88 Chapter 2
lic image of Soviet tourism became linked to palm trees, mountain peaks,
and the seaside (with or without a romantic sunset). A 1935 cartoon series
in On Land and On Sea captured the irrelevancy of local tourism activists
under the caption “Where is tourism here?” A sign in a park announced a
“local tourism” event, which consisted of a blathering bureaucrat extolling
the merits of tourism and one person in the audience, asleep. The “tourists,”
in the next cartoon, could all be seen on the beach.^75
The Soviet tourist industry by the late 1930s had not yet provided an at-
tractive product, and tourism as the best form of rest appealed to a small
coterie of enthusiasts. Conditions for comfortable touring either did not exist
or remained accessible only to the very few, such as the tourists who appear
in the 1936 fi lm scripted by Il'ia Il'f and Evgenii Petrov, One Summer.^76 In the
depths of the scenic Caucasus Mountains, two aspiring automobile enthusi-
asts can only stare in envy as an open touring car speeds through their dusty
village. They argue about whether the car is a Lincoln or a Mercedes, confi r-
mation of the shortage of Soviet-made tourist transport. Going over a bump in
the road, the touring car loses its spare tire, and the enthusiasts cry, “Tourists!
You lost your tire!” in an attempt to alert them. But the holiday makers have
no time for the local heroes (and the heroes keep the tire to use on their own
car they are building). The fi lm reproduced a powerful image of the Soviet
tourist in popular culture: attractively mobile but privileged and alien. None-
theless, a small minority of Soviet citizens actively sought tourism as the best
form of rest in the 1930s, even if they disagreed on the most appropriate form
and levels of comfort. The next chapter examines the appeal and drawbacks
of Soviet tourism for the participants themselves.- NSNM , no. 9 (1935): 14.
- Odnazhdy letom , dir. Khanan Shmain and Igor' Il'inskii (Ukrainfi l'm, 1936), script by
Il'ia Il'f and Evgenii Petrov.