Democracy or no democracy, many who lived in the late days of the USSR view it with nostalgia. If you were a writer, a political activist, an artist, open disagreement was a no-no, but for Joe Public (or the Russian equivalent... say, Иван Иванович Иванов) what difference could it make? They toed the line, got on with their lives and picking mushrooms in the forest... one would suspect interactions with the government were few and far between - and the fewer and further between, the better.

At least, there was no pretence, no façade. Nowadays the pressure from above is much more insidious. Democracy is just a warped term they shove down our throats so that we may bow and accept the political situation, as it is supposedly of our own making.

Now I'm left wondering if Hanna visited Saudi Arabia, China or North Korea.