The Mail-Journal, Volume 22, Number 46, Milford, Kosciusko County, 13 November 1985 — Page 5

Third in a series:

Circus highlights journalists' tour to Moscow

By DELLA AND ARCH BAUMGARTNER MOSCOW, Russia, Friday, Oct. 4 — Our group of touring American journalists boarded a Russian train in the big Leningrad railway station late Sunday evening. It was in the waning hours of Arch’s birthday, and cause for a little celebration once we were situated in our compartments.

It was a first experience for all of us on a Russian train and for the most part we found it satisfactory. “Everything but the restrooms,” someone was in a hurry to mention. Rest rooms are a real problem throughout Russia, as they are in many foreign countries ih the eyes of Americans. The car we were in was 10 compartments, two to a compartment, with a minimal restroom facility on each end. It was a rolling night, as one would dxpect, but better than sitting up. We left Leningrad at 10:30 p.m. and rolled into Moscow at 7:30 Monday morning. We were taken to the large Intourist Hotel on Gorky Street where we found accommodations quite satisfactory. The place is busy as a bee with guests of many nationalities. One knew immediately he was in Russia by the presence of uniformed policemen everywhere. They appeared quiet, unsmiling, stoic, and appeared to pay little attention to anyone: giving one the feeling he had better not try anything! Moscow Really Big Moscow is one of the big cities in the world, with a populationof eight million. In area covered, it is about the largest city in the world. To our surprise, there are a lot of people on the streets, the stores are jammed, some with long lines, but there isn’t all that much merchandise to choose from. Clerks stand around arranging things on the shelves, but making no attempt to sell anyone anything. “No sense of ‘selling’ as we know it in the United States,” someone commented. And why should they merchandise ; they receive the same pay if they make a sale or not. Everyone works for the government, if one can imagine that! The average pay in Russia is about 177 rubles per month (some of course make more), but it’s easy to see this won’t go very far once basic essentials are taken out. (Note: a ruble is valued at about $1.25 U.S.) And yet there are many people with huge savings, we were told by Roxinne Erbasti, Associated Press Bureau Chief here in Moscow. She said they receive about two per cent interest on their savings. She met with us

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CHILDREN’S MUSEUM — Russians pay attention to the education of their children. The Children’s Museum is a good example. This large building accommodates all forms of the arts. Located on Lenin Hill in Moscow, it attracts large audiences.

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BACKGROUND BRIEFING — The best, most thorough background briefing on life in Russia came from Richard Comb, aide to the U.S. Ambassador, held at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. We noticed an armed guard outside the embassy door as we left, “for the protection of” Americans coming and going.

MOSCOW CIRCUS — Mythical and magical would only partly ” describe the famous Moscow Circus, rated as one of the very best in the world. A one-ring circus, it covered all phases of what we think of circus acts. We were all delighted.

Tuesday morning at the hotel, and told us there are 30 U.S. correspondents in Moscow, working on a basis similar to Russian correspondents in the U.S. They have a special press compound, and have limited contact with the man in the street. She advised us not to pay too much attention to official pronouncements but to talk to people we meet on the street and in stores. Miss Erbasti said, “A journalist can live here a long time and not really know Russia.” She said there is always the feeling of surveillance, a sort of neighborhood watch. She said no one really knows what military expenditures are here, since they are woven into the fabric of government statistics. Things like troop numbers in Afghanistan are virtually hidden from the public, and if anything is mentioned of this campaign, it is that the Russians were invited into the country to help stabilize it. We received a copy of Pravada (Truth) from the bus driver, and found it to be a six-page tabloid paper — no photos, no advertisements, no funnies. Quite dour, in fact. 'Teach The Children Ofieming for sure: Russia is teaching their children of the perils of war, perhaps thus justifying its social austerity. Teachers appear at monuments with small groups of children, lecturing them on Russia’s glorious past. Russia lost 20 million soldiers and starved people in World War 11, while the United States lost 400,000, a ratio of 50 to 1, and so it is understandable that the war years of 1941-1945 really ravaged this vast country. During that period the United States had only 13,500,000 under arms in the army, navy, air force, marines and coast guard. In a real sense America provided the tools of war with its mighty convoys to Russia, but the Russians were in the trenches really until 1944 and the Second Front. The children are also taken to the museums, the former churches, but seldom to church services. Russia has had a wonderful religious history until the communists came into power. But now it is a godless society, where worship among the older generation is tolerated. But if young couples take their children

to church services, they are t quietly tapped on the shoulder < and asked why they are there. ] And if they teach religion to their | children, they are inviting a jail sentence. ’ Information is limited in i Russia, but they do have state i run and state controlled i newspapers and television. On the whole, people are better educated now than in the past. Somehow the/ hear of a British 1 miner who is on strike, and yet he owns an automobile, while he is working steady and has no car. This comes home to them. Health care is free, Miss Erbasti told us, but nurses make only 90 rubles per month. Remember, the average is 177 rubles per month. Russians have a hate/love relationship with Americans. They hate us as an opposition world power, but envy our lifestyle, our material things and our frppHnms It’s an interesting country. One ‘ sees soldiers everywhere, then is told there are only 18 million Russian communists out of a total population of 170 million Russians. At our meeting with several members of the Russian press, we were told one must be sponsored to become a member of the communist party. Big deal. Lousy Rest Rooms We can’t understand their public restrooms for the life of us. For the most part, they are dirty, the stench unbearable, and if they have any toilet paper at all, it is of the slick, National Geographic type paper. (Note: If you’re traveling to Russia, plan to bring lots of pocket-size kleenex along.) But about as much as anything, we could barely tolerate the smoking in the restrooms. At the circus we attended one night the restrooms were practically shoulder to shoulder with cigarette-puffing wierdos. Fifteen minutes in there would induce a chronic case of emphysema. And now get this - they pay up to sls per carton. This may not sound like much to an American addicted to the habit, but on these meager wages, it’s considerable. Nix On Booze The problem of alcoholism in Russia borders on a national disgrace, and the Russians know it. We heard this everywhere we went. Perhaps this is because their new General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev has issued a crackdown on alcoholism. At the U.S. Embassy, the Deputy Chief of Mission, Richard Comb, told us it was nothing to see Russians drink vodka by the water glass. It was something of a contest among comrades to see who could keep on his feet the longest. But no more. Chiev Gorbachev had tightened the screws. Where alcoholism was once tolerated, and a drunk on the street was either taken home by the police or thrown into the slammer for the night, now he is subject to a fine. The new regulations on drinking are firm: No alcohol of any kind is sold prior to 2 p.m. and no alcohol served at government luncheons. Officials know it will be difficult to curtail drinking among the present generation, but the next generation will not have this problem if it is addressed now.A Russian Ministry ' Yesterday morning (Thursday, Oct. 3) we met with several members of the Russian Foreign Ministry, comparable to the American State Department. Much of the discussion was concerning arms reduction, since this is a topic that will be of overriding concern at the Summit Meeting coming up at Geneva, Switzerland, November 19 and 20 between Gorbachev and our American President, Ronald Reagan. Gorbachev has had the subject of nuclear freeze on the front burner, taking the iniative (and thus the world headlines) on the subject. He had a lengthy interview in TIME magazine, and only yesterday in Paris he captured world attention by offering new nuclear limitations initiatives. The four men we spoke to at the • Russian Foreign Ministry seemed to agree that verification abj solutely must accompany any » such freeze and eventual reduction. * They decried the uncertainty of I the American elections. One I speaker said the two years before an American election and one I year after are “absolutely lost.” They said there has been such a radical shift in American foreign " policy in the last 10 years. America cries “unacceptable” about Russian assistance to I Cuba, Grenada and Nicaragua, ’ yet the U.S. has the USSR ringed with rockets in Europe and | elsewhere. The United States wants to show it is the strongest I military power in the world. And I this creates most of our problems with your country, we were told. I Another hard one to swallow: That the Soviet press is as iny dependent of its government as is n the U.S. press of its government. >f And another: That many U.S. political leaders appear on Soviet

television. We remember President Nixon talking to the Russian people via television some years go, but little else. We are for understanding between two peoples and through this we seek peace, and not through political superiority, we heard. Our Ministry hosts told us the United States was in Afghanistan first, then the USSR came in to

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GORKY PARK — Spacious Gorky Park is located not far from downtown Moscow and is popular for its wide open spaces. Here a young dad is on an outing with his youngster amid a flock of everpresent pigeons. Parks abound in Moscow as well as in other Russian cities.

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“TELL THE children,” this photo would suggest. Daily we saw small groups of school children around historic monuments with their teachers, and the lesson of the Great Patriotic War (WW II) was being told and retold. After all, Leningrad alone lost a million people, military and Civilian, being starved or killed in this historic battle. It’s patriotism at its highest level.

Achievement record workshop

By RONALD W. HOYT Extension Agent, 4-H and Youth County 4-H members who plan to participate in the Achievement Record program in 1986 are invited to attend the 4-H Achievement Record Workshop, which will be held on Thursday, Nov. 14, beginning at 7 p.m., in the Justice Building meeting room in Warsaw. This workshop will be a valuable learning experience for those 4-H members who will be compiling 4-H Achievement Records for the first time, as well as 4-Hers who are experienced in doing record books. Theta will be separate sessions for both junior and senior participants and a special opportunity for 4-H members to ask specific questions about their records.

fl QqCIAL SECUjtgyy) M I It

Q: My son is going to be 18 next month and he got a notice that his social checks will stop. He is just a junior in high school. Can’t he get checks until he graduates? A: A child can receive social security checks up until they reach age 19 if they are a full time high school student. Contact any social security office and they will help him complete the necessary form to keep the checks coming. Q: I recently discovered 1 have a heart condition that requires medication. My druggist said medicare would not pay for it. Why not?

A: Medicare does not cover prescriptions, it is felt this would make the cost of the medicare program prohibitive.

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aid the rebels. “We don’t want our troops there; in fact, the United Nations is working on a settlement to that problem. We have the impression the United States doesn’t want the Soviet troops out, that you want to make Afghanistan ‘our Vietnam’.” Russian Circus But enough of politics and things of a serious nature. There’s more to Russian life than all of that heavy talk.

National 4-H report forms, instructions, junior 4-H report forms, former state winning books and former winning junior books will all be available at the workshop. The 4-H members are encouraged to attend, and reminded to bring their green record folder “My Record of 4-H Achievement” and any work on their Achievement Record Books along. 4-H CALENDAR NOVEMBER 13 — County Achievement Banquet, 7:30 p.m., Women’s Building 14 — Achievement Record Workshop, 7 p.m., Justice Building 14 — 4-H Beef committee meeting, 7:30 p.m., extension office 18 — Junior leader meeting, 7:30 p.m., Justice Building 19 — 4-H Goat committee meeting, 7 p.m., Bonnie Hile’s home 26 — Extension board meeting, 7:30 p.m., Justice Building lounge Busy Homemakers met in November The Busy Homemakers Club of Milford met on Wednesday, Nov. 6, at the home of Mrs. Ralph Tusing. Anna Cripe was co-hostess. “America The Beautiful” was sung by the group. Mrs. Velma Pinkerton read “In The Fruit Room” for devotions and gave several hints using vinegar. Ten members answered roll call by giving the name of a Christmas gift they would like to receive. Mrs. Vernon May read “A Poem Os Thanksgiving.” The door prize was won by Mrs. William Motts of Elkhart. The-yearly books for 1986 were handed out by Mrs. Vernon May. Next meeting will be op Wednesday, Dec. 4. The club will eat out and go shopping.

On Wednesday night our group of 23 attended a performance of the new circus on Lenin Hills, and saw what was a most magnificent performance. It would be difficult to describe adequately, other than to say it was easily the best and most professional circus w 6 had ever seen anywhere. We hadn’t seen a lot, yet we did see a circus at Shanghai, China, which rated a high billing. Yet this could not compare to the Russian circus. It had high wire acts that were breathtaking, balancing acts (and now we know where Nadia Cominiche came from), juggling acts, horse-riding acts, a trained seal act, water ballet. And more — much more. And if anyone is under the delusion that all Russian girls are fat and dumpy they can dispel the thought right now. At intermission, there was a mad rush to the many ice cream vendors in the lobby where ice cream cones were frozen and ready for the rush. Here was our first real encounter with the heavy smoking in the restrooms. “There should be a law,” we thought. Our tickets to the circus was paid for as part of our tour cost, so we had to ask the price. “About $2 American,” we were told. The one ring circus was held in a large round arena which seated an estimate 4,- to 5,000. Childrens’ Musical Theater Yesterday afternoon we went back to the same area on Lenin Hills to see a performance at the Moscow State Childrens’ Musical Theater. It was located next door to the circular building where we saw the circus. It’s another high tribute to the attention the Russian people are paying to their youngsters. The absolutely magnificent building cost 15 million rubles, and cost I*2 million rubles a year to support. The halls have paintings to appeal to youngsters and figures oi animals and clowns to excite their curiosity. Special rooms are set aside for youngsters of various ages, and on one wall are drawings made by the children of their impressions of various plays and characters. We had the pleasure of attending a performance at the theater, which we all enjoyed. The attention and obedience of the youngsters was commendable, and they laughed their little hearts out at the performance. Cost per child for a performance runs from 100 kopeks to one ruble and 20 kopeks. We were back at our hotel on Gorky Street in time to join the crowd to visit Lenin’s Tomb and later for dinner. Our dinners, by the way, are very good at the Intourist Hotel, usually accompanied by bottles of warm beer and Pepsi Cola. The company that has that Pepsi-Cola franchise in Russia has a good thing going. More on Lenin’s Tomb later.

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Wed., November 13,1985 — THE MAIL-JOURNAL

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