Hearted Youtube comments on Elvira Bary (@elvirabary) channel.

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  23. Elvira, I have seen your refined and elegant face flashed up by the YouTube algorithm for about the last week or two but while it intrigued me, I had not for whatever reason, decided til just now to click on it. Although the received wisdom is that you should not judge a book by its cover, well, I get what the advice is behind that little epithet - yet it is simultaneously silly to ignore the clues right in front of your eyes! Yes, they will occasionally by themselves lead you to conclusions which are WILDLY off - which of course makes them dangerous to rely on. But, as with human nature - no matter HOW many times we are warned not to generalise and to look at the individual, it is preposterous to suggest that powerful forces aren't present inside nearly all of us which are most often excellent, if not infallible, guides to formulating general principles which can usually be relied on. Principles that when we know them will mostly enable us to predict an outcome or provide a reasonable assessment. In your case I saw the name and the title of the video so was 99.9% sure you would be a former Soviet citizen. Similarly, the background, hair and clothing strongly suggested a background of some privilege (with by the way, absolutely no negative connotations inferred from that - quite the opposite, in fact!). From that, in turn, I was almost equally sure that not only would your English be immaculate, but that even the also-predicted slight Russian inflection, timbre, rhythm and tone would be sophisticated and graceful - with perhaps even a hint of the influence of the old aristocracy. Yes, I know, even the best theories go too far! And I acknowledge I am far too keen on Tchaikovsky's lugubrious "Pikovaya Dama" to be healthy 😏 But I did permit myself a smile when I hit Play and then again when it turned out a close relative was a senior army officer - in those days, not everyone or even anyone could attain that so I guess it was more a slight twinkle of recognition in my eye than a smile that time. I have a fascination for psychology while having no formal qualifications in the subject whatsoever. And I suppose my interest is, to use that word again, piqued, when I encounter someone with a seemingly far sighted and profound knack for seeing everything that most miss - and understanding the implications. I shall look forward with curiosity to other episodes, assuming there are any - there must be at least a few from the links provided at the end of this one but be assured I shall try to unearth the others! Thank you for the fascinating and rather esoteric material!😆👑
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  42. ​ @elvirabary  there's this phrase I kept hearing "Happy Soviet Childhood." I haven't heard it recently but I heard it enough in the past couple of years. Then I think I made it through everybody who could have said it and I didn't hear it anymore. Like someone said lots of people thought that their childhood was happy just because they were children. If things were terrible, they didn't know it. Okay there was that one little kid who stood in the farmer's market and said "Grandpa why don't we get another pig?" Oops. He was quickly shushed. Thankfully no one got in trouble. Offhand I know three or four people who lived through the Soviet Union when they were young or in some cases just younger. One of them doesn't speak English and I don't speak Russian so... Not a lot of info there. One of them mostly wants to talk about where Russia is going now and how it's going back. But sometimes he tells us stories. The other one has lots of memorabilia and lots of stories and mostly talks about that. One lives in the US and the other fled Russia two years ago plus a couple months But he did live in the US for 9 years during and after college. It's all fascinating and scary. And So amazing that so many Americans think that the traditional values which Russia talks about are the same traditional values the US believes in. I guess propaganda still works. I still remember Ronald Reagan and his evil empire. He had the guts to say it. I remember Gorbachev and then I stopped watching the news and when I heard about people doing bad things I thought, oh I thought they changed! I guess they changed back. Gradually, like boiling a frog. Wherever you are, stay safe. I had a co-worker in the '80s in Boston who was from Poland and a boy that I liked whose family left there when he was seven. So I started reading books. There were not a lot of books at the library but there were at least three. I wish I could remember what that one in library binding was about or who it was by or anything at all. But it was all so long ago. Recently I found the obituary of my coworker. It was definitely her. I think she was like 30 years older than me when I knew her. Her life story in her obituary was fascinating. All the countries that she lived in before she moved to Boston. Actually she moved to the suburbs but she worked in Boston. It didn't occur to me to ask her anything and also I was too shy. And I think she left by the time she was 13, according to the obituary.
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