Leningrad was beautiful. The gold of the Peter Paul cathedral glistened in the April light, the art of the Hermitage was overwhelming. But the NO TOUCH ladies, as I called them, were everywhere; always stout and always in black, They were in every room of the museum and if one dained to go too close to a work of art, there was a scolding that transcended the language barrier. The NO TOUCH ladies also occupied every public bathroom. Their job was to dispense one lone piece of toilet paper to each user. The toilet paper was akin to the wax paper bags my mother used to pack my sandwiches in for school lunch. These were the widows of World War Two. The Soviet government made every effort to employ them, whether it be passing out toilet paper or sweeping the streets with twig brooms.
Moscow was altogether different; a huge city with the Soviet era architecture that has also infected the look and landscape of Beijing. Concrete, bold, stout—like the war widows—and crumbling. It was when I went to Moscow University that I first came to the realization that all the red scare of my childhood was needless. If the premier university was in such a state of shambles, what did this say about the Soviet Union? I had a private laugh at the folly of our fear.
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