My humble eurocents about what I remember from early 70ies...

Back then I was a youngster, wanting to buy an SLR with my pennies (that time it was pennies, now cents). The only thing I could afford were Praktica (hate the looks and KLUNK-shutter), Seagull (hate meterless cameras) and Zenit, so you may guess how it all started. Price difference beetween E and EM was tiny, IIRC the EM cost 495 finnish marks (pretty equal to nowadays 500 euros or 700 USD) and E only 50 less.

At that time I was a beginner, although I had used my fathers Retina and loose meter, plus done enlarging in home darkroom. The ZENIT EM was in latin script, fine. "B" in shutter speed was B like it should, fine. Only two things clearly showed about its origins: MADE IN USSR in the bottom and cyrillic "GOST" in film speed dial. Actually a bit odd, as it also says DIN and ASA in latin? So only one speed scale for all markets when more expensive top & bottom were made both export & domestic versions.
Then there was the odour from the leather case, which didn't fade easily...

To be continued!