Zakyev (zack-yev)

Our immigrant from the former Soviet Union, Zakyev came to the United States immediately after Gorbachev lost power. He used to live in central U.S.S.R., and was raised with his collective family under the iron curtain of the Soviet state system. He therefore is quite new to the freedoms of America and still has occasional difficulty in dealing with his new liberties. Over consumption of America fast food is still an issue.

Zakyev is not as clear minded as his other housemates, but is a devoted comrade to his new friends. Always trying to fit in, his overzealousness often raises more ire than good. He brought with him several natural habits that are still issues among the other dwellers of the house such as his onion and liver borscht and his ritual toe-scunge cleaning in the bathroom sink.

Zakyev is clear in his life concerning his likes and dislikes. He enjoys classic literature and is actually quite a source of information if one can muddle through the waves of irrelevant things that come from his head. Zakyev's farm back in the motherland was only 23 kilometers from the little town of Chernobyl, and we all know what happened there. Zakyev simply refers to the events there the "big boom", and does not acknowledge any possible side effects from the disaster.

Zakyev enjoys anything on the television but has to be watched as his gullible nature will often get him into trouble buying plots of swampland in the Everglades through television marketing programs. He is also quite the scientist, perfecting his own nuclear energy source using his onion and liver borscht after it's gone rancid for sometime. For reasons of national security, it was deemed best that his pursuits in this field be limited to low calorie version of his brew. His last experiment failed and had to be tossed out into the compost pile in the backyard, which explains why the compost pile has been the scene of a few strange happenings lately.

Politically, Zakyev loves the American political system, but hardly understands it at all. He is fascinated in the political process here, and still finds it amazing that presidential political debates do not include firearms and explosives. Zakyev is still catching up to the American culture which runs too fast for him to comprehend fully. He was last seen dancing to Bee Gees records