CAMARILLO, VENTURA : 2 Families Get a Taste of Soviet Life

The Cold War is over.

Two Ventura County families took the message from the June summit between President Bush and Mikhail S. Gorbachev more seriously than most.

Valerie Chrisman and her 12-year-old daughter, Beth, and Sandy High and her 9-year-old son Jason recently returned from the Soviet Union where they served as citizen-diplomats in an international program aimed at promoting peace and understanding.

Chrisman, High and their children lived in Moscow and Tallinn, Estonia, with Soviet families who are, like themselves, college-educated professionals.

They were part of a delegation of 23 women and children from California, New York and Maryland sponsored by Mothers Embracing Nuclear Disarmament and the Soviet Center for Creative Initiatives.

The Ventura County families became involved in the program in March, 1989, when a group of Soviet citizens visited Ventura County to see American agricultural methods firsthand. Some of the them stayed with the Chrismans in Ventura and the Highs in Camarillo.

The experience spurred the women to join the trek to the Soviet Union.

They said the Soviet people were wonderful, but both expressed shock at the general austerity of Soviet life and the lack of consumer products that most Americans take for granted.

Chrisman, who has traveled in Europe, Africa and South America, said the Soviet Union “felt more Third World than most of the countries I’ve traveled.”

High agreed. “One hour out of Moscow, there would be picturesque little villages with outhouses.”

Chrisman said the Soviet people she met worked hard but are confronted constantly by undone jobs, bad plumbing, broken doors, miswired elevators and potholes in the road.

“You knew where the bathroom was because when you walked in, you could smell it,” Chrisman said.

She said the people also seemed to be embarrassed by the lack of consumer goods and the poor quality of Soviet products.

“The joke is nobody wants a Soviet-made television because the only way to repair it is to kick it,” Chrisman said.

She said that although the people in Estonia were encouraged by recent economic and political changes and confident of future freedom, the Muscovites were befuddled.

“The people that we lived with were really proud Soviets. . . . They did not want to leave their country,” Chrisman said. “They wanted to make it work, but they had no idea how it could.”

And like many Americans, they were worried about the future.

“People are people,” High said. “In Russia, you still find people who tell their kids to eat their dinner.”

The Americans will see their Soviet friends again soon. They are expected to return to Ventura County in January.