Word: raisa
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...since Czar Nicholas wed Alexandra in 1894 have Russians encountered a ruler's wife with such presence, such personality, such promise as a subject of mild jokes and elevated eyebrows as Raisa Gorbachev. She is the first spouse of a Soviet leader to weigh less than he does, acid tongues have it in Moscow, and the first "Czarina," as some of her fellow citizens mock her, to appear in the Kremlin since the fall of the Romanovs. She is also the first Soviet First Lady to use an American Express card and, as a member of the board...
...suddenly, there is Mikhail and Raisa, a pair who can hold their own in the international journalistic sweepstakes vis-a-vis Ron and Nancy and, given the Gorbachevs' comparative youth (he is 57, she 56) and the Soviet political system, who will probably outlast George and Barbara or Mike and Kitty. The Western press trembles with anticipation...
...Raisa. Even in this semienlightened age, prominent women are somehow reduced to first names: Maggie, Cory, Nancy. Yet, despite her visibility, Raisa Gorbachev remains a riddle inside an enigma wrapped in sable. Is she the witty, cosmopolitan muse of glasnost, as some Westerners who have met her suggest? Or is she a hard-line ideologue, as others report? At a dinner with ^ the Reagans during the 1985 Geneva summit, Raisa launched into a lengthy and pedantic monologue on Soviet policy. After the Gorbachevs left, Nancy Reagan may have spoken for the other guests when she fumed, within hearing of then...
...Belgrade, the capital, he repeatedly waded into excited crowds with Wife Raisa to shake hands and shout good wishes amid cries of "Mikhail! Mikhail!" In the northern city of Ljubljana, he toured a high-tech electronics plant that has a product line including robots used by U.S. automobile manufacturers. In the Adriatic resort of Dubrovnik, he strolled the Stradun, the city's marble-paved pedestrian thoroughfare, and was again greeted by cheering spectators...
...fans in other countries had cause to rejoice in some non-prime- time, though historic, performances. East German Frank-Peter Roetsch was the first ever to capture both the 10-km and 20-km biathlons, a daunting standard for future ski shooters. Even more notably, Soviet Cross-Country Skier Raisa Smetanina tied for the most decorated competitor in the history of the Winter Games as she took a bronze in the 20 km, the record ninth medal of her four- Olympiad career. Even Britons, whose team failed to win a single medal, could take pride in a new national achievement...