There, in Russia five years ago, when Cuba had been taken out of the oven to cool and Vietnam was still coming to a simmer, Bech did find a quality of life impoverished yet ceremonial, shabby yet ornate, sentimental, embattled, and avuncularreminiscent of his neglected Jewish past.In these two short stories, Updikes brilliant observational acuity is matched by a light, comic touch. The writer Henry Bech travels to Europe on a hapless cultural exchange, first to Russia, where he struggles to spend his money when everything from his meals to his bugged hotel room is already paid for, and then to Rumania.This book includes Rich In Russia, Foreword, Bech in Rumania, Appendix A and Appendix B.