New Owners of McDonald’s Demolishing Toilets as Alien to Russian Traditions, Muscovites Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 30 – In an anecdote which captures both what Russians think the introduction of McDonald’s meant in their country and what its demise says about the current Kremlin obsession with traditions, some Muscovites say that the first thing the new Russian owners of these restaurants are doing is destroying the toilets in them.

            That is because, residents of the capital now joke, toilets in restaurants kept as pristine as those in the Western owned franchise are “a phenomenon alien to Russian national traditions,” Russian journalist Tatyana Pushkaryova reports in her latest collection of anecdotes and jokes (publizist.ru/blogs/107374/43045/-). Among the best of the rest are the following:

·       There are reports that the Russian defense industry is now putting suicide pilots on its missiles because it can no longer import the computer chips it had relied on as guidance systems. Unfortunately, many of the pilots are prisoners who skipped geography lessons, and the accuracy of their targeting leaves much to be desired.

 ·       Socialism clearly has been restored in Russia. The very same rock groups which were banned in 1982 are now being banned once again.

 ·       An Azerbaijani who arrived in Moscow and displayed a sign saying “I am Zamir” so that he could be picked up was immediately arrested for discrediting the Russian armed forces because the police assumed that Zamir stood for za mir (“for peace”) rather than being the man’s name.

 ·       Putin’s visit to a military hospital for those wounded in Ukraine has revealed something the Kremlin media have long concealed: there are no wounded and no Russian medical personnel who are taller than he is.

 ·       Anyone who doubts that Russia is a fascist dictatorship can perform this simple test. Carry a sign into Red Square with a poster declaring “No to the fascist dictatorship” and see what happens.

 ·       The degradation of Russia has been going according to plan but unfortunately Russian traditions got in the way and made things even worse.

 ·       Rich Russians calling on others to tighten their belts in the face of economic difficulties have led some to conclude that what they should be tightening is not their own belts but rather the noose around those making such proposals or perhaps even the one who has led the fatherland into such a disaster.