nationalities were subjected to total deportation in the USSR: Koreans, Germans, Ingrian Finns, Karachays, Kalmyks, Chechens, Ingush, Balkars, Crimean Tatars and Meskhetian Turks. In addition, there was an implicit, but quite obvious anti-Semitism, and the practice of repression against representatives of other peoples, such as Poles, Kurds, Turks, etc. Since 1974, the nationality in the passport was indicated on the basis of the application of the person himself. Then there were jokes like this: “Papa is Armenian, mother is Jewish, who will be their son? Of course, Russian! However, in most cases, nationality was still indicated by one of the parents.
By mom and dad
In the vast majority of cases, a citizen determined his nationality by the nationality of his father. In the USSR, patriarchal traditions were quite strong, according to which the father determined both the surname and the nationality of the child. However, there were other options as well. For example, many, if they had to choose between "Jew" and "Russian", chose "Russian", even if their mother was Russian. This was done because the “fifth column” made it possible for officials to discriminate against representatives of some national minorities, including Jews. However, after the Jews were allowed to leave for Israel in 1968, the opposite situation was sometimes observed. Some Russians looked for a Jew among their relatives, and made incredible efforts to change the inscription in the "fifth column". Nationalities and during this period of free national self-identification were determined according to the lists of officially recognized peoples living in the USSR. In 1959, there were 126 names on the list, in 1979 - 123, and in 1989 - 128. At the same time, some peoples, for example, the Assyrians, were not on these lists, while in the USSR there were people who defined their nationality in this way .
By face
There is a sad anecdote about a Jewish pogrom. They beat a Jew, and the neighbors told him: “How is it, you bought yourself a passport, with the “fifth column” where Russian is written!”. To which he sadly replies: “Yes, but they beat me not by my passport, but by my face!” Actually, this anecdote quite accurately illustrates the situation in law enforcement agencies, where they taught to determine nationality in this way: not by a passport, but by a face . And if, in general, it is easy to distinguish a gypsy from a Yakut, then it will be somewhat more difficult to understand where the Yakuts and where the Buryats are. But how to understand where is Russian, and where is Latvian or Belarusian? There were whole tables with ethnic types of faces that allowed policemen, KGB officers and other structures to accurately distinguish people "not by passport." Of course, this required a good memory for faces and observation, but who said that it would be easy to understand the nationality of people in a country where more than 100 peoples live?
At the behest of the heart
The Fifth Column was abolished in 1991. Now, in the passport and in other documents, nationality is not indicated or indicated in special inserts, only at will. And now there are no lists of nationalities from which a citizen must choose either. The removal of restrictions on national self-identification led to an interesting result. During the 2010 census, some citizens indicated their belonging to such peoples as "Cossack", "Pomor", "Scythian" and even "elf".
