I grew up in Moscow, Russia. My twin brother and I had a great & happy childhood but as was typical of Soviet life in the mid 1970s, food was in short supply. Our mother usually had to stand in line, even for staples such as milk, butter & vegetables.

A typical dinner for our family might be a plate of boiled potatoes, with some black bread and a glass of milk.

When we were 6 years old, a friend of the family gave us our first pet - a adorable, cute furry rabbit. We loved it. We kept it in a cardboard box in our room, fed him stale bread & cabbage. Every day, when we got home from school, we would run to the cardboard box in the corner, take the "Krolik" (as we called it) out and let him run around the room. Despite the widely scattered little turds, we loved the responsibility of taking care of a live thing.

One day we came back from school to find the box empty. Our mom told us the rabbit had died and she had given him to the building maintenance worker for disposal. We were very upset, cried and mourned our little friend.

Two evenings later, we were invited to our mother`s friends, the Lionovs, for dinner. There were several other guests, and a typically rowdy time was had by all as we worked our way through the pickled vegetable appetizers and the adults drank vodka. Finally, Mrs. Lionov brought out the steaming main dish. Meat was hard to find in Moscow and we were all very excited to have a hearty meal.

Our mother was strangely avoiding our attention and we understood why when Mrs. Lionov announced the main course: Rabbit Casserole
30