Boris Goes to the Grocery Store

In 1989, the soon-to-be first President of Russia, Boris Yeltsin, went to an American supermarket in Houston, Texas.
And it changed his life forever.
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Here's a snippet from Yeltsin's autobiography (Against the Grain) for reference:

"A great deal has been written about my trip to America, both there and in the Soviet Union, so I doubt whether it is worth dwelling on the overall results of the journey. I met with many interesting people, from President Bush to ordinary Americans on the streets of those eleven cities. No doubt it will sound banal, but what surprised me most were precisely those ordinary people in America, who radiated optimism and faith in themselves and in their country.
There were, of course, shattering experiences of another sort -- the supermarkets, for example. When I saw those shelves crammed with hundreds, thousands, of cans, cartons, and goods of every possible sort, for the first time I felt quite frankly sick with despair for the Soviet people. That such a potentially superrich country as ours has been brought to a state of such poverty! It is terrible to think of it." (Yeltsin, p. 255)
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[KeepCuriousCo]

Speaking of Russia, here’s quite possibly the worst intelligence disaster in US history (at least until recently).

[willreich]

Imagine the world if Boris stopped at a Hooter's instead

[Tadicuslegion]

“What’s this? What’s an Oreo?”
*5 seconds later*
“How many can I fit on the plane?”

[RustBrand]

He also said “if the people saw this, there would be revolution overnight”

[blake]

Randall's really needs to make "we dissolved the Soviet union" an ad campaign

[XxmilkshakexX]

Wait until he finds out about Sam’s Club and Costco.

[Tetsujinhanmaa]

Theres a story about a Mig pilot that defected to the West. When they show him a supermarket, he thought it was all an act. Until they went a few blocks and saw another.

[ThomasFarquhar]

You walk into your local store, and you see a f***ing high ranking Soviet official just walking around like "damn this is unlike anything back at home"

[AngstbringerB]

Apparently this also sent him into a severe depression as well. He received many food items for free from the store manager and took them on his flight back.

[cbh]

And this is how a Texan grocery store started WW3.

[danielevans]

“What are these?”

“Girl Scouts.”

“What do they do?”

“Bring you cookies.”

[everydaychemistry]

"Holy shit they have food in this country"

[Waynside]

American diplomat : “ so here’s our space program where we’re trying to go to the moon”
Russian diplomat : “ holy shit, no way. You guys got food.”

[nikitasavtchenko]

Can confirm. My dad grew up in Soviet Ukraine and came to Canada in his late 20s. He broke down and cried the first time he entered a grocery store.

[Sillykids]

This is proof that one seemingly insignificant event could theoretically alter the timeline

[wilianrodrigues]

“Time to see how you truly are!”

“Fuck…”

[CountArtha]

*In capitalist America, *
*food waits in line for people*

[AxeTheViking]

"Ooh, I've got one! Okay, so, the president of Russia walks into an American grocery store..."

[coreylee]

He thought to himself, I could feed my country for 100 years with the food on aisle 5 alone.

[piper]

Then they stopped at the liquor store and he freaked out at the variety of vodka