More first hand information from my friend Anna! Share if you dare because this is where we are headed. Soviet elite was not just the prominent Communist party functionaries. Celebrities were considered elite - actors, gymnasts, musicians, ballet dancers. They played footsies with Kremlin and served as "palace entertainment". This circle also included accomplished academics, writers, tv personalities, kosmonauts, elite doctors, ministry and upper echelon government workers, etc. They lived in special apartments in downtown and other prestigious Moscow or Leningrad neighborhoods, shopped in special stores, went to Kremlin hospitals, their kids went to Kremlin kindergarten, etc. They were allowed to travel abroad (under KGB supervision) and had access to information from outside. They all had summer houses in suburb and good cars. Because they were "somebodys" they were allowed much more than an average bear and where ever they went, the obnoxious bureaucrats treated them with care because you never know who those "special" people might know and be related to. They were given priorities and indulgences. A lot of those who ended up here in the US are the people who were part of that system and at some point just could not live with the reality of it. A lot of them are dissidents, some are Jews that got pushed out, some saw a different life abroad when they were allowed to visit other countries (mostly Eastern Block and occasionally France, Germany or even USA) and understood that being at the top of that pyramid in USSR equals being at the bottom everywhere else. Nick and his family were elite, me and my family were average Soviet worker bees. There was a huge difference between the two of our worlds in that "fair", "egalitarian", "socially just" cage. At the end of the day we all ended up here as dissidents.
Posted on: Wed, 14 Aug 2013 05:47:34 +0000
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