Saturday, 25 March

In the afternoon, I went to the American Embassy to watch a movie “Stormy Weather” which was acted by blacks. It was very good.

Today was the Greek National Day. The Greek Ambassador, Politis, held a banquet in the Greek Embassy from 6.00 to 8.00 p.m. The famous ballerina Semeonova was also there. I talked to her for a while. She is almost forty but she looked as if she was twenty something. Once she was married to Karakhan, and after the Karakhan affair she did not perform for several years. But in terms of dancing she is still the dancing Queen. Canadian Minister Wilgress talked about the signing of the leasing treaty between the Soviet Union and Canada the day before yesterday. He said the Canadian Government was better than the American Government as it did not affix any terms, because it was its duty to help the Allies so Canada would not affix compensation terms like the United States. As a matter of fact, these compensation terms cannot be implemented. If implemented people will think that their government cheats them or other countries do not carry out their duties. All these would have a bad influence. Canadians mainly came from Scotland and France, therefore they are very conservative. But they are next to the United States, and their material advancement has been speedy, so Canadians are practical and not inclined to hollow ideas. With regard to the American Presidential election Minister Wilgress expected that Roosevelt could win the election. But in the Upper House Democrats would become a minority which would mean the Americans agreed with his external policies but disagreed with his internal policies. This is quite reasonable.