This is a curiosity from the Soviet era, quite along the line of Eastern countries imitating Western products. China had its own Parker 51 clones, and today we discuss a Russian one:

The model name translates to little golden fish, and the novelty factor lies in having a small glycerin-filled chamber with a small plastic goldfish swimming around inside. On the clip is SOYUZ, and the cap band says Leningrad, today called St. Petersburg.

Slipping the cap off reveals a stainless steel nib, cosmetically identical to the Parker 51, except when mine arrived in the mail it was actually impressive how poor the condition was. It was bent to one side and misaligned, and took lots of patient work before ink would flow again. It writes OK now, but I’m sure that isn’t an authentic writing experience.

The pen itself is an aerometric clone, complete with plastic button/plunger hidden away under the fish. (Edit: I’ve been corrected on Reddit; the pen is an accordion filler.) It’s actually very easy to clean: hold it under water, and push repeatedly until the pen expels no more ink.

As for using this pen: it filled up perfectly well, and wrote with a good wet line. I didn’t think it would compete this closely with Parker 51s, but the feel was quite similar (though this was after I had worked on the nib). The lightness of the pen is quite pleasing, though it does feel rather cheap and old. The fish is amusing, though.

The Russian internet is a wild place.