Wednesday, August 23, 2023

Russians Say They Dream of Becoming like Alaskans

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 21 – Russians say they now dream of falling asleep in one country and waking up in another. Such things don’t happen often, they acknowledge, but they did at least once in Russian history. Until 1867, Alaska was part of Russia; but then the tsar sold it and it became part of the United States.

            That is just one of the anecdotes Moscow journalist Tatyana Pushkaryova offers in her latest collection (publizist.ru/blogs/107374/46611/25). Among the best of the rest are the following:

·       Moscow is now offering a package deal to Russians. The latter have to hand over their male relatives to fight in Ukraine, and then the state sends these men back in a package along with seven million rubles in addition.

·       The special military operation and the crash of the Luna-25 are both different and the same: they ae different in that the latter was instantaneous and didn’t involve any deaths; but they are the same because they were the work of the same criminal at the head of the state.

·       Western auto makers have now disabled online services for owners of their cars in Russia. Some Russians are pleased because now they can reset odometers without anyone knowing.

·       Russians know that you mustn’t tell idiots they are idiots. Tell them they have a mysterious soul – and then run!

·       The Russian government has discovered that alcoholic beverages from unfriendly countries have a terrible poison in them – alcohol.

·       Russians say that the greatest achievement of the last 20 years has been stability but they can’t tell you what tomorrow will be like.

·       After the failure of the Luna-25, the Russian government decided that it had failed because the holy incense used at its launch wasn’t good enough. As a result, Moscow has launched a new 1.5 billion ruble program to develop a new, more modern and more reliable kind of incense.

 

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