| Logic would dictate that those with the most oppressive jobs would be the least supportive of the system. Logic would be wrong. The serf mindset fit perfectly into the thinking of Homo Sovieticus. To this might be added the serf’s wish: If I keep my head down, it will not be chopped off, and if I don’t prosper too much, no one will notice me.
Bardak is a rude Russian word meaning "whorehouse," always spoken in dismay at disorganization, undelivered services, sloppy work. In the dotage of the Soviet system, bardak became a way of life. At a factory in Öskemen (Ust Kamenogorsk), Kazakhstan, for example, an enormous, imported tool-making machine was delivered as ordered. No one ever calculated whether it would fit through the door, which could not be enlarged. The machine didn’t fit, and it couldn’t be disassembled. When I saw it, it was rusting in the snow.
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