Soviet Violated Mothers

[slava1stclass]

To all:

This picture says it all.

Regards,

slava1stclass

[Ed_Haynes]

Yes, this is the way you see them in New Delhi, Shipped there as metal for melting.

[matteti]

Yes, this is the way you see them in New Delhi, Shipped there as metal for melting.

And I guess it's where an unscrupulous dealer took one and put a miner's glory gold-plated star on it to resell it to me as an authentic! Before buying, make sure you carefully examine the photos and check the gold star... if it looks a bit small (usually, a couple of star points will go past the edge of the background), then it's probably not the real thing.

[Guest Rick Research]

I just don't get it. Is the Sub-Continent SO starved for metal

any metal

all metal

(like some sort of science fiction alien world?)

that it makes ANY kind of ECONOMIC SENSE to destroy things of more value intact that apart, and then shipped thousands of miles to...

what? Be made into ankle bracelets?

How much actual, real, solid, measureable "gold" was on these, that sending the sort-of-silver(ish) remnants 1/4 of the way around the world (by truck? by mule? carried by humans over the Hindu Kush on freakin' FOOT?) is LESS insane than melting down last year's LOCAL tea kettle for a new one?

I know that THEORETICALLY many Soviet awards are supposed to be, quote-unquote silver... but most don't tarnish like any silver I've ever seen. Things like MMMs are the same sort of cupro-nickle/"German silver" or whatever it was that the WW2 British War and Defense Medals are--

they are"silver" COLORED, but NOT sterling coins.

It just seems like an insane return on costs versus financial return--like pulveriszing Michaelangelo statues to make garden path gravel.

[Ed_Haynes]

India has absorbed precious metals since the 14th century. This is why it was historically so rich (before British imperialism). Such items (including the two medals I salvaged, shown and discussed elsewhwre) were on their way from Russia to India to becomr cheap silver jewlery to sell at outrageous prices to stupid Western tourists (pardon the redundancy). A local (New Delhi) medal dealer bought several kilos of these -- at random and out of curiosity, mostly mother heroine, other mother orders, and 1985 OPW 2s. Better, I guess, than using Victorian or even WWI medals for that tourist ruibbish.

[Paul R]

stupid Western tourists (pardon the redundancy).

Ed, what is that supposed to mean ?

[Guest Rick Research]

Ahhhhhh! Enlightenment!

But wouldn't it STILL be CHEAPER to buy REAL trash scrap metal than caravan it in from thousands of miles away?

Up to about 1980, around here (banjo music) we had, for example, VAST "yards" of junk cars. Acres and acres and acres. The further back you went, the older the vehicles. Heaps. Think the scrapyard in "Goldfinger."

Those are ALL GONE.

Where are the MILLIONS of defunct autos?

They went somewhere!

I should think EVERY society produces enough rubbish LOCALLY to recycle into anything it needs or wants.

It's the shipping costs and effort that just don't make sense. A penny's worth of junk is a penny's worth of junk. Sending it around the planet... COSTS but does not ADD value.

I must re-consult Marx on this point.

[Chris Boonzaier]

on their way from Russia to India to becomr cheap silver jewlery to sell at outrageous prices to stupid Western tourists (pardon the redundancy). A local (New Delhi) medal dealer bought several kilos of these -- at random and out of curiosity, mostly mother heroine, other mother orders, and 1985 OPW 2s. Better, I guess, than using Victorian or even WWI medals for that tourist ruibbish.

Well, as an ex pacifier of ex colonies and present day stupid Western tourist I can only agree. better to melt down medals that some bint got for consistent shaggin than to melt down medals awarded to soldiers for doing their duty in uncomfortable places.

As the wife has a penchant for Middle eastern generic silver jewellry it would really, really make me cry to know her bracelet was made from a mutiny medal to the 32nd foot!!!

[Ed_Haynes]

Though a lot of Soviet medals did come to India from 1979-89, "fresh" from Afghanistan.

[Bryan]

I see gold teeth!

And what do you guys see here?

[matteti]

I see gold teeth!

And what do you guys see here?

Maybe one day those Red Star medallions will end-up on the Mother Hero backgrounds shown in first post to make the very rare soviet order of the "Bolshevik Hero"!

[Guest Rick Research]

"And what do you guys see here?"

I see a moron who needs to be culled from the gene pool.