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He also was turned down for his requests of moonshine, tobacco for rolling cigarettes and the balalaika.

The letters showed that Navalny asked for an eclectic range of items, including, variously, a bottle of moonshine, a balalaika, a staff, two pouches of cheap tobacco, a kimono and a black belt.

The walls were painted with Soviet-era cartoons — a wolf with an accordion, a donkey with a balalaika, and a bear in a vyshyvanka, a traditional Ukrainian costume.

There were Russian balalaika groups, political advertisers, choral singers and, on a recent Sunday, a spoken-word Shakespeare sonnet.

“I got my Greek bouzouki and my Irish bouzouki, but I didn’t get my Russian balalaika or my Turkish oud,” he said.