In Bulgaria we had drinks named "Etar", and "Altai" that were probably the "Coca-Cola"/"Pepsi" meant to be cheap replacements. I loved them as a kid, along with

In Bulgaria we had drinks named "Etar", and "Altai" that were probably the "Coca-Cola"/"Pepsi" meant to be cheap replacements. I loved them as a kid, along with plenty other sugary drinks (Schweppes, "Швепс" was probably the most popular brand) As for "Tuzik" shops, we had Corecom shops - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corecom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corecom - e.g. a way to spend your foreign (and "evil") currency with fancy things. Getting Pez, Toblerone, or Kinder's Surpise egg was one of the best thing that could happen to a kid. I must've been 4 or 5, asking friends & colleagues of my grandma (at her work, she would pick me with her to be there) "Please, give me some dovari" (dovari, my mis-pronounciation of "dolari"/долари - e.g. dollars). She was a manager there, and one of her worker's husband used to be a sailor, or maybe a truck driver (T.I.R.) - those folks would come with "lots" of dollars, and we may even get bananas and oranges for Christmas, and empty cans from Coke (I'm not kidding, these were valueable, as you could've make a pencil holder, and was fancy to have anyway). Then every house had this pretty cool looking book called Neckermann - basically this - https://www.neckermann.de/ https://www.neckermann.de/ - you go visit someone, and they'll show you the latest Neckermann - it's not that you can buy, and even if you have the money to know how - but it was cool way of showing off, and talking about things... Gosh, I do miss, and then not these times...