Random Things You Didn't Know About Daily Life In Soviet Union (13 items)

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  (#8) The Ruling Elite Ate And Drank Like Kings

  Konstantin M. Simis reported in 1984 that the "ruling elite" in Moscow, despite there being a nationwide food shortage, ate like kings using the so-called Kremlyovskaya stolovaya , or "Kremlin canteen."

  The "canteen" was a "network of special stores" that sold food "of particularly high quality" to those with special passes: "sausages, fish delicacies, cheeses, bread, vodka, cakes" as well as fruits and vegetables "produced and grown on state farms that supply the [canteen] system exclusively." There was also American cigarettes, Scotch whisky, English gin, and pharmacies that sold prescriptions you couldn't find anywhere else in the country.
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  (#3) Pepsi Came To The USSR Before Coke Or McDonald's

  McDonald's and Coca-Cola are often cited as being the two American companies with the most worldwide influence and reach, but did you know that Pepsi-Cola made it into the USSR first? It's true: Pepsi was available in the Soviet Union 21 years before McDonald's and 16 years before Coca-Cola.

  It had a lot to do with Pepsi's appearance at an exhibit at Moscow's Sokolniki Park in 1959, where the soda was given out for free in disposable paper cups. The Soviets struck a deal with Pepsi a decade later that also included the distribution rights for Stoli vodka.
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  (#4) Cars Were Meant To Last A Lifetime

  According to Russian author Alexander Kabakov, from the 1930s to the 1950s especially, car owners in the Soviet Union took great pride in making their vehicles last as long as possible - and in some cases, they lasted a lifetime.

  Quality control was a huge part of it, and so was build quality. Kabakov says the metal frames were so thick coming off the line, they were basically "resistant to corrosion." 
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  (#1) Beer Wasn't Considered Alcohol

  It sounds wild, but it took until 2011 for beer to be defined as an alcoholic beverage in Russia. Prior to that, legislation classified it as a "foodstuff," meaning it could be sold like a soft drink. This meant it could be sold in street kiosks and could be imbibed openly in just about any public place in the country.

  During the Soviet era, Mikhail Gorbachev learned the hard way not to mess with alcohol sales: historians think his attempt to ban liquor "hastened his downfall."
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  (#7) There Weren't Soup Kitchens For The Poor

  A New York Times feature from 1989 reveals quite a bit about the Soviet attitude regarding the poor and the homeless in the last few years of the USSR. One Western diplomat is quoted as saying that Soviet officials stopped gathering statistics on poverty "because they insisted it simply did not exist."

  When presented with the idea of combating the issue with American-style "soup kitchens," one Soviet official said: ''We are opposed to this system ... where poor people get free dinner. Psychologically, it's a strange idea to us. We will not consider such a variant." In 1989, it took a Soviet worker 10 times longer to earn a pound of meat than it did the average American.
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  (#5) Buying Groceries Took Forever

  Everyone's heard of long Soviet bread lines, but that's not even the half of it. Even a self-proclaimed "well off" American student living in Moscow in the mid-'60s says that getting any food at all was a tremendous chore. Dr. Naomi F. Collins says that "exhaustion" followed her in the "efforts of daily living." Even buying staples like cheese and rice "took forever" because you had to stand in long lines for nearly every item you wanted.

  Even after waiting, you didn't get the item directly; you had to get vouchers at each "station" and pay a cashier before going back to the stations and picking up your items.

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