JustPearlyThings - May 15, 2023


Top Level CEO Reveals How He Escaped The USSR


Episode Stats


Length

8 minutes

Words per minute

239.34612

Word count

2,123

Sentence count

165

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

5

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, we talk to the founder of a multi-million dollar company that started in the Soviet Union. We talk about his life growing up in the USSR and how he managed to make it to Canada. We also talk about the trauma of leaving the USSR when he was 9 years old.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 And it's really cool because this is a multi-million dollar brand that you created from nothing.
00:00:05.540 And you came from, you said the Soviet Union?
00:00:08.400 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:00:08.860 Okay, can you tell me a little bit about your background?
00:00:10.920 So I was born in Kiev in the USSR.
00:00:13.620 So it's actually really funny that happened, like the way that the mind shift has happened in society is
00:00:17.840 everybody always called me like a Russian guy, even though I was from Ukraine.
00:00:20.960 Okay.
00:00:21.420 And now it's like, see, I told you.
00:00:23.560 Why don't you have an accent?
00:00:24.980 Why? Because I was nine years old when I moved.
00:00:27.240 Really?
00:00:27.640 Yeah, I was nine.
00:00:28.080 And you still had no, I'm surprised you don't have a little bit.
00:00:29.960 Russian is my first language.
00:00:31.320 Really?
00:00:31.740 Yeah, Russian is my first language.
00:00:32.480 Your English is perfect.
00:00:33.640 Well, because it's now my, it's my native language now because that's what I grew up in.
00:00:37.660 Like I finished high school, university, everything, you know?
00:00:39.580 Yeah.
00:00:40.100 I grew up in Vancouver.
00:00:41.560 And then, so I lived in the Soviet Union until 92 and then the Soviet Union collapsed and we got on an airplane with a suitcase.
00:00:47.540 And there was a rule when you left the Soviet Union.
00:00:49.180 So they said, look.
00:00:50.400 And you were nine.
00:00:51.020 I was nine.
00:00:51.460 Did you have siblings?
00:00:52.380 No, just me.
00:00:53.120 Just you and your...
00:00:53.500 Me, mom, and dad.
00:00:54.120 Okay.
00:00:54.500 And the rule was you're allowed one suitcase per family.
00:00:57.940 Okay.
00:00:58.280 And 50 US dollars to leave.
00:01:00.160 Wow.
00:01:00.560 Because they made it really, like, they, you know, Soviets... 0.99
00:01:02.280 You were nine years old.
00:01:03.340 Correct.
00:01:03.720 Were you, like, was it scary for you?
00:01:05.580 Did you, did you know what was going on?
00:01:07.160 No idea.
00:01:07.780 So my parents didn't tell me we were leaving the country forever until the day we left.
00:01:11.720 Because what, yeah, because there was a big risk of being robbed.
00:01:14.380 So what would happen is, like, if you're telling people, oh, I'm going to North America and it's like, cool.
00:01:17.620 And then they would just, like, come and rob you.
00:01:19.160 Because, you know, it's like the Soviet Union.
00:01:20.900 It's, what, 90s were wild at that time.
00:01:22.860 It was just mafia and corruption and, like, inflation.
00:01:25.340 It was just, like, a crazy place to be, right?
00:01:27.400 Wow.
00:01:27.900 So my dad, I remember, he's like, hey, we're going to stay at grandma's house.
00:01:32.120 I'm like, it's Wednesday, okay.
00:01:33.640 And then we got there.
00:01:34.660 It was, like, Wednesday night.
00:01:35.340 He's like, hey, tomorrow we leave for Moscow.
00:01:36.820 I'm like, where are we going?
00:01:37.440 He's like, we're moving to Canada.
00:01:39.500 And I was like, I was just like, what's happening?
00:01:41.080 You know, Canada to me is, like, an imaginary place.
00:01:42.640 Because back then, you didn't have the, like, internet.
00:01:45.080 You didn't have, you know, hundreds of channels on TV.
00:01:47.800 We had three TV channels.
00:01:48.880 They're all Soviet propaganda, government channels, right?
00:01:51.800 So I don't know anything about the outside world.
00:01:54.480 Like, the world that I live in and, you know, the Soviet Union in 92 versus, like, let's
00:01:57.920 say Canada, there was about a 30-year gap in development.
00:02:00.900 So everything that, like, the Canadians and Americans had in 92, right?
00:02:05.340 That was, like, the Soviet Union was what North America had in the 60s.
00:02:08.820 Wow.
00:02:09.040 Like, the technology, like, we had the road, you know, the dialy phone with the big ringy
00:02:12.780 thing.
00:02:13.040 We had to call the operator sometimes to connect us.
00:02:15.020 Like, nobody in the 90s did that.
00:02:17.700 So it was just, like, a very strange experience, obviously.
00:02:21.320 Because it's, at the time, it was, like, a different planet.
00:02:24.720 And was it traumatizing to you?
00:02:26.700 Like, I mean, I'd imagine you had a whole group of friends that you just left.
00:02:29.840 Yeah.
00:02:30.100 What was traumatizing, I would say, is, like, realizing when we arrived in North America how
00:02:33.840 poor we were.
00:02:34.940 That was actually quite traumatizing.
00:02:36.440 So you didn't know?
00:02:37.660 Well, in the Soviet Union, everybody's just poor.
00:02:39.600 Like, it's just normal for your grandma, you know, to wake up at 5 in the morning to go
00:02:43.320 on the bread line because she has to, you can't get bread if you're there at 8 in the
00:02:46.000 morning.
00:02:46.240 There'll be no more bread.
00:02:47.380 So, you know, the grandmothers, the retirees, would get up super, super early, go to the
00:02:50.640 store, and then wait in line for two hours to get a loaf of bread because they would
00:02:53.260 sell out because there was always a food shortage.
00:02:54.940 It was always the case in the Soviet Union. 0.88
00:02:57.040 But you had no idea.
00:02:58.220 No.
00:02:58.580 So I remember, like, you know, I'm on the airplane, and I remember that very, very clearly because we're
00:03:02.440 flying from Moscow to Montreal, then we change planes.
00:03:04.900 And on the airplane, they give me, like, this little Etch-a-Sketch toy.
00:03:07.460 I've never seen that before.
00:03:08.400 I'm like, this is a crazy technology.
00:03:09.960 Like, you can draw on it and then, like, pull it, and the thing disappears and draw again.
00:03:13.420 I saw my first can of Pepsi.
00:03:15.640 I've never seen a can of soda before in 92.
00:03:18.400 Like, I never, I just, it didn't exist in the Soviet Union.
00:03:20.840 And then the other thing I remember when we landed in Vancouver, I needed to go pee,
00:03:23.620 and there was urinal pucks in the urinals. 1.00
00:03:26.000 I had never, I'm like, what?
00:03:27.140 I had never seen the urinal puck.
00:03:28.160 Like, I just remember thinking, like, what is happening?
00:03:30.040 What is this stuff?
00:03:32.300 So would you say, I'm curious, this kind of sounds like a dumb question, it might be,
00:03:38.520 but were people happier in the Soviet Union versus Canada?
00:03:42.860 Because it's interesting, because, like, I asked this question to someone, like, an Uber
00:03:47.560 driver the other day that was from, like, a third world country, and he said that people
00:03:51.280 were happier there.
00:03:52.640 I would say, but I'd imagine it was so corrupt, maybe not.
00:03:55.140 I would say it was a really, so this is something I was actually thinking about this morning,
00:03:58.180 because I woke up literally thinking that question, so I started researching it this
00:04:01.860 morning.
00:04:02.200 I just needed to know for myself, because I was thinking back to that, right?
00:04:04.820 Like, I will introspect, and I'll say this, people in North America are happier.
00:04:13.460 Now, let me rephrase that.
00:04:14.580 People back there were happier.
00:04:16.540 People back there were happier, but they were less unhappy than the people in North America.
00:04:20.520 So, the reason, what I'm trying to say is a very difficult thing to kind of comprehend
00:04:25.440 is, like, people in North America have a delusional degree of unhappiness.
00:04:30.480 Like, the unhappiness, you know, because you have, like, a pretty comfortable life, and
00:04:35.140 then you're creating problems that don't exist.
00:04:37.820 You know what I mean?
00:04:38.420 So, yeah, people in North America are probably both happier and unhappier at the same time.
00:04:43.840 Like, there's just, like, this degree of unhappiness within what should be perceived as happiness.
00:04:47.600 Would I say people in the Soviet Union were happier?
00:04:51.320 You have to ask my parents.
00:04:52.440 They'll probably go back into, like, the 90s were pretty nuts.
00:04:54.900 What do you think they would say?
00:04:57.600 My dad, 100%, would say they were happier back there.
00:05:00.060 Really?
00:05:00.680 100%, yeah.
00:05:01.380 Wow, that's crazy.
00:05:02.720 Yeah.
00:05:03.300 So, what happened when you got to Canada?
00:05:05.820 Well, I remember, like, we went to a supermarket, and it was full of food.
00:05:08.700 I just, I hadn't seen cereal before, so I was like, whoa, cereal.
00:05:11.940 And cartoons, like, we got, like, a cartoon every week, you know, delivered on Soviet propaganda TV,
00:05:16.420 and it was, like, some same cartoon my parents grew up on.
00:05:19.220 Because in the Soviet Union, you know, when you kill capitalism, when you kill innovation, nothing's new. 0.91
00:05:23.920 So, everything's just recycled over and over.
00:05:25.640 So, it's like we're literally watching the same cartoon our parents watched.
00:05:29.580 Oh, so it was, like, a whole new world to you.
00:05:32.560 Planet.
00:05:33.260 Yeah.
00:05:33.840 Yeah.
00:05:34.280 And so then, what was school like?
00:05:36.880 It was tough.
00:05:37.520 Like I said, I realized very quickly that we were poor.
00:05:39.660 That was a difficult thing, because, again, back in the Soviet USSR, everyone's just. 0.95
00:05:43.920 So, it's kind of.
00:05:45.200 Yeah, just like you're poor.
00:05:45.680 But you felt different from everyone else because you were.
00:05:47.840 Well, I got made fun of because I dressed different, right?
00:05:49.960 Like, I just, I had patches in my pants.
00:05:51.600 Like, my grade grandmother, who lived into, like, the early 2000s, would, like, repair,
00:05:56.260 if I, like, had a hole in my classy, you know, Soviet sweatpants, which is a slobs, it's what we wear. 0.95
00:06:01.680 You know, I had the track suits and the sweatpants.
00:06:04.240 And mine had patches on the knees because my great grandma would stitch them up.
00:06:07.540 Like, everybody in the Soviet Union learned different skills because nothing would get done that you needed done.
00:06:12.160 Like, if you wanted something fixed, you just had to do it.
00:06:14.380 Is it hard when you come on shows like mine and these girls talk about their trauma? 0.99
00:06:20.460 And you're like, you know what I mean?
00:06:22.140 It's just, you actually came from the Soviet Union and they're talking about how hard it was for them, you know?
00:06:27.440 I mean, look, I think I'm privileged in the sense that my parents, like, raised me in one home and they stayed together.
00:06:33.380 And obviously, there's disadvantages some of those girls had because, like, they were raised by a single mom. 1.00
00:06:37.260 Right.
00:06:37.800 That has, like, profoundly negative consequences on them, like, through their adolescence, as we see now, like, actualized through statistics and data.
00:06:45.540 But, I mean, are their problems pretty stupid?
00:06:47.560 Yeah, they're pretty stupid, but you can't tell them that.
00:06:49.380 Yeah.
00:06:49.600 So, you went to Canada and then where'd you go to school?
00:06:53.240 So, I went to high school and elementary school in Vancouver and then UBC, University of British Columbia in Vancouver for university.
00:06:58.600 Okay.
00:06:59.000 And what was that like?
00:07:00.740 UBC was a really interesting experience.
00:07:02.460 So, again, this is kind of getting into what Canada looked like and maybe still looks like.
00:07:06.700 My dad tells this story.
00:07:08.020 I don't remember it as well, but he said he took me to the career, like, not career day.
00:07:10.960 He took me to, like, initiation at UBC, like, to check out the campus and stuff.
00:07:14.920 And, you know, we're driving my dad's 89 Camry and we pull into the parking lot.
00:07:18.440 And Vancouver was an interesting town in the early 2000s because in 2000, Hong Kong seceded from the British Empire and it went back into Chinese rule.
00:07:25.500 And so, all the wealthy people in Hong Kong, it's one of the wealthiest cities in the world, they moved their families to Vancouver because there was more sort of certainty in a democratic country.
00:07:33.720 So, you know, I'm, like, a whitish-looking guy, obviously.
00:07:37.100 And, like, at that time, the university is probably 90% Asian.
00:07:42.120 I mean, that's just the demographic of Vancouver.
00:07:44.000 Like, Vancouver is just that way.
00:07:45.820 I did not know that.
00:07:46.800 Yeah, Vancouver is, like, profound.
00:07:48.600 I don't know the total area, but I know that, like, at the university, there's many times on group projects where, like, I have the best English and I'm the one that wasn't born in the country.
00:07:56.080 That's pretty normal in Vancouver.
00:07:57.000 It's a normal Vancouver experience.
00:07:58.340 I had no idea that that was.
00:07:59.480 Yeah, so, like, I grew up on, like, Chinese food.
00:08:01.380 I had a Chinese girlfriend.
00:08:02.180 Like, that's just, my friends were Chinese.
00:08:03.460 It's just, like, that's fine.
00:08:04.380 Like, that's just what it was.
00:08:05.460 Okay.
00:08:05.900 But they had so much money.
00:08:07.260 And so, you know, you get into UBC, and it's a very wealthy school, very wealthy area for, you know, this demographic.
00:08:12.820 And the parking lot's got, like, Lamborghini, like, straight-up Lamborghinis and, like, Bentleys in it.
00:08:17.040 And my dad tells me this story, and I don't remember it, but he told me that.
00:08:20.840 He's like, when we went to the initiation day, when we're in the parking lot, my dad said, you looked at me and you said, I'm going to drive a car like that one day, but I'm going to buy it for myself.
00:08:27.820 It won't be you.
00:08:29.200 Wow.
00:08:29.480 Because, obviously, the kids there were getting this stuff.
00:08:31.400 And, by the way, that's a very typical Vancouver experience.
00:08:33.380 You'll see a lot of 19, 20-year-old kids driving Lambos.
00:08:35.500 It's just how it is.
00:08:36.380 As many of you know, I was just banned on TikTok, and we are demonetized on a daily basis on this platform.
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