#119 - Yury - Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain - The Chris & Mike Show

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:07):
There it is. There it is.
We got it. Now we're cooking with gas.
We got cooking with gas. This is Mike and I's band Yuri
song called Freeman Do. You guys have?

(00:34):
Hey boys and girls, it's Christian Mike Show.
We are here with Yuri. We are I see live right now on
YouTube as well as Twitch. So if you happen to be on those
platforms, welcome to the show. Welcome and then, as always, in
a couple weeks, this episode will drop on our podcast channel
and all the podcast outlets for your reviewing re listening.

(00:54):
You know what is the word pleasure?
Pleasure, pleasure. Hey, thanks for coming on, Yuri.
It's nice to meet you. And just so everybody knows, we
just popped Yuri's cherry because he has never been on a
podcast before. So, so welcome, Yuri.
Welcome. Thank you for doing that with
the you know. Thanks for coming on man.

(01:15):
Yeah, so far, I enjoy that. Can you?
Let's go, Let's go. Depart.
All right. Hi, guys.
Yeah. So what I did, you know
homework. I realized I have to talk about
myself quite a lot so I I guess I should my LinkedIn page and

(01:37):
kind of copy paste and ask myself to just read it out loud.
Well, this this is. Tell us like, who you are, why,
why you want to come on. You know what inspired you to
want to come on and talk to two knuckleheads like us?
Yeah. And where?
And but before we start that, where are you at?
Because I'm in Arizona, Mike's in Illinois.
Where are you? Right now I'm in a pool house.
It's pretty much no. I know you're in a pool house,

(01:59):
but I want to know where you what's what city, what?
Country. Yeah, it's a small town,
Greenwich, next to New York. Greenwich, CT.
It's right next to Manhattan, maybe half an hour.
OK. So New York's cool.
So you're in New York, I'm in Arizona, he's in Illinois.
So it's a beautiful thing. That's technology, man.
You got to love it for that partof it.
Right, but you obviously have anaccent, so where did you grow
up? Yeah, it's a it's a great

(02:20):
question, especially nowadays. I have a cover story I always
use. Actually, I recently used that.
I'm from Romania. I know it.
Awesome. So no, I actually grew up a
friend. From Romania for years that I
worked with was a cool. Guy Yeah, right, right.
No, actually the the real, real story is I grew up in Soviet
Union platform is how I called that.

(02:42):
And maybe 20 years back, when I quite was guided by my
grandparents, I made a big decision.
I moved out and now I live in the United States for the last
20 years with my right. So you grew up in Romania?
No, Romania is my cover story. Because nowadays, in a place
where I actually grew up, because it's, it's not a good

(03:05):
thing. Oh, OK.
It's not. Yeah, it is Soviet Union.
He. Actually hit the nail on the
head, Chris. He grew up in the Soviet Union.
You said that before he came back on.
Right. I just assumed because the name
of the accent, but I wasn't, I wasn't sure.
So. Yeah.
So how was so how so? Because we like, we like we like
to talk about anything and everything.

(03:26):
As you know, we're just, it's a conversation.
I want to hear that part of the story.
Right. I want to hear.
I want to hear what the Soviet. Union.
What was it like growing up? Yeah.
Yeah. Wow.
All right. Please.
All right, let's go from, I think from the beginning, I
guess it's, you know, Soviet Union platform.

(03:46):
I, I, it's how I called it Soviet Union LLC Soviet Union
Corp was powered by certain beliefs and that was because
they all came back to communism party.
So the communism communist system was designed for everyone

(04:06):
pretty much. And obviously my family members,
my parents, my grandparents, they are under this umbrella.
They believe what they should believe.
And I was super lucky when I grew up at that point, when I
was let's say 10 and 11. It's actually the point when you
start asking yourself questions.All right, how long I can live

(04:27):
in a life, right? It's 100 years.
So I already had 10% of my life down when I was 10 years.
So I was lucky at that point in life, the whole, the system, if
we call IT system and actually the system, right, starts
falling apart. And I found that wherever my
parents, they believe actually it's alternative reality.

(04:49):
And I had the luxury to challenge that and ask them
direct questions because at thatpoint it was already OK to ask
what the heck is that, right? So honestly, my mom, she was
more conservative. She had more political correct
answers and my questions why we do this, why we do that?
My dad. You're freezing up on us.

(05:37):
Yeah, and I looked at my thing. I'm uploading fine.
So is he. Weird.
Sorry ladies and gentlemen here.He's having technical
difficulties, which really sucksbecause I'm super engaged in
this story. I know, I know, right?
I've never met anybody from. Russia.

(05:58):
No. No.
And I really want to hear about how he grew up and like how old
he is now. That was one of the questions
he'll. Be back.
Yeah, Yeah. No, absolutely.
Because that that's something that's fascinating, right?
Because it's you're going behindthe Iron Curtain.
Is that what that was called when you're growing up?
100% good job. So be able to see, you know, at
least at least listen to a storyof.
Of let's make sure we establish how old he is now so we know

(06:22):
what years we're talking about when he was growing up, because
if he's close to the same age asus, yeah, you're going to hear
what his experience in life was compared to going to an American
school every day. And sure, right away you can
just you hear the difference in what those people went through.
And right away, at 10 years old,he was aware that his life was
10% over. Were you aware at 10 years?

(06:43):
No, no, no. And right away, my brain went.
I had no idea my life was. 10% over at 10 years old.
But see, that means that he plans on living to 100, right?
But. What I'm saying is that was the
despair and the hopelessness that life was, you know?
It's just. You're just kind of waiting to

(07:03):
die because you're going to do the same thing over and over and
over and over again because everything's for the system,
right? Right.
And that's, that's communism, which you know.
It doesn't work. No.
And you eat the same, you sleep the same, you work the same.
You do this. I mean, it's, it's, it's
Groundhog Day movie to an extreme.
Yes. And that's that's.

(07:23):
A great way of putting a great analogy.
And I had no idea he was where he was from when we were talking
because it it, it just, it wasn't his resume, his, his life
resume he sent me was more business related and things like
that. So this really surprised me when
when I first heard him speak. I'm like, oh, he's not from New
York. No, no, you hit the nail on the

(07:47):
head. I couldn't believe it.
Yeah, he's like, I'm from Romania.
That would have been cool enough.
Here we go. Absolutely.
Yuri is piping back in, ladies and gentlemen.
You're good. I don't.
Know you're good, man. We were.
So I was just like, Oh my God, I'm so engaged in this story.
I want to hear the rest of it. Right.

(08:08):
Oh. He froze again.
Let's see if he was in Russia, Icould see like, you know, the
three continents, right? Or two continents apart, right?
You know, and there's other Wi-Fi.
No, because the weird thing was is he was keeping up with us on
the upload speed. Oh, interesting.

(08:29):
Which is nerd talk, ladies and gentlemen.
But it is nerd talk. You have to have a decent
Internet connection to use this service, so that's why we're
always talking about it on the. Podcast And that's why I
included in all my welcome to the Hey, there you are.
There you go. Nope, there you went.

(09:00):
You're still freezing up on us, brother.
Man, that sucks. Yeah, because now he does suck.
0% loaded. Yeah, but he, you know, he's
looks like he's having a good time.
He's got a smile on his face. I want to ask him if he's on
ADSL connection. Oh, that could be it.

(09:22):
Because you and I are sitting here talking to each other like
we're in the same room and we're1800 miles apart, so.
We are. So I wait for your to come back
on. Mike and I were talking before
the show that that I have a unique ability in my vehicle to
get ethanol gas. OK, so there's two stations in
Arizona, both are in the East Valley, one's in Tempe, one's in
Mesa where you can actually get this ethanol fuel.

(09:44):
So I go to the one in the East Valley because I'm on that side
of town this morning doing real estate stuff.
What was I pull up to the gas station slash restaurant.
And the restaurant inside gas station is one of, you know,
Arizona's favorite fast food Mexican stops called Filibertos.
Yeah, Filibertos, right. So I pull up in there and
there's there's a landscape truck and you know, a AA44 door

(10:07):
Crew Cab, dually wheeled tire, massive truck with a long
trailer that's probably just as long as a truck.
And this gentleman's blocking 1233 pumps, right?
Which means you're blocking 6 people's ability to pump
gasoline on the other side. The ethanol nozzle on that side
of the pump is broken. So the only ones on the side
where his trailers at in front of that spot is another truck.

(10:29):
That's one of those, you know, they have to have to the back is
empty open. So you unload, you know, like, I
don't know, drop off pickup donation type truck.
OK, right. It's like going to the
restaurant and look around. I kind of, you can kind of tell
a landscaper because they're everything's covered from head
to toe except their face becauseof the Arizona sun.
So I was like, excuse me, you know, is that your white truck
out there? He looks out there, looks at it,

(10:52):
looks back at me, doesn't say anything.
I'm like, is that your white truck?
I said you there's ethanol there.
I like to pump that gas for my vehicle.
And that's the only one that's working.
Gentleman behind him rattles something off in Spanish and the
guy that I'm talking to respondsin Spanish that rewraps his
burrito and continues to eat. So I'm standing looking at him
for about 3 seconds and I'm like, I'm like I just need you

(11:12):
to move your truck forward so I can get gas.
It's not that. Big a deal.
Reasonable request. Didn't respond to anything I
said OK, so forget exactly what I said, but it's something to
the level. Well, if you're going to be a
Dick about it, then maybe when I, when you come out there,
you're just not going to have any, any air in your front 2
tires. And I walked out and none of
them moved. Like, no, it's, it's and it's
somewhere in that conversation that point out the fact.

(11:33):
I know you understand what I'm saying because what you do for a
living, you have to at least understand what I'm saying.
Whether you speak it or not, youhave to understand what I'm
saying. And there's two guys here.
There's three guys here and thenthere's the door and there's
there's four guys that are there.
Don't look like they're a landscape.
And again, in Arizona landscape,like legit, you're wearing a
bright white yellow shirt and the only thing that's open to

(11:55):
the air is yours on your face. And even when you're in the
yard, you put on your face with a mask of sunglasses.
So there's nothing exposed to the sun, right?
But you have to, and I've done that when I've done light, it's
actually a cooler environment, being completely covered from
the sun. And the only thing really
exposed, Nothing. Nothing really.

(12:16):
When I run my bones, everything,I'm just like a landscape.
So and nobody wants skin cancer.No, but it was just, it was a
reasonable request. I wasn't being a jerk.
I was, I was slight and and respectful about it.
And he just looks at me like, like, fuck you is basically what
he said. And then the guy behind him
again changed on something Spanish.
And I'm learning Spanish, but I'm not quick enough to pick up

(12:38):
what they say because, you know,people who have spoken Spanish
their entire life. Well, I mean.
They're talking as fast as we are right now, right?
So there's you. One second, he's going to finish
this. I got to finish this story.
So my point is, boys and girls, it's not an unreasonable request

(13:01):
to ask someone to move forward when you're trying to get fuel
if the only pump that is allowing fuel to be dispersed.
Be a human and respond instead of just being a Dick and staring
at the. And one thing I would like to
add to that story, yeah, is true, genuine, heartfelt
Mexicans that grew up in Mexico hate Mexicans like that because

(13:27):
they give them all a bad name, right.
When you fake that you can't speak English.
And that both that I've known plenty of good Mexican families
who came here illegally and then, you know, made it legal
later on, but their parents werealways careful to make them
speak English when they were in the house and, you know, just.
We're in this country now. Here's what we're going to do.

(13:48):
So I, I hear that in my head too.
It's like, man, those, those kind of people, they give
Mexicans a bad name. They do.
Well, and it's just, it's just ahuman respect thing, just.
Yeah, it doesn't, it doesn't matter, but it's I'm talking
now. It's the language barrier thing
too, you know. Yeah, Yeah.
Anyway, sorry you're. Yeah, no, we were talking about
little situation happened this morning when I asked somebody

(14:09):
politely to move their vehicle so I could get some fuel and and
they just stared at me like I was and, you know, a space, an
alien that just had no relevance.
It was the strangest thing, man.So, you know, so anyway, so we
want to we want to continue. This is Yuri.
He lives in New York. He's originally from the Soviet
Union. And we were talking about how
Mike and I both you made the statement that when you turn,

(14:32):
1010% of your life was gone. That hit he and I, like you,
wouldn't believe. Because when we were 10 years
old, we were not aware at all that our life was ever even
going to end for one thing, let alone know that it was 10% over.
So what made you hyper aware at 10 years old that your life was
10% over? That's my first question.

(14:53):
Oh, it's a it's a great question.
And I actually first time in life, I asked myself why I I
knew that why I had this kind ofconcern, right.
And you nailed it. I didn't expect it.
Let me think about it. My guess.
All right, So here's what happened back in the time in our

(15:14):
culture when I say our culture, whatever culture we had at that
point, right, Sure. When grandparents or adults die,
the holdest event, the holdest ceremony, I called it right, was
designed around tragedy and it was really depressing for
anybody, even adults. So I, I guess at that point I, I

(15:38):
was witness of few, maybe relatives or some neighbors that
die. And obviously that concept that
life is over a certain point wasintroduced by not even asking me
kind of right. And it was introduced in a
pretty harsh style as a whole. This, you know, process to say
bye to those, you know, people who die.

(15:59):
It's, it was set up like like a real, real experience, right?
You can see actual dead body, right?
And that dead body, it was not like modern days.
It was not designed to be. It looks healthy.
And nice. It wasn't, Yeah, it wasn't, it
wasn't more. It didn't go to mortician and

(16:20):
get it all cleaned up and stuff,right?
Right, right. So yeah, yeah.
Now you kind of went to, it's not a therapy session, right?
I don't pay you guys right. So I think at that point in
life, I was first time experienced, second time
experienced that that concept that you might be bright and
and, you know, running around todoing some shit when you child
obviously, right. And then at certain point you

(16:42):
that piece of disposal piece of meat which looks ugly.
And so I think it was it is my answer why I was kind of aware
of the fact that eventually the whole this, you know, version of
the life is over eventually thatthat that dude or that Lady
were. Yeah.
OK. Now my next question real quick

(17:02):
is how old are you? So we have a time frame of when
we're talking about. At that point or right now?
Right now? Oh, right now I'm roughly 45.
OK. Yeah, I would say it's my kind
of. Cool.
So I'm, I'm 10 years old and you, Mike's eight years old.
And you, so you were, you were 10 years old in the Soviet
Union. Right.
OK, so when did you move from the Soviet Union?

(17:24):
How old were you? I needed that when I was in
college. Second year in college where
maybe it was 19, it was in Boston.
And actually it was not Boston. Yeah, it was New Hampshire.
Right, OK, so you so you lived there till you were 19?
Right. I I was OK till 17 1/2.
I would say pretty precise. So.

(17:44):
So what was it like being a teenager growing up in Russia,
man? Partly have Which part of that?
I don't, I just like, I know what is obviously we know what
it's like to grow up in America as teenagers.
And it was, you know, when we were teenagers, right?
There wasn't the social media, there wasn't the Internet.
It was, it was basically, you know, you, you get home by the
time the street lights come out.So it was a great childhood from

(18:06):
that aspect. If you look at what kids have to
deal with now, right? Because there was no hiding
behind texts and phone calls andcell phones and shit like that.
It was just you're going to knocking on Mike's door.
Hey, Mike, can Mike come out andplay?
You know, and then parents like no, he's grounded.
He'll you know, or he's doing a homework, whatever.
So did you have so just. I mean, I don't.
Here's a way of asking that, I think here's a way of asking

(18:29):
what you're trying to say. Did you have that same kind of
freedom even though you were in a communist country?
I mean, you could you could comeand go as you pleased as far as
playing with your friends and going to a club.
Or that's what he's asking, right?
Robert, I think it's. It's.
It's not making. Teenager in Moscow, in Russia.

(18:50):
Yeah. So in my Moscow, different
cities as well, right, right, right.
I think the whole concept, the whole narrative, we are less
free nowadays. Our kids, I have 3 kids, right?
It's international. So back in a time when you're
17, when you're 15, when you're 14, the level of freedom and
level of independence, I would say, right, if we put any number

(19:16):
on that, it was maybe less than 10X.
So we did have a pretty similar experience.
You just go to somewhere and youcome back from somewhere and
your time and obviously you havesome expectation from, you know
yourself that your parents wantsyou to see before the dark and
you can have access to the bike.You can bike somewhere and

(19:38):
explore and find sometimes you find troubles, right?
Sometimes you find something very interesting and sometimes
you build, build, bring those troubles to your household,
right? So, and I grew up in a small
town, like roughly 9000 people compared to a local town.
So I would kind of say that it'smore like small version of

(20:04):
Queens in New York. OK.
You have quite diverse community.
You have people who are successful doing, you know, good
stuff and a wife and obviously. You have some Russia.
It it was small town near and usually in upgrade that time it
was Gorky and that small town was primarily built around two

(20:24):
different 2 businesses. One business produced food for
peaks and second business produced peaks and obviously
humans, we eat those, you know, pigs.
So it's pretty simple. Pretty simple, logical I'm.
I'm pretty good with geography, but are you closer to the

(20:44):
European side of the Soviet Union or are you more like in
the interior of the country is what I'm asking I guess.
It's right in the middle. I would say it's right in the
middle. And like, I know we're right
where you're at. Then yeah, like let's say 4
hours by good car, 4 hours from Moscow.
It's very much to to put a point, right.

(21:05):
So that lifestyle was evolved pretty dynamic dramatically
when, you know, systems start falling apart.
The whole freedom was leveraged by not just kids, but adults as
well. So the whole system was very
like maybe 2 years a transition from one type of everyone

(21:28):
shared, everyone united by same vision.
And now over 2 years it become more kind of independent
lifestyle. So each family who?
Lived under two different regimes, right?
Right, so I what was? The first regime.
I'm sorry. What Who was in charge during
the first regime, when you were like, from birth to whenever

(21:49):
Putin took over? Right, right.
So the the last guy, I think to be political correct, we should
kind of stay away as far as possible so our podcast can go
live, right? We don't talk about that guy.
I will stay away from that part,OK, Just for the reason.
Fair enough. I don't believe.
I don't believe I have so much, you know.

(22:10):
What? You call him Bob.
Yeah, I don't have kind of very concrete balls and.
I like what Chris says. Let's call him Bob.
And when Bob was in charge, whatwas life like?
And then when Putin took over, what did you notice like
immediately and then maybe progressively afterwards, so.
The the Bob I wasn't part of Bobumbrella How to say that when

(22:35):
Bob was on top of family is a family member.
I already am flying over to you know my new life.
So but when I grew up, it was a dude named Gorbachev, right?
Based on based on record. Think of his name.
Thank you. Yeah, yeah.
So that dude, he was pretty kindof human focused kind of.

(22:58):
He was not a good manager, but obviously he managed the
country, which was not a good business in the first place.
So maybe we would have much moresuccess in the business if he,
you know, run, you know, pretty good business at that point.
There's a previous guy, whateverprevious guy name, he could not
build as a country, as a business in any perspective.
Yes, it was super inefficient. It was super.

(23:22):
How to say that super not right?Inefficient works, and no
inefficient works. It just it wasn't.
It wasn't performing the way it should be.
And the people suffered under that right.
Oh, it's a great, great note. I didn't see anybody in my
circle who had zero, who had anynegative emotional things in

(23:47):
their life. Right.
The system itself, when you unite people on their same
vision and you let them go in that direction and you tell them
to feel, you know, the fact theyactually part of that journey
and they can feel, you know, accountable for whatever there
is. They have to be the one guy who

(24:07):
might, you know, part of you know, he might be plumber second
guy, he might be big boss, right?
But at a certain point, everyonehas access to the same table, I
would say, right. And when people united by
something huge, they actually feel very happy about the
lifestyle. They even it's not about money
at that point, right, It's more about where we going.

(24:31):
I would say Ellen masks. He isn't biggest communist type
of guy right. He's trying to put you and me to
the Mars and when I grew up, theguy who is in charge, our Ellen
Musk, they try to put me in a live way in the future.
We all happy. I forgot exactly the tagline,
but we did at we had exact same branded message from the system

(24:55):
as well. OK.
That makes sense, yeah. So let's go to the Mars so.
So this is kind of a random question.
I don't know if if it's even a legitimate question.
But as I grew up not really understanding communism, right,
because I lived in America, right?
So I never had this struggle through that.
Is it true that that the government would dictate what

(25:18):
your occupation was? At a certain degree you you
more. Your journey started in high
school. In high school, you're pick
something based on your parents observations, right?
So your parents pretty much put you on some path and that that
specific path will place you somewhere in the society.

(25:39):
And you got a full time presencein society and you feel very
happy because you go to the to the to the Mars.
Gotcha. OK.
OK. Then with that said, sorry
Chris. You're good.
No, you're good. I like where you went with that.
With that said, what if you wanted to be an artist?
him and I played in a band together, right?
We chose that as part of our profession for a portion of our
lives. What if you wanted to be a

(26:00):
guitar player in a band? You don't have that freedom.
You have a freedom to play guitar with any rhythm you can
come up with because guitar music doesn't impact does have a
direct message, right? But as soon as you open your
mouth, whatever comes from your mouth, it has to be in a certain

(26:22):
Li was a message. We go to the Mars.
It's got to be politically correct.
Pretty much. You can't be.
Anti establishment gets you taken off the stage and shoved
in in a closet in the backroom for days.
Pretty. Much, Mike?
Yeah. Yeah, so like it or not, we
could Chris and I could have went on stage and said, you
know, fuck America. We hate this fucking the way

(26:44):
this country's run, which we never would have said because we
love where we live, but we already.
Said that right. To get up there and what if?
What if you did that? Oh God.
In my time, in my yeah, sure, yeah.
I don't see anybody. I didn't see anybody in my life
in my circle. And I did have some, you know,

(27:05):
very bold and proactive activists wherever people who
against the system. Nobody would say that.
Yeah. It's it's so it's not just bold,
it's it's not even the the the bad news when system when you go
too far too long for to the Marsyou actually start, you actually

(27:26):
believe you, you you're in a path to the Mars and anybody say
the Mars is fuck anybody say that the Mars is illusion.
Not so many people can hear the message.
Not so many people can support that.
So what are we screaming your Microsoft on the stage.
Not so many people can, you know, get reacted in that
passed. Away.
Gotcha. Yeah, that makes sense.

(27:49):
So now, so now you're in America.
You like you, you moved from Soviet Union, Russia and you're
in America now. You go to you go to college.
What did you study in college and was and what did you notice
when you came over from a communist country to the
freedoms of America? What was the biggest culture
shock for you? Great question.
Yeah, go back to education part then we can culture police.

(28:13):
OK, Yeah, I, I just maximize opportunity to study as much as
I could. Thank you for, you know, to my
parents, I guess they, they are pretty direct.
You, you better still learn and be smart than not.
Yeah. So I went to same.
Message. Right, right.

(28:33):
So I went to mechanical engineering school.
I graduate after 70 years, been in a in a pretty good college
and I went to PhD and as a mechanic engineer type of guy.
And obviously I drop out for thesake of someday I will say it
loud. I drop out PhD instead of high

(28:55):
school. So this I, I Max out the fact
that we had free education system.
It's a good part of the kind of go to the Mars.
It's it's, it has a good benefit, right?
When you go to the Mars, you have to build a good platform
for education. You have to get to the Mars, you
need engineers. So I spent seven years studying
math, finance, where we named that.

(29:15):
So I was full time in a few different education systems.
The good news, I paid 0 for that.
The best news, sometimes I even get paid for that.
If you started good, if you got good score points, whatever you
call that, you actually get paid.
And so transition to cultural question, what was quite
different versus here versus Russian culture?

(29:39):
Yeah, honestly, it's more I'm trying to go back that time, my
impression that time versus my impression nowadays and.
That time he's been Americanized, Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, it's kind of, you know, it's now I'm going to
different Mars, right. Right.
Exactly. And my belief system already

(30:00):
kind of influenced by years. Be present.
Be present here. I'm not going to say prison.
Well, maybe, maybe, maybe pose. Let me, let me pose the question
this way. Like so when you, when you first
come to America, right, and the freedom that you were then
allowed, was that just like overwhelming, like, Oh my gosh,

(30:20):
I can just get up whenever I want.
I, I can go to McDonald's and get a cheeseburger or I can go
in this movie at blockbuster. You know, just that type of
because you're going from like awhat a communistic world where
you're kind of told what to do, when to do it, how to, you know,
all this stuff, right? And now you're now you're
completely free to kind of do whatever you want, right?

(30:41):
Like you can go in the middle ofthe not.
Exactly not, not not even exactly.
I would take even absolute the good news in my personal case
when I was out, when I checked out from that hospital, from
that Mars expedition, right. Yes.
I would say it the last two or three years, the, the, the, the,

(31:01):
that regime, the system was already collapsed, right?
It was complete freedom that time in that part of the
country, not OK that those threeyears after the system
collapsed, it was the biggest freedom you can experience in a
life. So you do whatever you do, you
go against legal things and yourlegal system, you, you quite
control that. You go against messages.

(31:23):
You can open your mouth, you cansay whatever you want because
the system doesn't exist now. You can say it out loud.
Your parents were dumb. Follow this, you know, one to
three belief. So back to your question was a
big like difference in the freedom to be honest here I
experienced much less freedom. So right it it was much less
you, you you observe by rules. There is something you you you

(31:49):
have to be compliant every day, right?
It's what I experienced here, right?
So if you compliant follow a certain protocol.
It's what I discovered here. Is it good or bad the first day?
Yeah. The first time you kind of you
don't feel comfortable. You you feel control kind of,
right. You have some boundaries, right?

(32:09):
But eventually, when you realizeall those girls, they actually
designed for good of your things, for good of your
presence, being part of the system.
I I decided, listen, that that version of control is much
better than what I experienced when I was a child.
So give me a simple example of something that you have to do
here that you did not have to dowhen you lived in your hometown.

(32:32):
Oh my God, so now? This is, this is, this is that's
a, that was a fast, fast answer,Yuri, because really, I never
would have thought coming from communistic control.
Have a claim that he had less, more freedom there, Right,
right, right. Give me a simple example.
Right, which if you. Think one off top of your.
Head Brilliant insight, man. But again, big note that we're
trying to compare apple and banana.

(32:54):
Yeah, we know, right, because the last three years it was
episode of companies. If you compare communism
different different animal, right.
So the the the biggest thing, not the biggest one of oh wow,
it's going public, right. Let me pick something in a more

(33:14):
easier to to to let's. Get you in trouble?
Right, right. So I'm trying to stay away from
trouble all about. You see how much KGB now?
Oh, let's doorman. I'm knocking on my door either.
Let's use that thing as the factwe we're trying to discover,
right? You see, when we try to say
something here, right, we're still trying to filter where

(33:35):
there are some messages they canput you guys and me in certain
trouble if you go to let's say, oh, the big one, which, and
obviously let's not count details because I don't know,
we're kind of in trouble for sure when we go races, when
we're trying to define differentpersonalities driven by
different, you know, ethnicity, the history behind each.

(33:56):
So we all came from different places, right?
We have to have some expectationwho that person based on ways
he's coming from, right? So that subject, the race, it
might be color, it might be the size of the body, etcetera in
the country we're part of right now, right.
It's much less written to, to emphasize, to explain, to be

(34:18):
verbal on that subject, much less like I would say, TNS.
Yeah, Holy crap. Amazing example, Yuri.
Wow, that was a brilliant answer, man.
Thank you very much. Now I understand.
I. It was just.
In the show. Just in the show.
How? Do we go up from there?
No, but that was that, that was amazing that way.

(34:40):
And that was a, that was a greatway to, to, to frame that
because I never would have thought of that.
So over there, you're just over there, you're just communistic,
you're in that world and that's how it is.
So they don't see any of that per SE, right.
And over here, like you just said, there's so much division
from from the cultures themselves, the race, the

(35:00):
religions, because you didn't touch religions, right.
There's religion and religion isthe mother of all wars, right?
That's why the world's always been at war as religions and
stuff. So I mean, that's that was a
really great insight on on the difference between the two for
sure. Nice job.
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen,Yuri from from, from, you know.

(35:23):
Yes, I think it's better phrase that way.
So OK, so here's another fun question because Mike and I
talked about this before you came on the show.
We were talking he like we've, we've always asked people what
is America's perception from thecountry, but obviously we're not
going to ask that because you'rein America now.
But we've learned that people that are in other countries
outside of America, some of themthink that we're arrogant pieces

(35:45):
of shit. And then Mike had a conversation
with someone and and the answer was basically, well, we only
speak one language in America, whereas your buddy speaks how
many, Mike? 5. 55 So how many languages?
He speaks 9 languages, but he speaks 5 fluently.
And where is he from? Norway, right?
So what about you, Yuri? How many languages do you speak?

(36:08):
I think the English, my second now become eventually the first
one, I guess because the way I process, yeah, first one
English, second Russian. I can speak, I can speak Ukraine
to support Ukraine. And then somehow I understand
Espanol and Spanish and pretty much that's it.

(36:30):
I'm not language guy, I'm more. No, it's, but still that's.
Still speaking? You're still speaking 2 fluent
languages, then you can understand two other ones, so
that's still 4. Languages.
I only speak one fluent. Right, right.
I'm learning Spanish, but it's not, you know, I had my little
ordeal today and I didn't understand the thing those guys
said because they said it so fast.
I was like, it's like, OK, so no, that's still that's props,

(36:53):
man. That's good job.
Now I had an uncle who took Russian in college and
supposedly that is one of the hardest languages to learn other
than like Latin which is a dead language anyway.
So they say that Russian is actually the hardest language to
learn that's actively spoken every day on the planet today.

(37:15):
Would you agree with that or no?It'd be hard for you to agree
with it because you grew up withit, yeah.
No, it it was hard for me as well.
It was like I said, yeah, I was pretty good in physics, math,
and, you know, such science, right?
Can I ask you a quick question? Why are the words this long?
And I'm, I'm holding my fingers really wide.
Ladies and gentlemen, why are there so many letters?

(37:37):
There's where in a, in a, in a, each word.
In Russian, yeah. Like when I look at Russian
signs, you know when you see them on TV, like the the names
seem like they're 14 letters long.
Yeah, they do. Oh, I think oh wow, is a test.
No, no. OK, let me nail that.

(37:59):
The the biggest difference between English American
language, right? There is a symbol might have
there are two symbols, right. But when you write description
for how you pronounce that, you have to come up with three
symbols, right? OK, in in that type of group of
languages like in Bulgaria or Romania as well, right?

(38:19):
And all those languages is Slavic.
There is no such like to be honest, there is no such
language as Russian. They all function of it's a mix
of and they always evolve, right?
They answer your question. They are not.
They don't have issue to write all small sounds, so you just

(38:39):
can read that exactly what I see.
You don't have to generate big sounds from, you know, small
symbols. Kind of.
It doesn't make sense. OK.
So whatever you see, you have toread that in English, you have
to memorize certain combinationsof symbols and you pronounce
them quite different whether yousee actually in the paper.

(39:01):
OK, so, so if dog in in America is dog in Russia could be what's
your call and it could be 14 symbols long.
Yeah, right. No, actually, right, right.
No, that animal, the one who have have.
Yeah. In English there are three
letters and it's dog in Russian.Sabaka is 11 more symbol bigger.

(39:23):
OK, but no need for that. We can call it Sabah.
Whatever. Sabah.
Yeah. So now, yeah.
Now we we simplify like become more English.
I know, I know Russian Sabah. So now that we now that we've
picked your brain about how you grew up and all that kind of
stuff because it's fascinating, Mike.
Now let's turn our attention to what you do now and and what you
want to share while being on theChris and Mike Show.

(39:49):
There's no specific message to share beyond us.
It just going through the life and be have quite different
experiences. Eventually you, I ask myself.
I should talk to myself directly, I guess.
At what point I should actually combine this knowledge and at

(40:10):
least in my head and feel it, enjoy it and so feel the whole
life, which I already went through right.
So being in the camera, being inthe podcast, thank you guys.
You know, for to be here. It was pretty much the main
driver. There is no direct message or I
have a message XYZ. No, I actually, I decided, OK,
it's time to. I'm 25.

(40:32):
I already had the laugh. And maybe it makes sense to help
yourself become, you know, more public versus less public, I
guess. Sure.
So with that said, Yuri, let me ask you this question.
Obviously, you probably looked over your shoulder for quite
some time when you first came here.
Do you still do that? What do you mean by that?

(40:53):
By the way? I discourage.
Were you nervous about being here on your?
Well, just because the, I think Mike what, what he's getting out
of the atmosphere in America, you know, the Cold War and
stuff, I don't think that was still relevant.
Relevant, right. But but the fear, the fear like
I'm from another country, in anygiven time, somebody could just

(41:14):
tap on my shoulder and say, you know.
Oh, the, the, and we're talking about, it's not about
podcasting. It's about, you know, back to
the first part of the outcome. Yeah, yeah.
No. Just what you just said.
Were you ever did you just kind of go into a headstrong and say,
this is what I'm going to do andI'm going to move forward in
this direction? Or you know what, you at some

(41:38):
point you had to make a decisionthat you're going to change your
life. What?
What triggered that? The the trigger back to it's a.
It's a next great question, which might be quite.
A great question. Right, right, right, right.
It might be there are multiple triggers.
It was not just one, right, Obviously the fact the fact,

(42:04):
right, I didn't believe that go to that specific Mars.
It was a good, you know, time tospend.
I didn't believe in that vision they had when I was 10, whatever
11 would say, right. Then next time, next chapter,
like when you from 10 to 14, I guess when systems start falling

(42:25):
apart, I had clear picture that there is no such system as the
system exists. You pretty much define your own
system when you go. And obviously there are some
external messages from grandparent, let's say right and
from somebody else who might whisper to ear its norm that's.

(42:45):
Still super intuitive at 14 years old.
I'm going to give you that again.
Yeah, but again, when you're in a journey to find signals and
symbols, you you can find them even you, I don't know, five, I
guess, right. I have, I have a sound history
as old right now, right. And I can see.
His I was looking at girls at 14Yuri.
That's was my only. No, no, no, I I did that as

(43:05):
well, but just for record, I, I.No, I'm not saying you.
I'm not saying you didn't. You're, you're a man like
anybody else. I'm just saying that was my only
concern at that point. I I wasn't thinking about.
This my only concern as well, tobe honest.
No, we we, we, we, we, we all right, so we, we probably have

(43:25):
to go numbers, right. Sorry.
Back to the shoulder part. Let's go back to the shoulder.
It sounds like we missed that part.
The shoulder part yeah, being indifferent ventures different I
was an entrepreneur trying to make different things in the
life trying to I was trying to generate cash flow.

(43:51):
I didn't know that thing. I would say cash flow at that
time, right. But obviously I was involved in
so many different ventures and some ventures I was part of a
joint somebody think somebody initiative, right and most of
the time it was mine, right. I was a guy who designed idea.
I was a guy who actually go after and I was the one who you

(44:12):
know, to take all the responsibility for the outcome,
good or bad. So being on different ventures,
multi different country, it was the easiest project I took over
in my life to be honest. Well, we're done.
That's a great answer. Yeah, that is a great answer.
So let's, so you, you, you sent me a, a, a full back history on

(44:36):
you. And I kind of I, I skimmed
through it because again, we like this being real raw and
relevant. So I don't, we don't like really
knowing who we're talking to toomuch because it's, it's the
reactions in the conversation ismore genuine from our point of
view, because I, I had a radio show and so I did all that and
that was, you know, as cool as, but it was never, never genuine.
And, and what Mike and I like about this is we're genuine and

(44:59):
the people we talked to, they'regenuine conversations and like,
like this entire story about where you, where you grew up.
And that's fascinating to both of us.
And you answered questions for us, probably for a lot of people
that will listen to this episodethat are watching now too,
because you never really get to get in depth with someone who's
lived behind the Iron Curtain. So that was cool.
Totally appreciate you sharing that.
And hopefully that, you know, the KGP doesn't come knocking on

(45:21):
your door tomorrow. I don't know if they still
exist, but if they do, tell themit's our fault and they can come
find me. Right.
And it's a record. I, I didn't share any secret so
far. So by the way, I can share both.
It's all for Sale, by the way. Any secret guys?
Reach out if you want to get some secrets.
Yeah, listen. We can talk about the business

(45:43):
model behind the podcast. Yeah, Yeah.
Let's get a business model together and we'll we'll connect
you to and you know, we can makesome money there.
I'd love and you're anymore every.
Minute that goes by, right? So you're married now?
You have three kids, right? How long you been married?
20 I guess it sounds like. Right.
OK. Yeah, my wife and I'm together.
I'm 32. So good job.

(46:03):
And you, you said you had a 3 1/2 year old.
What about the other two? How old are the other two?
I have a quite diverse portfolio.
The oldest asset I have 22, OK, the middle 112 and the youngest
3. So it's kind of wow, 10 years
gap. Yeah, that's OK, you know.

(46:24):
And there's. There's I have a friend who had
had what their kids were all gone up and grown and then all
of a sudden they decided to haveanother kid.
And so there's like 25 years apart, you know, it's crazy and.
Just for record, same acts, samesperm, same exact kind of thing.

(46:44):
That's. Funny, Vernon, so talk a little
bit about your, your, your business side of what you do
now, because I did, I did skim what you sent me and you talked
about some ventures and real estate stuff and, and things
like that. And, and, you know, give us a
little insight to what you do now.
Is there something that you wantto, you want to share?
I mean, are you, you know, like,what's your like?

(47:06):
We OK, let me put it to you thisway.
Like we've had people on here that are health and Wellness,
that are fitness coaches, peptide experts, writers,
authors, producers for movies. We've had a professional boxer
on who ironically enough, a weekafter he was on our show, he
like literally just dropped thisguy with one punch.
And he was the most quiet, sincere, polite, gentle human I

(47:31):
think we want to talk to. And he just laid this dude out,
man. Like we just one punch and then.
He jabbed him and then he just laid him out with the second hit
to hit. It was beautiful.
It's just, you know, so but that's the cool thing.
Everybody has has something, whether it's it's are we going
to be a coach or we're going to,you know, teach about investing

(47:51):
and things like that. So that's kind of what I'm
getting at with that, because obviously we connect a while
back because we have such a a scheduled out show.
But what is it? What's your passion in life,
man? What fuels your fire?
What What makes you up in the morning and get you excited?
Yeah, what makes your ego now at45 in America?
Yeah. Right, it's good coffee, I

(48:14):
guess. That helps.
We love we. Should have a product placement
right here like Dunkin' Donuts Iguess or.
Chris and I, I think he's still drinking it.
We drank Don Francisco's butterscotch toffee.
If you want to send it to me by the case, I'll talk about Don
Francisco's from here to KingdomCome.

(48:34):
Yeah, yeah, Mike introduced me that.
It's legit, dude. It's like you don't even have
anything. It'll change your life.
Yeah, you don't have to have anything in it.
It's that good. It's just and, and they have a
wide variety, Yuri, there's a wide variety of flavors from Don
Francisco, you know. All right, I should try that and
thank you for time to to let me process and come up with the
right answer. I guess what makes you wake up?

(48:58):
Well, everybody wakes up becausethey're alive.
But once you wake up, what's your?
Yeah, I know that party. I got it.
I've been trying to make a joke,I guess.
Still here? Right.
No, it's good. It's good, man.
Yeah, There's a child. He's three years old.
He makes me wake up. No, actually, the biggest
answer, the right answer would be I still, I have curiosity and

(49:19):
a level of nine out of 10, I guess.
And it comes to the price. Sometimes you go to too many
directions, right? Sure.
So yeah, that is. Main reason that's called ADHD.
Yuri squirrel. Squirrel.
Welcome to United States. We all have kind of diagnosed

(49:40):
kind of thing. No, actually it's curiosity when
you have interest in something, right?
So nowadays, right, I, I found myself with a big, big, with big
passion involved in, I called itopportunistic investment
transactions. And, and what I found the whole
my life is more opportunistic type of investment.

(50:01):
I invest my, my time to execute certain vision which I can come
up when I wake up one day, right?
So pretty much the answer your question, what it wake UPS.
Nowadays I have a vision that meand my team, we can build quite
sizable portfolio of passive investment investments.

(50:22):
So we can retire with a quite stable cash flow and enjoy this
American dream, do nothing pretty much, and still have a
nice lifestyle, right? That's my dream too, Yuri.
Yeah, you see how I nailed it? You see how I made it right And.
And I'm in tune with that dream too.
So let's all find that dream together.

(50:43):
Yes. How do we find?
The dream is not it's challenge.The dream I can, you know, write
it down. The dream I can give you a lot
of details of what this dream isabout, right?
The whole thing. Is put it into.
Emotion. Yeah, the whole exercise to find
the path to the dream, right. And that is called execution
center point. And at the same time, it's more
not just execution part, just sometimes it's not execution as

(51:06):
well. Sometimes you put to yourself in
a in a treadmill and you go on direction, which doesn't bring
you to the vision that you come up with, right.
So sometimes it makes sense justdoing nothing, right.
So if the equation, what makes me up sometimes doing nothing,
right? So I'm, I'm most of the time I
take a break to do not most of the time.
Sometimes I take a break, do nothing, just kind of reassess.

(51:27):
Is it right path, not the right path.
Is it right action plan to the vision?
I can I just come up recently. So nowadays I'm in debt space,
investment space, trying to finddeals, trying to find
opportunities, make sure that those opportunities, they, they
bring the value for to me, to myinvestors very much.

(51:48):
So do you run like an investmentportfolio?
Do you run like a hedge fund? Help us understand.
It's coming up, it's coming up. You know, it's more friends and
family structure because I do that.
I do that. I'm investor had for the last,
let's say four years, three years and a half before I was a

(52:08):
guy who's a horse when I say horse and the guy who run the
show. Yeah, I.
Know I got that. Right.
I was a guy who focused on startup.
I had and I was trying to build something big, building an.
Empire. Right, right.
So whatever Elon Musk's dream isabout right.
And then last three years I shipped gears.
I realized there are different approach to to the the goal.

(52:31):
There are different strategies how you can accomplish your goal
passive, all this type of income, right.
So last three years I shipped completely from active guy.
Obviously I am active to find a deal, but I I prefer that that
deal has one more driver. OK.
Who can drive? So you, so you, So you're the
passenger. You're the passenger in the car.

(52:52):
Right. Sometimes a passenger, sometimes
you step on a on a gas station and you put a gas in a in a car.
So there has to be somebody. Yeah.
And somebody has to tell the thedriver where, you know, the
highway ends and it become, you know, Paver Rd.
So you have to slow down the guy.
Yeah. OK.
That's do you have some great analogies?
Man, yeah, he does. Yeah, right.

(53:13):
I love it. I like the.
You should like it. Just write a book about
analogies. Analogies by Yuri.
That's a. That's a good analogy, man.
You're very good at making people understand.
Yeah. Complex things, yeah.
You're good at painting a picture.
Your answer's painting a picture.
So it's not just a generic answer.
It's like you're framing it, which is perfect for for
podcasting, for people to listento it because then they can they

(53:35):
can picture what your answer is because the way you frame the
response. For your first podcast, you've
done amazingly well and I've been captivated the whole time.
First off, I've never met anybody that grew up in Russia,
so you got me right there. That was a win.
Thank you guys. I agree with Chris, this whole
time we've been talking about some pretty seriously complex

(53:55):
issues and you have a really good way of painting a picture
to make my stupid brain understand it.
Not just listen, there are such thing as stupid brain.
Just being funny. I think it's it's a stupid
approach to explain things. So I I was trying to make your
your brain comfortable. You did a great job.
Yeah, for sure. Man, you did absolutely.

(54:16):
That's fantastic. So what's on the horizon for
Yuri? What's what's, what's the,
what's the five year where you're going to be in five
years? What's the goal?
What's the target? There's goal you're.
Going to take over the world andand and we can join.
No, no, no, I I'm not that dude.I have 0 Mars plans.
I don't see myself in the Mars 0plans for that.

(54:37):
I don't. Want to go to Mars either man?
No. I don't even have I have 0
desire be in a part of any government or related journeys
processes would say right. I agree with that.
So the plan is very simple, stayhumble as much as I can, kind of
control emotional part is obviously we get older and we've

(55:00):
found ourselves that the middle age crisis kind of behind the
back. So control that part.
So where we can accomplish wherever I can accomplish, it's
migration, right, It would be good enough.
So obviously tangible part of the equation, what I expect it
be to have, I have a least, I have a vision board.

(55:23):
I did it maybe 10 years, 10 years ago.
Certain point I can share with that with the with the crowd.
I guess I'm not ready right now,but obviously there are some
tangible. We're going to, we're going to
have you back on the show, man, because I mean, we're not done
yet, but we're going to have youback on the show because you're
an interesting conversationalistfor sure.
You're very intelligent because you're a mechanical engineer.

(55:44):
So that alone you have a very analytical mind, which is
fascinating. Which is good and bad, right?
Well, no, but it's it's been. Great for this podcast.
That's all we care about right now.
We're damn glad to meet. You Oh, you guys selfish, right?
No. You should think about my brain.
I have to analyze everything what we discussed here.
Just just nature. It's my muscle.
I can't help you there. You're you, you got to live in

(56:05):
that body. I get to live in this one.
We're just, we're just happy that, you know, like Chris said
for a podcast, it's great for the audience when you can paint
a picture and make them understand right along with us.
So. The the really cool thing is
that your your, your responses to the questions, the fact that
you pause and think about how torespond shows your level of

(56:28):
intelligence because you're justnot wanting to to quickly answer
something just to fill the space.
You're wanting to answer the question with a legitimate
response to help us understand why we asked and and the answer.
So don't ever feel like like your answers were wrong.
They were they were spot on. It's public speakers, right?
When you go to see a public speaker, they will have pauses

(56:49):
when they're on the stage. And those pauses on stage are
because in their brain, they're going from this chapter to that
chapter. But what that pause does, it
makes the person kind of lean anymore.
What's he going to say? And then when you deliver your
answer, because the way you do it so eloquently and the way you
frame it, it's a great answer. Like it's just, it's a great
answer. Like I want to ask you what you
have for breakfast, but I'm afraid you'll you'll make my

(57:11):
breakfast pale in comparison just how you would paint the
picture. It's very simple.
It's a yogurt and two knots. See, it still makes our
breakfast sound like shit, just the way he said.
It. All right, so yogurt.
It's yogurt and it's and a whitecolored yogurt.
I'm not going to raise this here.
It's a white yogurt. That's awesome.

(57:36):
That was hilarious. So.
So did you ever watch the Rocky the Rocky trilogy's the Rocky
movies with Sylvester Stallone? Fight the guy.
Oh yeah, I did that. That wasn't that sport as well.
Oh, right on. So so that's great because I
love, I love boxing. So does Mike.
So you're from so so you're fromRussia's and Ukraine's in that
area. The Klitschkos did you?

(57:58):
Have you? Did you watch them in their
careers? Not not enough.
Because I'm not. I'm not a box guy.
I'm kickboxing guy. OK.
OK. So you're more you, more you go
boxing just for physically fitness and just to do that so.
You I gotta go kickboxing? Oh cool, right on.
Straight up kickboxing or Muay Thai.
Straight, yeah, the, the, the, the basic one.

(58:19):
The basic one, right. The regular one when you when
you use your legs to break, to break somebody else's legs.
So when you watch the Rockies, did Dolph love Dolph Lundgren's
character? You know, the Russian guy?
Was that a good stereotypical example of, you know, the
steroid arrowed Russian athlete that was just juiced up like

(58:41):
crazy? That was a great look.
You didn't answer the question with the look man.
In real life, in the real life, this guy who looks quite
different to be honest, he is more his shoulders more rounded,
he's more less organized, I would say, right.

(59:03):
But it was important for local crowd to to enjoy the fact that
we can nailed that type of machine.
So it it was a picture not for me, it was a picture for you
guys. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense for
sure. I must break you.
Yeah. Yeah, it was a style machine.

(59:25):
I never saw such guy. All my friends are good guys who
actually perform nicely in the kickboxing, etcetera.
They are quite different. Yeah.
Yeah, do you know? Do you know who Bert Kreischer
the comedian is? Yuri.
Google that. OK.
Yes, Google's your friend. He has a great story of going to

(59:47):
Russia when he was in college, and he's told this story a
million times and he elaborates on it each time he tells it.
But I will say the one thing that he says about his time in
Russia is it was the most intimidating experience going
into it. With some of the nicest people

(01:00:09):
he ever met, he said they were scary as shit, but they were
cool to him because they wanted to party with him.
Right. And in general, yes.
And in the general, general yes,yes, yes.
I didn't find any culture any place when I travel and I travel

(01:00:29):
quite remote spots in in the universe, I would say, right?
Let's say in Bangladesh, right? I found myself so sometimes
shocked by certain local messages for them.
It's norm for me. Outsider is quite wow.
I'll give you 1 which quite remarkable, at least for myself,

(01:00:50):
right? I was in Bangladesh and the guy
who was my kind of buddy, he's local, right?
So he put me in a, in a program,like not a program.
We went for different local coolplaces, etcetera.
Right. At a certain point he was
explaining to me about certain religion, which I don't want to
kind of promote right now, not because I don't like that, just

(01:01:12):
because I feel responsible for what you're saying here, right?
So what he said that we all different and at that point,
imagine what we had, we had a food in a good restaurant and in
the food we had on table, we useour hands to use to to eat the
food. So it's a restaurant, it's you
have you dress nicely because those most guys are professional

(01:01:33):
in that in that meeting, right? And they use hands and what he
said, listen, we might be all different in any degree, right?
We may have different, different, different opinions,
different, etcetera. But in reality, if we cut our
hand right here in this spot, you and me will have exact same
blog. Yep.
Yeah, we do so. And so the bottom line, he

(01:01:55):
introduced me the concept that actually he's absolutely right,
etcetera. And then I do believe we're all
the same. We do have some differences just
based on a place where we grew up, based on messages we
listened from our parents and based on books we consume.
And it's why I'm trying to stay away from books.
I don't have been influenced by somebody else.

(01:02:18):
So it's kind of the summary for,you know, to make this whole
thing. I agree with what you said that
that speaks to me because I don't buy into governments
borders. We're all on this planet right?
A lot of people don't even consider the fact that we are
literally spending at 1000 milesan hour hurtling through space

(01:02:40):
into Infinity and it could all end in 1/10 of a second, right?
Something terminal if if the Earth, well, if the Earth
doesn't stay at 23 1/2°, if it goes to 18, we're all dead,
right? Yeah, yeah, that.
Would be. That's how fragile life is.
So for us to define all these things by races, religions,

(01:03:03):
countries, cultures, it's just so stupid.
We're all human beings. We all came a theoretically and
you know, if, whether you believe, if you believe in the,
in the big boom, right, the evolution with you, Carl Sagan,
we all spawn from monkeys. But if you believe the biblical
side of it, we all spawn from Adam and Eve.
So sure, we're all related if that's the case.

(01:03:24):
And there's I've heard somethingand you may know if this is true
or not, Mike, because you're, you listen to so many things.
There's a point in time where the world population was just
under 2000, correct? And we still survived that.
So we're all related in some way, shape and form to those
2000 people. We can trace.
This is a true story. I just got it.
OK, They just figured out that they can trace all modern man

(01:03:48):
down to one woman. Everybody that's in our current
state today. They call her Mitochondrial Eve.
She was busy. I got a joke by the way.
What's your joke exactly? I got a message 19199 other

(01:04:08):
people. Trying to get my style kind of
explain couple of things in a simple language, right, right.
We're going to. Practice that.
We're going to practice that, Yuri.
Every conversation we have, we learn something.
Today. We've learned so much.
It's, that's why we do this. Yeah.
It's it's it's been fascinating talking to you to.
Be honest, it was my question, why did you guys do that?

(01:04:28):
What you. Because I got to meet somebody
who grew up 10 years after me, 17 years.
Right, right, right. Yeah.
So we're all roughly within the same era as far as, you know,
the way we grew up before the Internet and after the Internet.
And that doesn't even matter. I would have never met.

(01:04:49):
I might have gone the rest of mylife and never met somebody that
actually was born in a differentculture, came to our free
culture and has lived on both sides of it.
And I got to hear it from your mouth.
I don't. I like to speculate a lot about
how, you know, different people grew up and live, but I don't
know till I hear it from them. So that's why I do.
This my question, sorry, sorry. Would you consider to have a

(01:05:15):
sample the taste of different culture like a sample, you know
the Whole Foods and you got a sample of new food on the shell
and you got you got a bite and you can always shoot it tastes
so different and good. I I don't have extra bite.
Would you consider to go somewhere and have a bite of
different culture? Absolutely.

(01:05:37):
I would love to, yeah. For sure.
Absolutely. I've just never afforded myself
the opportunity to do that. So yeah, I would love to so.
We have to push. Yeah, I guess.
It's going to happen, yeah. So if I ever meet the future
misses, I'm probably going to make that happen.
So there you go. So now you mentioned Yuri, that

(01:05:57):
you travel all over the universe.
OK, We don't want to talk about stuff off planet Earth because
of, you know, you're, we got to keep that stuff on the down low.
We don't want KGB knocking on your door.
So you mentioned Bangladesh. What other, what other countries
or, or I guess it's a country orwherever.
What's what's something that that somebody would be shocked

(01:06:18):
to know that you went and visited?
Not much to me. For me, Bangladesh was the
biggest wow factor was the quitethe I know there are some
different countries exist. I I didn't have I had no need, I
would say to go, but definitely there are some places don't ask

(01:06:40):
me names. I have to Google that there are
small countries and I met someone's been in I think it was
in what country? It was in Indonesia somewhere.
So I met some. I already was impressed how we
different from local guys, let'ssay in Indonesia, right?
And then in a breakfast in localhotel, I came across small talk

(01:07:03):
to someone from even more different place.
So that sample, the one I mentioned, Mike, you want to go
Whole Foods, right? I had this bite.
So what I back to the question which we can circle that what
makes me wake up every morning? I still didn't touch.
I didn't still bite other piecesof the pie.

(01:07:24):
So there are some cultures, Laos, I guess.
Laos, it's a country which I kind of in my not exactly bucket
news. I don't believe in bucket news.
It has to be a life list. So I'm trying.
To dude, I love that it's lifeless.
See, I have to have a thing where I call it's it's your life
resume. Like what have you done in your
life? What kind of things have you
accomplished? That's a lifeless dude.

(01:07:44):
It's so much better than a bucket list.
That's cool. Again, the Uri euphemism.
I like it too. Yeah.
I'm adopting that one. Let's write a book, guys.
Write a book. Man, we have to come up with the
title. What?
Yuri euphemisms. Yuri euphemisms, right?
Euphemism title, Yeah. It has to be, that's what.

(01:08:04):
Oh, that's what Yuri said. Oh, really?
There you go. That's it.
That's catchy. That's what Yuri said.
I think it sounds like that I come up with a name in the past
to to send some messages to my daughter.
Oh, it was an exercise. She asked me in a random spot
and she can put a camera in my face and ask me any wisdom to to

(01:08:26):
me. So I would love to listen her
records wherever I deliver, produce I guess for the last
maybe 10-15 years because she collect those records.
Yeah. So it might be good content for
whatever book nowadays. So.
You just sparked another question that I have because you
talked about records. What kind of music did you

(01:08:48):
listen to? Growing growing up.
Growing up, yeah. Growing up, I was not in the
space of music guys and I actually went.
I put myself in music school forover the year just for the sake
to be comfortable to have this conversation, I guess, with you
guys. OK.
Let me ask you this real quick. Music was not my thing.

(01:09:11):
OK, when you turned the radio on, what did you hear?
Like if you're at. Did they?
Did they have radio in Russia? No, we, we and we had cold and
hot water. It was a joke.
I know. All right.
So if you go right now in Miley's, I I rather talk about

(01:09:32):
today's kind of things. Right.
OK. What are you listening to now?
It's. Pretty much function of previous
things. You'll find the biggest one I
have, which called papaya. So papaya is a kids music and
somebody very smart dude come upwith the rhythm and the like
this how to say that it's it's designed for kids.

(01:09:54):
But I enjoy it so much because when you listen to five times
and it's stuck you in your brain.
There's one more person I have to promote in this podcast and
don't share with anybody else. I was a big fan of Selena Gomez
and I was a big fan of Selena Gomez for one specific song.
And don't ask me which one I learned.
So if you go on my music list, it would be some classical

(01:10:17):
piece. Just I trying to push myself in
a classical. I don't believe it's good.
Stuff I I love classical. Music I love most I can Queen,
queen and such things. Now we we had access to any
music we can. But obviously that if you go
back to that, that time under umbrella of communism system,

(01:10:38):
right, Obviously it was so limited and we had local guys
and local guys somehow the copy paste international guides.
So somehow through the proxy, myparents, they were part of
global culture. But again, it's from the proxy
visit local guy, he had access to international content and he

(01:11:01):
produced local content, but influenced by international
content. So I was part of your culture on
a 10% degree, I would say. Gotcha.
OK, gotcha. Yeah, cool.
Good answer. So does your do you?
Is all your family still in Russia aside from you?
Most of the family, yes. OK.
And so do you, do you visit or you just phone calls FaceTime?

(01:11:23):
For multiple reasons and we all can Google those reasons.
I I'm not part of that life anymore.
Gotcha. And mechanically, emotionally
and etcetera. So it's kind of answer for that
question, right? That's cool, that's fine.
I'm I'm in the same boat with mymy my family so no worries there
man. It's just a random question.
By the way, my family lives. My my my mother lives about

(01:11:49):
probably within 15 minutes of me, but I haven't talked to her
in over a decade. My father lives in Illinois and.
I know, I know, I guarantee there's a story behind that.
But it it makes sense, there is.There is.
There's all kinds of stories behind that, but this is about
you. Now it's therapy session for you
guy. My family lives next door to me
and two blocks away and I see him multiple times a week, so

(01:12:12):
yeah. Mike is a good guy.
And Kristen? Yeah, Mike is a really.
Yeah. I had a good family.
Kristen. Not so.
Yeah. It is what it is.
But but like you talked about, like you're the person you are
because of how you were brought up and and your influence, what
your parents did and what you read and what culture and what,
what world you were in as a child and that that formed that
formed who you are. And I don't, I don't regret how

(01:12:33):
I was brought up because it it made me the person I am today.
I'm the points, the fingers. One of the things that I always
say is the people that I find the most interesting
unfortunately have the most fucked up lives.
True, it's unfortunate. It's.
True. Let me think about it.
You know the most. Interesting.
People I've ever met have had the most oppressive childhoods

(01:12:57):
that anybody could ever ask for.And you can either come out of
it triumphant, like Chris did, and decide this is my life and
I'm going to live it my way and I'm going to be happy and
positive and I'm going to go forward and be effective.
Or I'm going to blame the way I grew up on the way I am for the
rest of my fucking life. Right.
And that's just there's. Nowhere to and and it's also we

(01:13:18):
have a choice right, we can't. So is it kind of transition to
let's talk about why you're so interesting based on how his
life was fucked up. The good news it was fucked up,
but it was fucked up under control of my personal.

(01:13:41):
I manage how much I need fucked up, sure, and so I was lucky I
was not fucked up like in our language.
You weren't fucked up beyond repair.
Right, right. So it was not I had so Oh OK
now. OK, Speaking of your kind of
language, I had to design artificial fucked up lifestyle

(01:14:03):
to become interesting person. That was me.
I had to do the same thing, yeah.
Thank you, Mike and I, I kind offeel that, to be honest.
I don't know why it's Yeah, right.
So I wasn't an adjourned. I was actually I was always
looking for something which Mikeme which can put me on the edge

(01:14:25):
of stupidity kind of and come out from this act whatever
exercise experience clean and nice and make a mental note that
thing whatever I did right now, I will leverage that to become
good guy, a good person, interesting person, wherever
that's I have so many occasion very another case stories in the

(01:14:48):
life which obviously was designed and executed by me by
my choice. I have nobody to blame.
I actually was. I might very calculate sometimes
calculated choices to do whatever I did.
Yeah, that's awesome. Maybe a good example.
Anything else you want to talk about, Mike?

(01:15:09):
Any other questions for conversations with with Yuri?
We're going to have Yuri back on.
We have to have. Yuri back.
We have to have Yuri, but now you're getting into the the
podcast zone. So go do a couple more and then
we'll have you back on. And, and, you know, just because
there's so much stuff we could talk about just for the sheer
fact that you're a great conversationalist man, you're,
you're fascinating human. Thank you.

(01:15:32):
Thank you guys. You are you too.
You too as well. Listen.
And you have and you have a poolhouse.
I don't have a pool house. Mike, do you have a pool house?
I don't have a pool house. No.
Now do you have a pool? Yuri If.
I have a pool house. I should have pool I guess.
Why you you would think that, you never know, man.
I just, I just, I'm trying to kind of educate kind of
Meanwhile, no, I do have a pool which right now closed for the

(01:15:55):
last three years it's shut and for for multiple reasons
because. The young, the little one, the
little one right you. Want to keep it's it's it's
reason 55. There are like 54, you know
before that. 54 other reasons OK.
Yeah, 54, I can give you the main 1.
I don't know why I need that when when we travel summer and
we need a full Yeah, when it's it's sort of, you know, kind of

(01:16:17):
place where you should have a pool.
I don't know why people build pools nowadays.
Private. That's what I always say about
Illinois too. It's stupid to have a swimming
pool and all. You know, it's more than that.
It's like if you claim you can afford such property and you
kind of calculated place that thing in the property, how much

(01:16:40):
you stupid man like like you're going to use it five times in
your life cycle and whatever and.
Yeah, where where Chris is goingto use his like 200 days a year.
When we had a pool, we don't have a pool now because our
grandson was born in like safetypurposes, but where we lived
before with the pool, I was in it every single day of the year.

(01:17:00):
But it's Arizona, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, listen, in Arizona you have to have a pool just for safety.
They have to jump in a pool to cool down right?
And N you have a pool to me I, I, I.
I'm trying to find an actual like logical reason why you
should have a pool. Obviously it looks sexy and nice

(01:17:22):
when it's a blue kind of thing on your, on a LAN, on your.
All it is, all it is around these parts, is to show your
neighbors that you're that much better than them.
It's a. Status.
Symbol I hope my neighbors they're not part of the path
cast, but if they hear that listen guys, if you I have a
pool, I have a pool not impress you.

(01:17:42):
It's the last thing I want to do.
Impress you guys to be a second.That that's what I've
encountered is people who have pools, except for Yuri, who live
north of what we consider the South southern United States.
It's a status symbol. It's a status symbol.
Right. And he?

(01:18:02):
Uses his it's a it's a dance floor.
He just covered it with with a deck, right?
And you just have barbecues and shit on the pool deck.
No, I have. In my case, I haven't like kind
of the the green colored condom,you just put it down there.
There you go right now. I call it that way.
Oh, this has been this has been fascinating year.
We definitely want to have you back on.

(01:18:24):
You've been a great a great. So much fun.
Conversation with Mike and I wrap this up all the time with
with if you're having a bad day,don't let the bad days when
somebody's going to miss you, Somebody Loves You.
So make sure you wake up tomorrow and and, you know, have
a better day because once you goto sleep, tomorrow is always a
better day. So if you're struggling, if
you're depressed, you're down, you know, reach out to somebody

(01:18:45):
that you know, they want to talkto you, they want to hear you,
they want to help you get off that ledge and and keep you
around because you know, this iswhat life's about conversations
and meeting people. And this has been a great hour
and 15 minutes or so. You're just getting to know you.
And truly, Mike and I are sincere to saying we want to
have to come back on at some point in time just to revisit
and, and chat about life and things like that.

(01:19:05):
Absolutely. So, So keep that in mind.
And if you have anything you want us to do as far as you
know, like we sent you links to like our, our pages and things
like that and drop reviews on the Facebook group.
If you have anything else you want us to do, by all means, let
us know. We'd be happy to do it for you.
Yeah, just reach out. Yeah, yeah, the the nice lady
behind my emails, Sidra, she will to execute what she

(01:19:31):
believes makes sense because I kind of ask her to become my
producer. I would say I produce people all
my life and now I ask somebody else to do kind of push me to be
here. So it's a big thanks for her to
her. She made it happen, to be
honest. So where where all the emails
you have is from her. And I think you see the very

(01:19:51):
good job. Nice guys, Chris, nice awesome
guy Mike. He designed lifestyle on his own
choice is good as well. So we're on the same page, Mike.
Thank you. Thank you man.
Yeah. You're the first person to
notice that on the podcast. There you go.
You're, you have a fantastic game, man.
We again, thank you so much for joining us.

(01:20:12):
It's been a blast, man. We've learned so much from
talking to you, man. Thanks for coming on man, nice
to meet you. Nice to meet you guys.
We're a great human. We'll see you on Mars, buddy.
No, I'm not. No, no.
Stop, stop, stop, stop. We're just, we're just checking
to make sure we're all still staying here.
Right, right. Stay here.
Listen, it is a fake bullshit vision.
There is no need to ghost. We, we, we, we're good here.

(01:20:35):
Yeah. Cheers.
Bye. See you.
Man, cheers buddy. Love you Mike.
See. You love you too.
That was awesome. Behind your eyes, yourself and

(01:21:11):
need your nerves. Take a moment, look until you
see it. Bite the bail and tear.
Bite the bail. Put your bail.
Hold your baby to your finger. The.

(01:22:41):
Come down here, you haven't found solids in your sand.
You keep fun fighting. Wait for the dead.
When you close. Your eyes and you ain't no

(01:23:04):
creature when you're playing smile and you just you press on
the almighty dance. You got a team ruin your life to
keep on going every day. Take the trail behind your eyes.
Feel the soul revolution now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

(01:23:32):
yeah. Take your moment.
Listen to your fear. What's your better with you?
More clear. You gotta, You gotta.

(01:24:12):
You gotta. You gotta.
You gotta. The.

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#119 - Yury - Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#119 - Yury - Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain