[baud9600]

In Eastern Europe in 1979, those were big sums of money. What an extraordinary story

[toephu2]

Yeah I'd be curious into how they acquired so much money

[ahartmetz]

What I've read about the GDR is that money was rarely the problem. You couldn't spend the money if what you wanted to buy was simply not available (except maybe in "Intershops" where you needed to pay in Western currency, that was in fact very expensive). It really was a different system.

[lukan]

Likely black market deals/work I think. Also just getting a replacement car was not really easy for normal people.