I made some remark about life being tough in Soviet times and especially while Stalin was still alive. “There was a woman who stole one and a half kilos of grain from the kolkhoz,” she said, recalling that she was sent to jail. I misunderstood her gist. I thought she was citing this as an example of an unjust system and tough times. No. The point was that then you got jailed for any tiny infraction of the law, but now people “steal millions and nothing happens to them.”
