Down-Home Style : Soviet Visitors Get a Taste of Capitalism

A group of Soviet citizens on a friendship tour today got a taste of American capitalism--including a trip to a fancy department store--and one predicted that the two nations will one day come together as allies.

The 31 travelers arrived in Atlanta on Wednesday, and some spent the night in American homes. Eleven members of the group are part of the first Friendship Forum tour to bring Soviet visitors to the United States.

One of the visitors, Yuri Kapeiko, a Moscow artist who illustrates children’s books, said through a translator that he believes the United States and the Soviet Union will reconcile their differences.

“Personally, I believe in the world. There are such serious problems that we will be allies as we were in the Second World War because there is no other way out,” he said.

Church and Mansion

The visitors toured a Civil War memorial, the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, a Southern mansion and a Baptist church.

Later, they got a firsthand look at capitalism, dining in a revolving restaurant atop the plush 70-story Westin Peachtree Plaza and touring Davison’s department store, which features Godiva chocolates for up to $26 a pound, designer jeans for $40 a pair and a Jean Patou perfume called “1,000” for $460 an ounce.

The Soviets included teachers, an editor, two reporters, a Russian Orthodox priest, a judge, a blue-collar worker, the manager of a toy factory and veterans of World War II who fought alongside the Allies.

“We simply don’t know each other,” said Wayne Smith, founder of the 8-year-old Friendship Force. “Knowing each other isn’t going to solve all our problems, but it’s going to take away the caricatures we have of each other.”

First Soviet Participants

In the past four years, 23 American groups have visited the Soviet Union under the Friendship Forum program, but the Soviet visitors are the first to reciprocate.

A Friendship Forum spokesman said the aim in exchanging visits with the Soviet Union is to reduce hostilities between superpowers.

“The hostility between the United States and the Soviet Union has created a dangerous situation, and one way of dealing with that is for citizens of both countries to meet each other and get to know one another as individuals,” spokesman George Brown said.