Anstelle von Gold oder Silber kaufte ich Essen

In 1986-1997 my family survived the collapse of the Soviet economy. I recall how my mother told me to stock up on food, which I never did. I replied to her that the Soviet economy was strong and didn't have any crisis for 70 years. One time when my mother visited us, she bought a large box of yellow split peas and hid it in my apartment.

Then in January 1987 food began to disappear. First, it became very expensive and there were long lines at each store, and then the food vanished completely.

All the stores were closed and they each had a note on the door that read: "Closed indefinitely." I recall how scared people were. I had to feed my three children. My oldest son Stephan, was thirteen. Sergei was two, and Valya was one. The morning came when we had no food. Igor ran around our entire town and didn't find any stores that were open.

At that time my mother called and told me about the split peas. For one whole month my family of five survived on those split peas, which I boiled until they became soft and fed my family. We ate them without any salt or oil, as we didn't have any. Though we quickly grew tired of the same food that we consumed day after day, it saved us during that long month of scarcity. Shortly thereafter, some stores were re-opened and we were able to buy food again.

Based on these memories, I try to keep a small stock of food on hand in case anything were to happen that would prevent me from being able to purchase food from the grocery store. Here is an example of what I currently store.