1. For food. In every Soviet food store one could almost always buy butter and oil, tomato or birch or apple juice, dried kissel [fruit juice thickened with starch], canned food, cereals, cookies ...

In 1989 Russian president Boris Yeltsin's wide-eyed trip to a Clear Lake grocery store led to the downfall of communism. It was Sept. 16, 1989, and Yeltsin, then newly-elected to the new Soviet ...