From Sofia to Leningrad?! Sofia is not and never was a city of the USSR or Russia. Check your facts and correct the post.
And the justification for an overwhelming availability of choice of goods from various and sometimes dubious producers is “shopping therapy”? What about quality and the production of goods to last for decades, as opposed to produced to break-down and consume more? Knowing that you have three types of bread to choose from and the products to bake your own variation was rather soothing as compared to today’s bombardment of bread types full of all sorts of additives and the necessity to spend a lifetime in testing out different products from different makes just to find out which one is the quality product to fit you.
Simplicity and minimalism were not a bad thing to mock. And the abundance of products which brings with it the abundance of fakes, low-quality and trickery is not to be praised. People back then had money to buy the things they need and they had a limited choice of proven quality stuff. Today they don’t have the money to buy any of the readily available myriads of low-quality junk stuffed down the throat of consumer-society through advertisement, promises of “therapeutical effect of shopping” and “oh, your neighbour has the latest iPod, so should you.”
All matter-of-fact-ly life was simpler and people were not living on credit, buried in debt. Life was humane.
