Pen and pencil in Parliament, comp. and illustrated by Harry Furniss

Volodya had earlier explained to her that Buryats were of Mongolian stock and were called Buryats on this side of the border and Mongols on the Mongolian side. Mongolia, Masha of course knew, was a puppet client state of the Soviet Union. The Buryats invited by Masha into the Slepak apartment later invited the Slepaks into their apartments. Masha and Volodya noticed they had covered their windows with curtains, and their floors with cartons and plastic, and their doors with felt. Volodya built a lamp for the kitchen and a wall desk and a desk lamp for himself. On the wall over the desk he hung photographs of Andrei Sakharov, Natan Shcharansky, Ida Nudel, Iosif Begun, and Yuri Orlov. Near their bed were photographs of Sanya and Leonid. To his delight, Volodya discovered that the bookstore in Tsokto-Khangil-stocked with the usual pens, pencils, maps, notebooks, periodicals, childrenБЂ™s books, and adult books-also had on its shelves volumes difficult to obtain even in Moscow. Masha began to buy childrenБЂ™s books, intending to send them to her grandchildren abroad so they could read and not forget the Russian language ...»