Michael’s Reviews > Second-Hand Time > Status Update
Michael
is on page 184 of 695
…Comrade Marshal, how does it make you feel to know that you received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for Afghanistan? Academician Sakharov gave a number: there were one million Afghan casualties…
Do you think I'm happy? I followed orders, but all I found was blood… We feared that the whole Islamic world would rise up against the USSR. We were told firmly, "Since when do our generals interfere in politics?"
— Sep 06, 2024 09:48AM
Do you think I'm happy? I followed orders, but all I found was blood… We feared that the whole Islamic world would rise up against the USSR. We were told firmly, "Since when do our generals interfere in politics?"
Like flag
Michael’s Previous Updates
Michael
is on page 166 of 695
… They could kill you for anything… If you hadn't been born in the right place, if you didn't speak the right language. If someone with a machine gun simply didn't like the looks of you… How had we lived before then? On holidays, our first toast had always been, "to friendship," and "es kes sirum em" ("I love you" in Armenian). Or "Man sani seviram" ("I love you" in Azerbaijani). We'd lived happily side by side…
— Sep 06, 2024 09:28AM
Michael
is on page 158 of 695
For two days, I deliberated: I'm a Young Pioneer, so it's my duty to go to the NKVD and tell them about what Vanya said. I have to file a report. This was a very serious matter -- it really was! ...Really, I was ready! Then, home from school one day, I found Vanya lying on the ground, drunk in the building entrance. He'd tumbled off his wheelchair and couldn't get up. I took pity on him.
— Sep 03, 2024 05:06AM
Michael
is on page 157 of 695
I was proud of our neighbour Vanya, he was a real hero! He returned from the war without any legs. He pushed himself around in a homemade wooden wheelchair.
A few days after Stalin died, I saw him, and he went, 'What do you know, Margaritka, that you-know-what finally croaked…' That's what he said -- about my Stalin! I tore my felt boots out of his hands: 'How dare you? You're a hero! With a medal.'
— Sep 03, 2024 05:05AM
A few days after Stalin died, I saw him, and he went, 'What do you know, Margaritka, that you-know-what finally croaked…' That's what he said -- about my Stalin! I tore my felt boots out of his hands: 'How dare you? You're a hero! With a medal.'
Michael
is on page 136 of 695
Our neighbour hid two little Jewish boys in her barn -- adorable kids... Three Germans showed up on a black motorcycle with their big black dog. Someone had informed on them… There are always people willing to do things like this, people whose souls are black. They're alive, but it's like they are soulless… Their hearts are medical, not human hearts. They have no pity for anyone.
— Aug 29, 2024 04:24PM
Michael
is on page 97 of 695
One day, parliamentarians showed up at the district Party committee headquarters demanding, 'Show us your special stores! You always have plenty of food to eat while our children are fainting from hunger at school.' They found neither mink coats nor black caviar in our cafeteria, but they still wouldn't believe us: 'You're deceiving the simple people!' The ground started shaking. Gorbachev was weak.
— Aug 25, 2024 12:15PM
Michael
is on page 93 of 695
"What is our national idea now besides salami?"
Salami is the focal point for selling collective wealth for aimless consumerism, it has been brought up about a dozen times.
— Aug 25, 2024 12:14PM
Salami is the focal point for selling collective wealth for aimless consumerism, it has been brought up about a dozen times.
Michael
is on page 88 of 695
A lot of things about the system were stupid, I don't deny it, but who will even listen to the man in the street today? Who needs him? Remember the Soviet place names -- Metallurgists' Avenue, Enthusiasts' Avenue, Factory Street, Proletariat Street… They're renaming the streets: Merchant, Middle Class, Nobleman Street… I've even seen 'Prince's salami' and 'General's wine'. A cult of money and success.
— Aug 25, 2024 11:55AM
Michael
is on page 70 of 695
"I remember seeing Gaidar on TV saying 'Learn how to sell… The market will save us…' You buy a bottle of mineral water on one corner and sell it on another - that's business. The people listened, bewildered. I would come home, lock the door, and weep. All of it scared my mother so much, she ended up having a stroke."
— Aug 19, 2024 12:41PM
Michael
is on page 57 of 695
"You want to talk about the nineties... I'd say it was revolting. People's minds flipped 180 degrees. Some couldn't handle it, they went crazy, the psych wards were overflowing. I visited a friend of mine in one of them. One guy was screaming, 'I'm Stalin! I'm Stalin!' while another one screamed, 'I'm Berezovsky! I'm Berezovsky!' The whole ward was filled with these Stalins and Berezovskys."
— Aug 19, 2024 12:25PM
Michael
is on page 46 of 695
"I'm a sovok, huh? And my parents are sovoks, and my grandparents, too? My grandfather the sovok died defending Moscow in '41… My sovok grandmother fought with the partisans… The liberals are working off their piece of the pie... I hate them all: gorbachev, shevardnadze, yakovlev -- don't capitalize their names, that's how much I hate them all. I don't want to live in America, I want to live in the USSR."
— Aug 19, 2024 12:21PM
