I got the bill for my surgery. Now I know why those doctors were wearing masks.
James H. Boren
As a foreigner in Ukraine I have made many incorrect assumptions based upon my experiences living in America. I assumed that my shower would always have hot water, I assumed that supermarkets would sell peanut butter, and I assumed that healthcare would be very expensive.
My first trip to a Ukrainian hospital was one that I will never forget. I was in the Carpathian Mountains skiing and snowboarding with a group of friends from America, Russia, and Ukraine. When engaged in athletic activities at high altitude like skiing, it is highly advisable to drink a lot of water. Otherwise, you can quickly become dehydrated.
Normally I would abide by this rule. However, up in the mountains in the middle of winter it was very cold, so I didn’t feel like I was becoming dehydrated. I am used to drinking water for free from the tap in America, but being in a foreign country, I refrained from consuming the local water. Also, the bottled water that they sold in our hotel was a strange kind of mineral water with a very bitter taste, so I had no desire to drink very much of it. All of these factors, combined with the high altitude and rigorous exercise, created a dangerous situation for my health.
After a full day of skiing and snowboarding, walking through the mountains, and site-seeing through the town, our Russian and Ukrainian friends invited us to go to the sauna. This was my final mistake. Whatever water and electrolytes I had remaining in my body after all of the rigorous exercise that day was washed away in the sauna sweat.
The next day I felt terrible and I couldn’t keep any liquids in my body. I knew that I was dehydrated. I tried to rest and drink lots of water and juice, but I wasn’t recovering fast enough. We had to take a train to Moscow the next day, and I needed to recover before then. I was going to have to do something that I had feared since the day I had arrived in Ukraine: I was going to have to go to a Ukrainian hospital.
Why was I worried about going to a hospital in Ukraine? Because I assumed that the costs would be similar to the costs in the US. In America, a visit to the hospital is very expensive. It can cost over $100 for a simple visit and consultation to any doctor. A trip to the emergency room, where I would need to go in order to get saline solution injected into my veins to help my dehydration, could cost $1000 or more.
At 3 in the morning, just hours before our train to Moscow, I was taken to the hospital in a quiet Carpathian town. The doctors were all asleep, and the head nurse examined me. She didn’t think anything was wrong with me, and in fact I believe she thought that I was drunk, since the symptoms of dehydration and drunkenness are very similar, and drunkenness is not only common in Ukraine, it is practically a national pastime. I knew, however, that I was in fact dehydrated and that I desperately needed some saline solution in order to survive my 36 hour train ride.
The nurse woke up a doctor who also thought that I was drunk, but after a lengthy and confusing discussion, (I spoke no Russian at the time), he finally agreed to give me the saline solution. You can imagine my horror when, thinking that a brief visit to an American Emergency room would cost me a minimum of $1000, the doctor turned on all the lights in the small hospital, took me into the operating room, and woke up the other five doctors and nurses who worked there. Here I was simply in need of saline solution, but they had awoken the entire hospital staff. In America, each doctor that examines you will charge you a different amount, so I was imagining 5 different medical bills, and I was thinking that this little treatment would probably cost me thousands of dollars.
The treatment was good and fast, and I was soon on my way home. But before I left, I handed the doctor my US Medical Insurance Card to prepare for what I believed would be an enormous payment. In America, you pay hundreds of dollars every month to a medical insurance company, which helps pay the hospitals for your visits. This decreases the costs of medical visits and procedures, but you have to pay in advance, just like with car insurance. Without medical insurance, no one in America would be able to afford our extremely expensive healthcare costs.
The Ukrainian doctor simply looked at my medical insurance card and laughed. I was worried that this might mean that he wouldn’t be able to use the card and that I would have to pay the full price, which I was certain would be $1000 or more. He wrote something on a piece of paper and said “20 grevens”. I was shocked. They had woken up the entire hospital, turned on all the lights, injected me with three or four bottles of saline solution, observed me for over an hour, and the cost would only be the equivalent of about 4 dollars. I didn’t know what to say. I was so grateful that I started handing money to all the doctors. Certainly they deserved more than 20 grevens for more than an hour’s work at 3 in the morning.
I must say that I was never happier to be in Ukraine than at that moment. Good healthcare at an incredibly cheap price relieved many of my concerns about living in this country. Of course, the well trained doctors deserve much better salaries than what they earn now, but for the common people, there is nothing better than knowing that in the case of an emergency, it will not kill you financially to get better physically.
Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain… and most fools do.
Dale Carnegie
I recently saw the new Indiana Jones movie (I know I'm about 6 months behind - I was out of the country, okay?). I have to say I was wildly disappointed with the film. It wasn't that my expectations were too high - it was that my expectations were simply based on this planet. I loved the religious mysticism of the first 3 films, but aliens? I just couldn't buy it.
Which brings me to another group of people whose expectations seem... out of this world. That would be the Communist Party.
I know what you're thinking - They still exist? Yes. Not only do they still exist, but they are still pushing their failed program's propaganda. Note this Russian article's statement: "the dissolution of the Soviet Union remains one of the greatest tragedies of modern contemporary history." Propaganda anyone?
A few months ago the St. Petersburg Communist Party Chief Sergei Malinkovich stated his outrage at the new Indiana Jones film, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The film is set in 1957 during the period when the United States and the Soviet Union became hostile towards one another, and the antagonists in the film are Communist agents trying to steal a mystical crystal skull that could give them ultimate power to rule the world.
Malinkovich is angry about the film because he believes that young people in Russia will think that the story is a true representation of history. He said that they don’t know the real history of what was happening in the Soviet Union in 1957, so they will believe whatever Hollywood shows them. Other Communist Party members agreed and said that America was trying to trick people and make children afraid of Communists.
They also said the actors Harrison Ford and Kate Blanchet were helping the CIA spread propaganda against the Communist Party, and that these actors should never be allowed to enter Russia.
I have to admit that when I heard these comments from the Communist Party, I laughed out loud. Are they really worried about Indiana Jones’s perspective on the Communist Party in 1957? Are they so insecure about how people think about them that they have to make a public statement concerning a popcorn action movie for teenagers? Do they really think Indiana Jones is in the CIA? Maybe Chubarashka (Russia's version of Mickey Mouse) works for the KGB, or is it the FSB now?
This is why most Americans don’t respect the Communist Party. The Communist Party is too serious, and they think everything is a threat to national security. They think that movies for children are going to threaten their power and authority, and they claim that we are disrespecting the accomplishments of the Soviet people. In America, we do not laugh at the Soviet people or at their accomplishments. In fact, we highly respect, and sometimes even fear, the strength and intelligence of the Soviet people.
However, at the same time, we think that the Communist Party, the corrupt and paranoid system of government that stole billions of dollars from the Soviet people and which lied to and murdered its citizens for decades, is ridiculous. We view it as tyrannical, hyper-critical, inefficient, inherently dishonest and corrupt, and in modern times, obsolete.
The thing that I find the most amusing about this situation is that the Communist Party is complaining about propaganda. Never in Russia’s history has a political party twisted the truth or used propaganda to control the people more than the Communist Party. They lied about everything. For them to complain about the use of propaganda in a film would be like Hitler complaining about ethnic prejudice towards Germans.
Perhaps they haven’t seen the original three Indian Jones movies, in which Indiana fought against the Nazis to prevent them from finding magical items which would enable them to take over the world. These films are not historical documentaries.
In the second Indiana Jones movie, a Hindu cult is shown eating live snakes and bugs, serving monkey brains for desert, and then a cult priest tears a man’s heart out of his chest with his bare hands. In the film, the cult was said to worship the Hindu goddess, Kali, known as the goddess of death and destruction. In reality, Kali is the goddess of time and change, but there were no protests or complaints by Hindu leaders at the outrageous events in the film.
They understood that it was just a movie.
No one believes that the Nazi’s tried to steal the ancient Ark of the Covenant in order to use it to conquer the world, or that Hitler wanted to find the Holy Grail so that he could live forever. Indiana Jones is a movie. It’s half action, half historical fantasy. If your children don’t know the real history of the Soviet Union, it is not Indiana Jones’ fault. It is your own fault.
Hollywood is not responsible for educating our children. It never has been. Hollywood’s only responsibility is to entertain us, and to make enough money so that it can continue to entertain us in the future. The Communists are confused about this situation, because in the Soviet Union films were always used as propaganda, and the government controlled everything that was shown. In America the situation is completely different. The government cannot control or influence what we show in our films. Everything is the choice of the director, producers, writers and actors.
As humorous as the Communist Party’s comments were, however, they reveal a trend of criticism and a common misconception which many older people have about the media, especially in America. Parents in America and around the world are blaming Hollywood and television and music and video games for their children’s bad behavior. But what kind of parents are they if they allow their children to watch and listen to such harmful things? And how can these things influence your children unless you have not raised them well?
As a child I watched hundreds of scary movies and hundreds of violent action movies, but I have never been in a physical fight in my entire life. I have never done any of the terrible things that I have seen on television or in movies.
Why? Because films are fake, and my family and our morals and standards are real.
My family raised me well, with discipline and understanding, they made sure I got a good education, that I worked hard at everything I did, that I played sports and met all kinds of people from different countries and cultures. They gave me the skills to live a good, successful life, and only a fool would ignore those lessons and believe what Hollywood tells him about history, love, and life in general.
Unfortunately, these days not all children are receiving such a healthy upbringing. Parents are working more and spending less time with their children. Instead of doing productive things with their children, many parents simply put their kids in front of the television or computer and leave them alone.
And don’t forget, children imitate their parents. People think that children learn bad habits from the media, but most bad habits, and good ones, are learned from our parents.
A common belief in America is that if parents read to their children every night, then their children will grow up loving to read. But recent research shows that the most important factor in determining whether children will enjoy reading is not if their parents read to them or not. The most important factor in determining how many books children read is how many books their parents read for themselves.
If children see their parents reading books, then they will read books. If children see their parents sitting on the couch and watching television or listening to music, or cursing, or smoking, or ignoring their family, then they will do the same.
And, unfortunately, if children see their elders being paranoid and angry about a silly action film, then those children will grow up to be paranoid and angry too.
I discovered an amazing thing the other day: a true propaganda site the likes of which I have never seen with my own eyes before. It was like stumbling upon a propaganda pamphlet from the time of Stalin - yet this is a modern day website trying to pass itself off as real news. And the best part - it's Russian.
The site is called Moscowtopnews.com and it is one of the saddest excuses for an actual news site that I have ever seen. It doesn't seem to be associated with any credible news source, though it does have links to Pravda, the famous Russian newspaper whose name means, of all things, "Truth".
It looks like they steal the articles from an actual news agency and then a government propagandist tacks on his own vitriolic anti-western comments. It's more like reading a KGB agent's blog for the indoctrination of young minds than actual news.
Some great lines:
On the situations in Georgia and Ukraine - "Just as it has become known that the US had a large hand in the invasion and genocide campaign against South Ossetia, it is also obvious they have a hand in the current crisis in the supply of gas to Europe. They financed and formented the orange and rose "revolutions" in order to get their dirty, filthy tentacles all the closer to Russia in order to strangle Russia economically.
It has been the intention of the US all along to take over the gas pipelines. That is the reason for Afghanistan now. And that is the reason for what they did in Georgia."
On America's presence in Afghanistan - "Now they are finding themselves quite alone even though they were so presumptuous as to think that Russia would allow them to run around wherever they feel like it."
On NATO's "encircling" of Moscow - "Russia retains the capacity to defend itself and if necessary to liquidate enemy forces concentrating on its borders with massive missile attacks from thousands of launch sites."
On Europe and the Ukrainian Gas Crisis - "The hydra monster empire would like to throw a wrench in the works in order to establish their own system to bypass Russia such as Nabucco. However, Nabucco is still in its primitive stages with little promise of success. Hopefully, their tentacles have been effectively chopped off by the truth coming out."
Their message to Obama - "Welcome, President Obama. Welcome, friend! We do not want your arrogance, we do not want your blackmail, we do not want your chauvinism. What we do want, and expect, is for your administration to clean up the mess your country has made, for wherever you look, the hotspots were caused by the United States of America, and none other."
And my personal favorite, On the Economic Crisis - "Russia is an economic oasis."
How many times has the ruble crashed since 1991?
Of course, for anyone who even remotely follows Russian politics, you know that it's goverment is in nearly complete control over the press and all journalists are forced to say whatever the government tells them to say. These kinds of pure propaganda are common in Russia, but it is rare to see them in English. It is a good lesson to see what kind of maniacs we are really up against as a country. To those who think America is the big bad bully on the interntaional playground, just remember - no one in the government is going to kill you for what you write/say/believe/support. That cannot be said in many 2nd and 3rd world countries, including Russia.
These kinds of mental dictatorships, where the governments control everything that their people see and hear, are dangerous to the entire world. Even our new President Obama recognizes this and mentioned it in his Inaugural speech.
From Obama's Inauguration Speech:
"To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist."
To those of you who don't know, (or haven't figured it out yet from this article) this is a direct challenge to Russia and a referral to its Soviet style control of the media within the Russian Federation.
Since Putin took control of the Russian government, he has initiated a form of government control and restrictions on free speech and the freedom of the press almost identical to those during the Soviet era.
It is intriguing, however, that the Russian propaganda machine has made a move into the English webspace. Perhaps they are trying to recruit Americans to their cause?
Probably not. Most likely this is an attempt to prevent English speaking Russians from reading real news on the internet and learning the truth about Russia's stances with the International community. If you speak Russian, the Russian government can control everything you read, but if you speak English, the whole internet is open to you and they cannot control what you might find. It may also be a way to combat Russians who are abandoning their country in record numbers in order to find decent jobs in America, Canada, and Europe. Russia wouldn't want them believing that their newly found freedom and prosperity were real.
The fact that the site is written in English is also quite ironic for several reasons. For those of you who have never traveled to Russia or Eastern Europe, their command of the English language is relatively low when compared to most European countries. For one, unlike Western Europe, they do not get many visitors from America or Great Britain, so most Russians have never met someone who speaks English.
Secondly, the English language is very difficult for native Russian speakers to master because the grammatical roots of the two languages are completely different. Russian uses many Greek grammatical structures, whereas English is much closer to the far simpler Latin grammar. For example, Russian does not have the word "the". It's use is almost impossible to explain to a Russian speaker.
What this means is, the person writing and editing this site must have spent a lot of time in Great Britain or America in order to master the English language to such a degree. I have met many Eastern European students who were studying English, and for a student to master the language this well, they must have truly loved English language and culture. Almost every Eastern European student I ever met who was diligently studying English had a great desire to move to America.
The person writing and editing these Anti-American opinions is probably a great fan of the United States. They probably watch all of our movies, listen to all of our top musical artists, and would love a chance to live in America. However, in order to make a living, this person is forced to use his or her love for the English language in order to write daily tirades against the United States government, which he or she most likely does not even believe.
How can I say this with confidence?
While in Russia I met a Russian Journalist working for the BBC in Moscow. This journalist complained to me about the fact that they had to tell what they knew were lies to the public, because the Russian government won't let the press write what they want. You can only say what the Russian government authorizes you to say, and this is almost always Anti-Western.
For example, when Ukraine had a peaceful revolution against a corrupt and fraudulent election (Russia tried to steal the election for the Pro-Russian candidate - a convicted criminal and rapist), during the Orange Revolution in 2004, Russia forced it's journalists to say that it was a violent revolution and that Ukrainians were attacking Russian citizens in the streets. These were bold faced lies, and the journalists knew they were lies, but Russia was secretly hoping to start a war with Ukraine in order to bring control of the country back into its own hands, like in Soviet times. (For those of you who don't know your Soviet history, without Ukraine there could never have been a Soviet Union.)
Fortunately this didn't happen and the Revolution remained peaceful. But not for journalists - If you don't say what the Russian government tells you to say, you will be fired - or in many cases killed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_journalists_killed_in_Russia
The most disturbing part of the MoscowTopNews website?
Look at what they say about themselves on the "About" page:
"MoscowTopNews.com takes a clear look at real issues and provides the full truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. This is objective, independent journalism. The world's events analyzed and commented on, bring the news to the citizens of the world, and not some cooked-up package catering to its master´s needs."
Ironic?
or Terrifying?
