All in a Day’s Work
In the early 1970s the Polish socialist regime hushed up the results of a government conducted survey. According to the research, the average female Polish worker got up at 5 The post All in a Day’s...
View ArticleSoviet Camps and Murder by Numbers
Following Soviet ‘liberation’ in 1945, more than ten percent of the population of Hungary were either murdered, or, after torture by the secret police, sent to rot in internment camps. The post Soviet...
View ArticleHey, stranger
Under the communist regime in 1980s’ Romania, it was not technically illegal to talk to foreigners. But any conversation had to be reported to the police within twenty four hours, The post Hey,...
View ArticleColder Than Cold
In 1980s communist Romania, people were allowed to use only a forty-watt bulb per room, that is when electricity worked at all. Electrical heating was permitted for only two hours The post Colder Than...
View ArticleEscape From North Korea
Using word of mouth, brokers in Seoul offered ‘planned escapes’ from North Korea. A low-budget version sold for less than two thousand dollars. It involved months or years of travel The post Escape...
View ArticleHoliday Reading List
I may be taking my holiday a bit late this year, but one thing’s for sure. I’m not going anywhere without my stack of beach reads. I’ve been packing my The post Holiday Reading List appeared first on...
View ArticleNorth Korean Average Height
Teenage boys fleeing Communist North Korea in the past decade are on average five inches shorter and weigh twenty-five pounds less than boys growing up in South Korea. Found in: The post North Korean...
View ArticleAnatomy of The Berlin Wall
The first obstacle was a three-metre-high concrete wall, the ‘hinterland fence’. Then a two-metre-high ‘signal fence’ of barbed wire and steel mesh, which triggered an alarm if touched and, along The...
View ArticleRice, rice, rice
It is difficult to overstate the importance of rice in North Korean culture. It signifies wealth, evokes the closeness of family and sanctifies a proper meal. Labour camp prisoners almost The post...
View ArticleTrivia Collection: Victor Sebestyen, Revolution 1989: The Fall of the Soviet...
Below is a collection of trivia I’ve found in . Troublemaker trading After the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, the German Democratic Republic’s ruling regime started trading human beings The post Trivia...
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