¡Viva las Revolucións por Minuto!

Courtesy New York Times

Socialist Nostalgia Week continues on Be the BQE with a nod to yesterday's piece in the New York Times on Cuba's decision to allow private sales of automobiles. Well the law is the law, but it's the photos of half-century old Russian and American cars lovingly kept going that's the real pleasure.

But what's that on the far right among the vintage Moskviches (Russia), Tatras (Czechoslovakia), and Chevys (U.S.A.)?  Yes, it's a Fiat 126, otherwise known as the "Mały (Little) Fiat" or "Maluch" (Little One). Back in August, in Coupe d'Arte, I posted about the Ostalgia show at the New Museum. I called attention to the 1972 Fiat 126 artist Simon Starling had driven from Turin, Italy, where the 126s had been made, to Poland, where after 1973 the Maly Fiat was churned out in ever greater numbers to keep the proletariat happy and relatively mobile (they often stalled). He painted it red and white (colors of Polish flag) and hung it on the wall.

The video below shows a Mały Fiat in action, set to the song of the same name by Polish punk band Big Cyc. The lyrics go something like this (tr. BTB):
He was close like a friend
Every Pole in a Mały Fiat
Laughed at throughout the world
But to us he was like a brother