h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I knew one once! Cristi Stoican was a gymnast who defected to South Africa, he and I worked at a gym in the early nineties. Great guy, we had lots of interesting conversations. I later saw him on TV, seems he coached some South Africans for the Olympics, I think it was in 2000 or 2004 ...

Anyways, great story! I wouldn't mind visiting Romania sometime.

Wow. It seems the 20th Century has had some effects in the 21st, t hen.

Thanks!

I wonder what became of him. There were more Eastern Europeans who came here. I know a guy called Milan Andrin from old Yugoslavia - at least his parents - he is now fully Afrikaans, you won't have any clue he is not 'native'. I think Eastern Europeans could fit in well over here. Old South Africa was also very 'authoritarian', discipline was a big thing with us.

I've known quite a few Eastern EDuropeans I would hardly expect to adapt well to authoritarianism. They were better at circumventing authority, I found...

We Afrikaners too! We grumbled about authority and worked our way around it but still ... when the authoritarianism ended we felt lost ... When someone tells you what to do all the time, you rebel but you have the comfort of knowing what to rebel against.

You know, that's a good point. I had a school friend who was like that.

She chose to go to a rather restrictive church college - and then broke all the rules.

I, of course, went to a wide-open university - and hardly ever did anything illicit.

Well when you have an 'evil' regime telling you what to do, you can't go wrong rebelling against it! I am a rebel by being not racist, by being openminded about religions different from conservative Calvinism, critical of make-money-at-all-costs Capitalism, pro feminism, pro animal rights, believing in evolution and global warming ...

Yeah, that's true.

I've jsut spent all afternoon explaining American propaganda in World War I and the Espionage Act of 1917.

Eugene V Debs made a speech accusing the fat-cat capitalists of being jsut as bad as the Germans, and got arrested on 10 counts of sedition...