The Writing on the Wall

What strikes you first, and shocks you, is that no one knows how to work. In the land of the workers, people are at best semiliterate in labor. They work reluctantly, irritably, listlessly. Sheremetyevo Airport in Moscow is
the gateway not only to the mystery of Russia but to the enigma of the Soviet economy as well.

The airport official overseeing the arrival of foreign tourists is a man of the Gorbachev era. Able, dynamic, in his early forties, he simply wants life to be better...