Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-07-19

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y be had in the Urals; in Kasakstan and
other southern states this is replaced by camel
meat that is equally moldy. Few vegetables are
sold except potatoes, onions and cabbage, and
these are always scarce in Winter. Carrots
and turnipS, while not unknown, are compare
lively rare. Butter when there is any, is ran
cid and sells at 16 or IL rubles kilo.
Fish and tea are the dietary staples Of Rus
STA. Salt fish is out of stock less frequently
than anything else except tea, which is never
lacking. Often there is canned fish, too; but
It is just fish, that's all-not salmon nor mack
eTel or halibut nor any one variety for at the
Soviet canneries everything netted is cooked
together
Sometimes it is possible for a Russian fam
lily to exc out its larder with fish that the chill
dren take in nearby streams or lakes spearing
through the ice in Winter and seining in Sum-
mer. The children must do this, because
father and mother are nearly always employed
and must also attend military drill twice a
week. appear at union and club meetings and
stand in line for hours at the store.
In February, 1880, I stayed three weeks in
one stretch at Kalata. Except for tea and black
bread and two or three messes Of knotty pota-
toes, had no food in that time except salt fish
oh, how salty! A big barrel stood out back
of the boarding house and the cook dredged
every meal from its smelly depths.
There complaint, though, from the
Russians with whom ate and worked They
thought no more OF the limited fare than they
did of the bedbugs with which they slept.
] won't say that there are bedbugs every
where in Russia, but they are pretty widely
distributed, and where they do exist they are
ignored one Of the normal viciSsitudes OF life.
Once put up in a communal house at San
Donate. Along toward midnight awoke to
find the sheet splotched with my blood. The
howl that set up occaSioned much amusement.
The Amerikanski was so unaccountabIy upset
by trifles.
In primitive mining camps In Mexico have
heard Of beds that worked three shifts" but
I had to 60 to Kalata to see the system in
actual operation. An acquaintance took me to
one of these communal houses q two-story log
structure that accommodated is or 20 families,
who did their cooking in one common kitchen
at the back He knocked at a door and a lovely
girl of II or 10 years admitted us. My COM
panion asked about her two sisters and gave
me to understand that the three lived together
in that one room.
At first thought must have misunderstood.
1t was only a cubbyhole, perhaps IL feet by s;
there was q box for q dressing table ard the
only bed was a narrow cot.
Where do they sleep?" asked
Then was told that the girls were employed
at the smelter and had arranged to work diff
ferent shifts that each might occupy the cot
a third of abe time One Shoveled ore, one ran
a motor, the other did manual labor Of some
other form.
Although the UraIs are covered by one OF
the finest pine, birch and spruce forests in the
world, the housing shortage is scarcely less
acute there than in Moscow and in Leningrad.
Carpenters are paid less than 4 rubles day,
timber is right at hand. yet it costs 1000 rubles
to build a four-room log cabin, chinked with
mud and whitewashed. Paint is practically
unknown. Considerable building is going on,
however, especially of the large communal
houses.
The high cost is due partly to primitive
methods Of numbering and inadequate sawnill
equipment, but more to inefhciency of labor.
AS 10 factories and mines, operations are con-
stantly interrupted by union meetings If
comrade feels that he needs to take five" he
has only to think up some grievance and every
body knocks off for few minutes or an hour
to debate violently over the alleged injustice.
Criticisms, however, are never directed at
any person higher up than the technical i'm
mediately In charge. The government, the
system, Bolshevism, are immune. The o. G.
P. U.-numbering quarter Of a million regu-