Countries that Existed When I Was Born, but Today No Longer Exist
I was born in 1981. I remember playing with globes in schools that still had that giant red patch across Northern Asia simply marked as 'U.S.S.R.' I remember the footage of the Berlin wall coming down and the collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. I was born so late in the Cold War and so secure from many of its tendrils that the reactions I saw in my parents and other adults around me didn't make sense at the time, the USSR ending was so much more to them than it ever was to me. Probably, the only comparable event in my own life would be the September 11th attacks and then the disastrous 'War on Terror'
It did get me thinking about endings. What is the end of a country like for those who live there? Is it ending a chapter in a book and then turning the page to the next? Or is it more intense? With sharper edges, sealing away of something and the start of a new thing? I wonder... How many people today living in Poland or Lithuania consider themselves Prussians? When will Burmese people start to think of themselves as Myanmarese?
Anyway, here is a list of countries that have ceased to exist since I was born. The dissolution of the USSR was so messy that I'm sure I missed something in there.
Burma - In 1989 became Myanmar. Czechoslovakia - Split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. German Democratic Republic - In 1990 joined with the Federal Republic of Germany. North Yemen - Re-joined with South Yemen in 1990. South Yemen - Re-joined with North Yemen in 1990. Union of Soviet Socialist Republics - In 1991, split into 15 new countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. Yugoslavia - Since 1992 the territory of this state has been in a great deal of flux. It's current descendants are Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedon, Serbia, and Slovenia.