Quaro
1939
Not sure about the accuracy of the Tweet, but not unbelievable:
And the video:
Timex
1940
If you are not in NATO, you will be invaded by Russia.
Oh, certainly, though the starting points are different. It’s just that as bad as we are at looking at ourselves, we may be even worse at looking at outsiders, so it’s always interesting to point out how non-monolithic different countries might be.
This is not that surprising to me, given the vastness of the country and the scale of destruction from the war. Even though it was eighty years ago I’m sure it had a big impact.
During the 1980s, admittedly not in Russia but in Eastern Europe, I saw plenty of areas that simply had not been rebuilt much, if at all, since c. 1945.
I’m in Minsk. Belarus is similar to Russia in that you’d need a reason to not be in the capital :)
It’s hard for me to adjust to a more European way where living in a smaller town doesn’t mean you’re loser who couldn’t find a better place.
Another reason for that is Soviet central planning. Since the 20s all the good stuff was sent to central cities for the sake of industrialization. Then for the sake of nomenclature who obviously lives there. It was truly absurd and kafkaesque: a combination of this administrative voluntarism and infrastructure improvement meant that a huge number of train seats were just regularly used by people who visited capital cities every weekend to buy essential products like meat you couldn’t get in smaller towns.
Lurb
1943
Time scales for war scars can be surprising. In the 90s my newly built high school was near the historical center of my Spanish hometown, in fact in an area that was the original prehistoric site and preferred by the elites until the 19th century. But in the 90s it was a slum of corrugated metal huts among ruins that you had to walk around and never accross. This was the result of French forces under British assault levelling the area for better lines of fire from their fortifications in 1812 and then Spain and my town having shitty 19th and 20th centuries. Nowadays it’s again a posh neighborhood, nevermind the 180 year blip.
jpinard
1944
Seriously WTF is Putin’s problem? Threatening nuclear war now?
Alternate title:
After a 6 hour discussion with a Frenchman, Putin contemplates nuking entire planet.
As someone who has been in days long meetings with French software developers, this is the most relatable Putin has ever been to me.
Timex
1947
This is especially true if he met with a Parisian.
My limited experience dealing with Parisians is that their reputation for rudeness is overblown. They aren’t super polite to strangers, but neither are most New Yorkers and Angelenos I have known. I think urban people generally tend to be busy and somewhat brusque. I know I am.
I have spent quite a bit of time in Paris in my life, and I really can’t recall much rudeness at all. If there ever was any, it was in precisely the same places you would find rudeness in any big city in the world, e.g. restaurants that prey on ignorant tourists.
Scotten
1950
Are you a car enthusiast?
I think what you are seeing is one of the reasons why Germany lost the war to the USSR - huge swaths of land with no/basic roads and infrastructure (albeit it some of it was really part of the Ukraine).
Scuzz
1951
In my brief traveling experience in 1980, the British were much ruder than the French.
CraigM
1952
I haven’t spent much time in Paris, but I also found the reputation was unearned.
I feel like Scotland is the one place where you kinda hope the residents are rude.
It’s the rest of France that think Parisians are rude I think, and thus their reputation…
Timex
1955
Well, I’ve dealt with a decent number of Parisians as well as other frenchies over the years, and I’ve found those from outside Paris to be a good deal more chill than the folks from Paris.
Also, there is this weird internal division among the French themselves, where the folks outside of France kind of hate the Parisians, and the Parisians think of themselves as the only real Frenchmen, with all the other French being dumb hick barbarians.
Of course this is just a broad stereotype, and also only kind of a vague feeling rather than things that any of the people actually believe in their rational minds… but there’s still some grain of truth there.
Like the Americans who think New Yorkers are rude, then?
Yeah, I like cars. And roads or their lack certainly hindered the invaders of Russia. In several wars!
When I lived in Berlin, too, the rest of Germany felt about Berliners the way many here feel about New Yorkers, or the French about their Parisian cousins.
Dejin
1958
Interesting. In my (admittedly limited) experience in England, everyone was very polite. I was told that it was part of the culture, similar to how they will automatically form a queue, rather than just pushing their way to the front as in some cultures.
I was told that the older generations were a bit worried that the politeness was going away in younger generations though.
