Oh, I can’t resist, I’ll tell you how I flew to Moscow! I spent ten years getting ready and couldn’t get around to it. And then, without looking, it curled up, where it all came from. Vacation accrued at the office. I clap my mittens - they only saw me! A man with children, she left all the farming, from under the cows to the Kremlin itself! I went to my brother - he called me a colonel. Younger than me, and long since retired;
He has nothing to do - he’s delighted! I was embarrassed to give a telegram. “Oh, you?!” he says. “If you,” he says, “were smart, I would have told you. I would,” he says, “take you from the station in a car. It would just whistle!” “Well,” I say, “the baron is not great, she got there on foot.”
I got there, but I was tired. They show me the way, but in different ways: one says - to the left, girl, another - to the right, citizen, the third says - aunt, go straight! They look at the knapsack, oh, my God! The back and forth went so far that I could see double in my eyes. Suddenly, an old man came up and asked: “Aren’t you going to see Ivan Petrovich? There,” he says, “in this house, second floor, sixth quarter. They’ve been waiting for a long time,” he says! - “Oh, thank you, old citizen!” I went, I went, I went, I see it says: 2nd floor. Oh, let me, I think I’ll go until the third, it’s more reliable. My brother and sister-in-law got upset and scolded me: why didn’t I send the telegram? I live one day, another. They’ll take me to the performance, I’ll be everywhere, and I’ll say: “Where am I going, such a disheveled person? It’s better to keep me at home, not show me.” My brother says to me: “Now we’ll make such a madam out of you!” And he took me to the main clinic. He started - Lord, Queen of Heaven, where have I landed! The women are sitting, the men are above them in white coats. They are caring for them, as if in a hospital.
All sorts of caps, bottles! They put me in prison, I'm afraid to move. They cut it all off first, then curl it, then let’s dry my hair.
It seems like half a day wasted in vain, and my brother says to me: “Well, now there’s another manicure!” A manicure is just like a manicure, and one will die. They opened a new room. My hands were placed in a dish with warm water, apparently to soak. What a mess! They wiped the cauldron and cleaned the nails. Then they started painting it pink.
I sit and think: how am I going to milk the cows?
Some kind of baskim? Yes, and she began to cry... The tears came out of me like peas, and the girl was scared, and her brother was waiting, and the authorities came running. What and why, unless they are dissatisfied with something? They were released, I calmed down and I said to my brother: “Send me home for Christ’s sake, three cows are about to calve.” - “Okay, let’s calve without you, let’s go to the store now.” I bought a jacket, a dress, and fashionable shoes. In the evening I got dressed, and I’m not myself. How I looked in the mirror, dears! Am I not me? And she began to roar even more. He drove and drove me, both to a restaurant and to see friends. Right down to the general himself: meet me, dear sister! But my sister can’t say a word, she’s afraid to step. I’m tired, I barely survived. No, I say, I’ll go and go home. They escorted me out, put me in a nice carriage, and a small suitcase full of gifts. There's no need for gifts, let's go home quickly.
As soon as I got off at my station, my heart began to skip a beat. I stand and look - he’s running! I stand: will he find out or won’t he? He ran past... The whole train ran around, running back. There were no people left anymore. He runs again, but again past me. Well, I think he’ll run one more time, and I’ll call out. As soon as I saw it, I was confused: should I hug or wait? “Eh,” he says, “I’m afraid to approach you. I only recognized you from the suitcase.” e “But, you can’t force everything on the people, next time I’ll put on a different make-up! Haven’t the cows calved?” “All three have calved,” he says.
My neighbor is such a bastard, I really hate him! Why don’t you ask for help, well, there, stack the firewood, clean the well, mow the weeds - no matter what! He just whines:
- Why bother, I’m an old sick man...
How different and how loud that laying hen is croaking!.. Like, this hurts me, and this hurts me, but he can’t sit and he can’t lie down!.. It’s disgusting to listen to, by God! I once told him:
- Why do you have such a mamon then, since you are so sick?
And he heard me answer:
“It’s my stomach,” he says, “it’s bloating, it’s a sin to laugh at a sick person.”
Here it is, you bastard! It is clear that the bloating is eating all the time, like a mill, without stopping. Everything that comes to hand eats everything, or whatever my hand can reach through my fence...
And I planted an apple tree by the well. She spread her branches towards the sun, she felt good, comfortable. And the apples are ripening now, not many, but so pretty, rosy, and big. So this bastard got into the habit of going to my well for water. The water in my well, they say, is somehow special and healing. And what is medicinal in it is the same as in his well, ordinary. And the bastard himself, as soon as he comes to my well, he grabs an apple from a branch and eats it right away! I haven’t tried it myself yet, I regret it, but he!.. And you won’t stand there with a drin all the time, guarding!..
Here my godfather, Svetka, a smart woman, says to me:
“And you shoot castor oil into the apples from a syringe,” he says, “according to the Turkish method.” Anyway, the harvest is gone, so at least you can take your soul away. And I’ll bring you castor oil from the hospital.
Well, that same night I syringed the apples. I thought they would turn blue and fall off. No, nothing, they hang on their branches, they just glow with their ruddy sides and attract. Svetka and I hid in the morning, on the veranda behind the curtain, watching. We see that a villain is coming!.. A neighbor came up to the well and saw that some apples today were extremely appetizing. He did one thing, then immediately a second, a third!.. He devoured everything, the bastard... Everything that I reached out to add flavor. And at least he doesn’t care!.. Reluctantly he pulls a bucket from the well...
Suddenly: - “Oh-oh!..”, the surprise worked. He sat down, clutching his belly as if he was about to give birth! Yeah, his bloating, if it weren’t all right!.. But how can he start running towards his house, like a young man, by God! Where did the agility come from?!
It is true what they say that haste is needed in two cases, and this is exactly one of them. He goes into his yard, towards a separate office!.. And there he has a bull terrier, ... an angry dog!.. And he doesn’t let the owner into the office, apparently, he didn’t recognize it, or somehow the owner smells wrong now... In short, he doesn’t let me in, that’s all!
You should have seen this bull terrier later... No, the neighbor didn’t have time to get to his office...
And the next year I harvested such a harvest from my apple tree! Dear, dear!.. And the neighbor no longer tries, he remembers, the bastard, that the apples turned out to be “rejuvenating.”
Sergey KONDRATIEV
Sober husband
(female monologue in character)
My husband has completely swayed me with his drunkenness! After all, this is impossible - he drinks everything that burns. I saved half a bottle of French perfume for ten years - I blew it out when I was sober. Then for half a day I was indignant: how can the French drink such crap in the morning! I poke him in the face with my makeup bag and shout: “You should have bitten your lipstick, Herod.” He says: “What do you think - I had a snack. The filling of this Snickers is delicious, but the chocolate itself is painfully hard.”
Oh! I stopped letting him into the apartment drunk. So he spent a couple of nights on a rug in the entrance and asked to go home. “And then,” he says, “in the mornings, dog owners take their poodles out to walk in the yard, but they don’t have the patience to go to the yard, and they mistake me for the lawn.”
Well, he started coming home like a piece of glass. And after half an hour, you see, he no longer knits the bast. And you search him all over, like in the Gestapo, and make sure that you didn’t bring anything alcoholic with you, but it turns out that he managed to pour vodka into this... well, you know, like an inflatable rubber ball, and put it under the back of his pants. I would never have known if he had once plopped down on a nail in a stool. I didn’t have time to look back - I licked the entire stool, and at the same time wiped it with my tongue in the corridor.
Where did he hide this vodka from me? In a drain, in an aquarium, in a wall clock with a cuckoo... There, someone's cuckoo spilled - and as a result, the cuckoo began to hiccup. He jumps out every hour and shouts: “Ku-ku-Ik-ku!” I shout: “What have you done, you bastard, to the poor bird?” he says: “Why, even a check is enough for a cuckoo.”
And then - I won’t lie, I didn’t see it myself - but he, apparently, spilled a bottle somewhere on TV. Because that evening Dorenko cursed so much, cursed so much - a sober person would never allow himself to do this!
Oh, what have I done with mine! Instead of vodka, she poured kerosene into the bottle - this only healed his ulcer.
She took me to see the old healer. She’s a very ancient old woman, she doesn’t live that long, she’s already overgrown with moss from old age. “Now, now,” he says, “I’ll drop some drugs on you, my dear, and you’ll never forget about the booze.” And he lapped up the potion and went to kiss his grandmother. I forcibly beat him away from her with my grandmother’s stick, and she, satisfied, smacked her lips and shouted after him: “Apparently, one rage didn’t work, you’re a beauty, bring me to Me more, more quickly - we’ll repeat the procedure!”
Then they sewed a “torpedo” into him. So somewhere in the market he managed to pull it out and exchanged it for a bottle for some Chukchi - he managed to persuade the Chukchi that this “torpedo” would be good for killing seals.
In general, I tried everything in the world, and then he suddenly stopped drinking. How did it happen? I decided to put on a cucumber anti-wrinkle mask for myself. You take the peel of fresh cucumbers, Moment glue, mix it, coat your whole body and wait for it to dry. And if it dries up, you scrape all this rubbish off with a nail file. Where there were no wrinkles, they won’t be there, and where there were, they are now not noticeable under the glue with the peel. A good way - my neighbor suggested it to me; she invented it herself. He says: “Try, maybe you’ll succeed.”
Well, I decided to try it. On Sunday I got up early, covered all of myself - as far as I could reach with my hands - with peel and glue, walked around the apartment, waiting for it to dry. And mine woke up with a hangover to drink some water, saw me in the twilight, and screamed: “You’re lying, you won’t kill me, there are many of us at every kilometer!” Eaglet, little eagle, winged comrade!.. A lot,” he shouts, “I’ve seen green devils while drunk, but I couldn’t even imagine such a terrible thing!”
“Calm down,” I say, “you fool, it’s me, your legitimate wife!” “No,” he shouts, “you can’t deceive me, swamp kikimora!” I’ve always been a legitimate person!” I say: “What do you think, am I not a person?” He says: “If you’re a human, let me get a hangover!”
Well, I gave it to him! Get over your hangover! All the medicine that was left from the healer-kisser - the entire three-liter jar was put out to him. He blew it out in one gulp. Then I spent the whole day hugging my earthenware friend. But after that, everything came to a sudden: I stopped drinking. He doesn’t drink for an hour, he doesn’t drink for another hour... And how many months have passed, and he’s no, no: not on New Year’s, not on his birthday, not on his professional holiday - Door Upholsterer’s Day from the customer’s material.
And most importantly, as soon as the guy was replaced! The next day I was walking home from work and saw him meeting me at the bus stop. “Give me,” he says, “I’ll help you carry your bags.” Well, I think I've lost my mind. I have two pounds of potatoes in this bag, but he never lifted more than two hundred grams in his life.
Well, I'm on good terms with him. “Give me your bags,” I say, “there are people all around, shame on you!” Look around - all people are like people, there’s one, even though he’s drunk, but he doesn’t disgrace his wife: she’s dragging the washing machine on herself, and he’s doing nothing but holding on to the hose.”
No, on the one hand, it is, of course, good when the husband does not drink. If, for example, she goes to the store, then she will bring what she sent for. Previously, whatever you sent for, passers-by would bring it.
Or, I remember, I sent him to the dry cleaner to pick up my blouse, made sure that he didn’t have a penny of money with him, and he came back - he couldn’t be drunker! “What did you drink for?” - I ask. He says: “While the receptionist was getting the wrapping paper, I wiped my shoes on your clean blouse. The receptionist offered to send it for re-cleaning, and I asked her to give me a stain remover instead.”
But there are so many problems with him now! He needs to cook. Previously, I remember, instead of dinner, he would drink water from the tap and smoke his “Amanita Channel”. He called this smoking water “chicken broth.”
And then he says something else: “What kind of oil is that on your windowsill - herring oil, or what? I eat the third sandwich, but it still tastes like turpentine. How I looked! Yes, this is laundry soap.
Or he came in the morning and went to the kitchen. I looked in and the five-liter tank on the stove was empty. But I put the laundry in that tank to boil. “The soup,” he says, “is delicious, but the dumplings are hard.”
Again, now you have to be jealous of him: when he’s sober, just look, someone will covet him. Although he’s not very curvy: about fifty meters with a skullcap. He has a special skullcap - it adds thirty centimeters to his height.
But now I’ve become well-read! He stopped drinking but won’t part with his book. I finished reading it a year and a half before the title page. Apparently, it’s a complex work - it’s called: “The Little Humpbacked Horse and His Comrades.” Author: Korzhakov.
Helps around the house - the nail in the stool on which he once plopped down has finally been hammered. Well scored that way -. with one hit. The neighbors downstairs, however, had their chandelier collapsed. I decided to show my father's concern. He came home after midnight and said: “I wanted to pick up the child from kindergarten. He sat until closing time until he remembered that he had been drafted into the army.”
So you look at him sober and you immediately remember our youth with him. How we met, how we went on dates... A week before the wedding, he tore off the entire flowerbed in the front garden in front of the house at night, so that I would wake up and see a bouquet on the windowsill in the morning. And before that, my mother and I took care of this flowerbed for two months...
Even now, when he stopped drinking, he became caring. On March 8th, I polished my suede shoes with shoe polish. I ironed the tights with a hot iron. They have now become openwork.
Well, God be with them, with tights. With the money that he now saves on vodka, these tights can be bought - from Paris to Nakhodka. But now there is peace and quiet in the house. He can’t even watch drunkenness on TV: as soon as someone starts drinking in the movies, he immediately remembers the green devils. So I am forever grateful to my neighbor for her anti-wrinkle mask: after my husband stopped drinking, all my wrinkles disappeared on their own.
This is what I wish for all of you, dear women, from the bottom of my heart!
Monument
I bought a “new Russian” plot of land. The mansion was torn down, a park was laid out, there was a metal fence around it, benches, birch trees... I also decided to install my statue on a hill to make it even more chic. Bros says:
- Why: in the summer I’ll sit in the cold on a bench, and next to me - here I am, standing at full height under a birch tree. But where in our city can you order a statue?
And one of the brothers tell him:
“So there’s a granite workshop nearby.” That’s what it says: “Making monuments.”
And the “new Russian” - he doesn’t understand that the statue is being erected in the park, and the monument... That’s right - in the cemetery. He just wants to stick out at full height. He goes to the granite workshop, sees a granite maker working there, and immediately:
- Hey, Chaldean, can you make a full-length statue? Then measure me quickly - I still have time for disassembly!
The granite worker, who was accustomed to receiving orders exclusively from relatives of the deceased, nearly swallowed the ruler in amazement.
- Who else? I'm crying for money, so is it really a statue for someone else's uncle?
— This is the first time that a client has ordered a monument for me during his lifetime...
- Why should I wait until you die, or what?!
- No, please, please, let’s do it in the best possible way, especially since you’re in no hurry...
- Why is this not in a hurry? I’ll charge the boys, as soon as you do it, they’ll be sealed in tightly that same day.
- So we will fulfill the order in two weeks.
- So, in two weeks they will wall it up.
- Do you already have a place?
- Otherwise! Over the hill. Under the birch tree.
“By the way, we are not only a monument - we can also plant flowers for you on the plot,” the granite worker suggests, thinking that we are talking about a cemetery plot.
And the “new Russian” - he’s thinking about his suburban area, so he says:
- There is no need for flowers, it’s better to have cucumbers growing on the hill.
- You have a strange desire...
- Why is this strange? Whoever comes to visit me will have a snack at hand.
- Well, cucumbers, this is not our part, but we can organize garbage collection...
- What? I pay money for the protection of the “garbage” site, and you are going to clean it up!
- Well, okay, will you order an orchestra?
- Come on, the bros will start dancing and trample all the cucumbers on the hill.
—Have you decided where the monument will stand?
“Everything is thought out: here is a fence, here is a bench, and here are statues.” Next to the sauna.
- Didn't understand. Why do you need a sauna in such a place?
- I'll order the girls. Let them wash me. Under the shower. Every Friday.
- So, are they going to drag you from there to the shower every Friday?
- What should we do if it’s a hot summer?! That’s why I put a bench right under the mound: if you drink beer, it will be closer to going to the toilet.
- Who should go? After all, as soon as the monument is erected, everyone will disperse...
- Well, they'll go their separate ways. But I’ll stay!
“I didn’t understand something again: are you planning to go to the toilet from there?”
- Why should I burst there, or what? Or directly at the statue? How about a male dog? No, I’ll get up from under the mound, go to the toilet and back into the cold.
- On your own?
- How else? Why should I sit on the toilet for half a day? My body is healthy - I went and did what I needed to do and went back under the mound. Light up the barbecue grill.
- This means to celebrate for nine days...
- What about nine? And on other days, should I go hungry there? When you sit in the cold, you know what an appetite it awakens!
— Actually, our clients usually lie there.
- What are you talking about! Lying alone in the cold can cause you to catch a cold! Now, if some beauty there wants to be alone with me...
“Who would want to be alone with you in such a place?!”
- What are you talking about, I once persuaded someone while drunk in a telephone booth to have privacy. Then it turned out that I had a refrigerator in the kitchen.
A completely stunned granite worker accepted an order from a strange client, and when the monument was made, it was needed that same day - someone planted a bomb in the Mercedes of the “new Russian”. True, they didn’t plant cucumbers on the hill, but the brothers made so many wreaths that the granite worker couldn’t understand how the “new Russian” would get out from under them to the toilet?..
You have read a selection of funny stories by a modern humorist writer.
Smile, ladies and gentlemen!
......................................................................................
BOGY'S MONOLOGUE. Shop, neighbors...
1996
Registration number 0277311 issued for the work: BOGY'S MONOLOGUE. Shop, neighbors...
And why am I suffering? A? Where is the justice? A? After all, he defended the collective farm property. In…. Look, give them grain and bread! A? Why should Nyurka be bullied for that? The storekeeper! Damn rucketeers! And I have plans for her. In…. I want Zhanitsa on it. In…. What? Am I old? But I’m thirty now, waking me up. Don't look at the bearded man. All of us are bearded and healthy. Well, the fact that they are mischievous comes from the breed. My grandfather Mikishka, you know, even jokes about me. About two years ago, do you remember how he took Valyukha from me? Oh, she was a good girl! Ten pounds. By God! I followed her for a year, and now from my grandfather she gave me an uncle, almost worth a peck. The guy will be one year old soon. In…. And you couldn’t say a word to your grandfather. As soon as I hit my ear, I confused heaven and earth for three days. Whoa... The bitch grandfather beat me off the girl and my head. It's a shame! In…. And my dad, he’s an even sharper joker! Thank God he went to a neighboring village. Let him go, bye, he'll make a joke. In…. What, grandfather? He sits and babysits his uncle. What? Try to go somewhere! When Valyukha gave birth, she began to weigh one and a half times more than her grandfather. Now that's someone with a hot hand! God forbid! In…. She'll give birth to someone else soon. So, my grandfather has no time for jokes now.
Yes! About the ruktirov! All eight pieces piled up. Nyurka scattered them about three times. Well, motherfucker, they are all kunhuists. And I was drunk. In…. What, I say, are you bullying the woman? What a mistake! Well, how they came at me with their kunhuys..... Why are you laughing? Wrong? But I wasn’t laughing! I was offended. Eight snouts for one woman! Well, when they came, I grabbed them all and pressed them against their own Kamaz. Held it for a while... These kunhuists turned out to be flimsy. They have been in the hospital for the second month. They can't get up. Nothing holds in them and, they say, never will. And then let them say thank you to Nyurka. She is compassionate. She left them and Kamaz sent them to the hospital.
Well…. About two weeks later, one of the Kunhuists remembered where they were and what happened to them. The police arrive with some riot police. I was hard... They took me... They brought me to the police station. They are interrogating. I was afraid... I can’t say anything... And the investigator yells: “Right now I’ll hand you over to the lads - you’ll talk to a cop!” They put me in a cell. They wanted to put iron on me, but it wasn’t the right size. Well, in…. Five guys enter the cell. Similar to kunhuists, but called ukhuists. Their struggle is like wow. That's it, they say, boy! The devil has come for you! They jumped and jumped. They screamed and screamed. Tired of it! I grabbed them, pressed them... Nothing holds in them either now.
The investigator, such a small one, yells: “What a goat! I'll fuck you!" I ask: “What is this?” He shouts: “I’ll make him a rooster!” "OK! Can you do that? “I can do anything,” he squeals. I was scared - I thought: “Sorcerer!”
Well, they put me in a cell with criminals. There are about fifteen of them there. Everyone's eyes are burning. They're stepping on me. And three of them poured out their shamelessness and let’s scare me. “They say take off your pants! Let's get acquainted!" Well, I thought, I thought... And I decided: “On equal terms, so on equal terms!” What, are you laughing? Well, I took off my pants... How did they see... At first there is deathly silence... And then there was a squeal at the door. They were pitiful and kicked them out. They ran away and now they can’t find anything.
The police chief came. Yell at this little guy: “Let him go, for God’s sake, before he ruins the entire police force!”
I'm waiting for the tape! Come, don't be a jerk! To sit, not to sit. Don't come yet.... Oh, Lord!
The village of Bely Bereg, Narovlya district, Gomel region.
They say: Anna Pavlovna Artyushenko, Eva Adamovna Artyushenko, Vasily Nikolaevich Artyushenko, Sofya Nikolaevna Moroz, Nadezhda Borisovna Nikolaenko, Alexander Fedorovich Nikolaenko, Mikhail Martynovich Lis.
- Visitors to us... Good people... There was no sign of a meeting, no sign. It happens that your palm itches - say hello. And today, Ani, I didn’t get my hopes up. One nightingale sang all night - on a sunny day. Oh! Our women will come running in a moment. There Nadya is already flying...
- Oh, I don’t want to remember. Scary. They kicked us out, the soldiers kicked us out. Military equipment has arrived in large numbers. Self-propelled guns. One old grandfather... He was already lying down. He was dying. Where to go? “I’ll get up,” he cried, “and go to the graves. With your feet." What did they pay us for the houses? What? Look how beautiful it is here! Who will pay us for this beauty? Resort area!
- Planes, helicopters - there was a hum. KamAZ trucks with trailers... Soldiers. Well, I think the war has started. With the Chinese or Americans.
“The owner came from the collective farm meeting and said: “Tomorrow we will be evacuated.” And I: “What about potatoes? They didn’t dig it up.” A neighbor knocks on the door, and he and I sit down to have a drink. We drank and let’s scold the chairman: “We won’t go, period. We survived the war, but now there’s radiation.” At least get into this land. We won't go!
“At first we thought that we would all die in two or three months. That's how they scared us. They encouraged us to go. Thank God - alive!
- God bless! God bless!
- Nobody knows what is in the next world. It's better here... More familiar. As my mother used to say: you show off, you rejoice and you are self-willed.
- Let's go to church and pray.
– We were leaving... I took the soil from my mother’s grave into a bag. She stood on her knees: “Sorry that we are leaving you.” I went to her at night and wasn’t afraid. People wrote their last names on their huts. On logs, on the fence. On the asphalt.
- The soldiers killed the dogs. They shot. Bang-bang! After that, I can’t hear the living thing screaming.
- I was a brigade leader here. Forty-five years... I felt sorry for the people... We took our flax to the exhibition in Moscow, the collective farm sent it. I brought a badge from there and a red certificate. Here, with respect to me: “Vasily Nikolaevich... Our Nikolaevich...” And who am I there, in a new place? An old grandfather in a capelush. I’ll die here, the women will bring me water and heat the house. I felt sorry for the people... In the evening, women come from the fields and sing, but I know that they will not get anything. Just sticks for workdays. And they sing.
– In our village, people live together. One world.
– I had a dream, I was already living in the city with my son. A dream... I'm waiting for death, I'm waiting. And I punish my sons: “Take me to our graves, stand with me near my home for at least five minutes.” And from above I see how my sons are taking me there...
– It may be poisoned, with radiation, but this is my homeland. We are no longer needed anywhere. Even a bird has a nice nest.
- I’ll tell you... I lived with my son on the seventh floor, I’ll go to the window, look down and cross myself. I think I hear the horse. Rooster... And such a pity... Otherwise I’m dreaming about my yard: I tie up the cow and milk, milk... I wake up... I don’t want to get up. I'm still there. I'm here and there.
– During the day we lived in a new place, and at night in our homeland. In a dream.
- In winter the nights are long, sometimes we sit and count: who has already died? In the city, many people died from nervousness and frustration, forty to fifty years - is this the time of death? And we live. We pray to God every day, asking for one thing – health.
– As they say, whoever was born where fits in there.
“My master lay there for two months... He was silent and did not answer me. How offended I was. I walk around the yard and come back: “Dad, how are you?” As soon as he looks up at the voice, I feel better. Let him lie there, be silent, and be in the hut. When a person dies, you cannot cry. If you stop him from dying, he will work for a long time. I took a candle from the closet and placed it in his hands. He took it and is breathing... His eyes, I see, are cloudy... She didn’t cry... She asked for one thing: “Say hello to our little daughter and my mother.” I prayed that we would be together... Some people will ask God, but he did not give me death. I live.
“But I’m not afraid to die.” Nobody lives twice. And the leaf flies off and the tree falls.
- Babonki! Don't cry. We spent all our years among the leading workers. Stakhanovka. They survived Stalin. War! If they hadn’t laughed and had fun, they would have hanged themselves long ago. So, two Chernobyl women are talking. One: “Have you heard that we all have leukemia now?” Another: “Nonsense! Yesterday I cut my finger, the blood flowed red.”
- In my native land, it’s like in paradise. But in a foreign country the sun doesn’t shine as much.
– And my mother once taught me that take an icon and turn it over, and let it hang like that for three days. Wherever you are, you will definitely return home. I had two cows and two heifers, five pigs, geese, and chickens. Dog. I clasp my head in my hands and walk around the garden. And there are so many apples! Everything is gone, ugh, gone!
“I washed the hut, whitewashed the stove... We need to leave the bread on the table and salt, a bowl and three spoons.” There are as many spoons as there are souls in the house... Everything to come back...
– And the chickens’ combs were black, not red – radiation. And the cheese didn't work out. We lived for a month without cottage cheese and cottage cheese. The milk was not sour, it curdled into powder, white powder. Radiation…
– I had this radiation in my garden. The entire garden turned white, very white, as if it had been sprinkled with something. Some pieces... I thought maybe I brought something from the forest. The wind poured in.
“We didn’t want to leave.” Oh, they didn't want to! The men are drunk. They threw themselves under the wheels. The authorities went from house to house and persuaded everyone. Order: “Do not take property!”
– The cattle haven’t been watered for three days. Not fed. To the slaughter! A newspaper correspondent arrived: “How are you feeling? How are you?" Drunk milkmaids almost killed him.
“The chairman and the soldiers are circling around my hut... They are intimidating: “Get out or we’ll set it on fire!” Well, here’s a can of gasoline.” I ran in and grabbed a towel, then a pillow...
– So, can you tell me in science, how does that radiation work? Tell the truth, we are going to die soon anyway.
– What do you think it is not in Minsk, since it is invisible?
– My grandson brought a dog... They called it Radium because we live in radiation. And where did my Radium go, is it always near my feet? I'm afraid he'll run outside the village and the wolves will eat me. I'll be alone.
- And during the war, the guns bang and bang all night long. Slap-slap. We dug out a dugout in the forest. They bomb and bomb. They burned everything, I would say the huts, and even the vegetable garden, and the cherries were burned.
If only there wasn’t a war... How I’m afraid of it!
– They ask the Armenian radio: “Can you eat Chernobyl apples?” Answer: “It’s possible, but the cores need to be buried deep in the ground.” Second question: “What is seven times seven?” Answer: “Yes, any Chernobyl survivor can count you on his fingers.” Ha ha ha...
- They gave us a new house. Stone. So, you know, not a single nail was hammered in for seven years. Foreign land! Everything is foreign. My master cried and cried. He works on a collective farm on a tractor for a week, waits for Sunday, and on Sunday he lies down against the wall and cries.
- No one will deceive us anymore, we will not move anywhere from our place. There is no store, no hospital. There is no light. We sit by a kerosene lamp and a torch. And we feel good! We are at home.
– In the city, my daughter-in-law followed me around the apartment with a rag and wiped the door handle, chair... And everything was bought with my money, all the furniture and the Zhiguli car. The money has run out and mom is no longer needed.
– Our children took the money... And what was left was eaten up by inflation. What they gave us for the farm, for the huts. For the apple trees.
– But we still have fun... They ask the Armenian radio: “What is a baby monitor?” – This is the grandmother from Chernobyl. "Ha ha ha...
– I walked for two weeks... And I brought my cow... People didn’t let me into the hut. Spent the night in the forest.
- They are afraid of us. Contagious, they say. Why did God punish? Angry? We do not live like humans, not according to God’s laws. Let's execute one another. For this.
– My grandchildren came in the summer... The first years they didn’t come, they were also afraid... But now they visit, they already take food, pack everything, whatever you give. “Grandma,” they asked, “have you read a book about Robinson?” He lived alone, just like us. Without people. I brought half a bag of matches with me... An ax and a shovel... And now I have lard, eggs, milk - everything of my own. One thing is that you can’t sow sugar. There is as much land as you want! Plow at least a hundred hectares. But there is no power. Here no one bothers a person... There are no authorities... We are free.
“The cats are back with us.” And dogs. We returned together. The soldiers didn't let us in. Riot police. So we are at night... Forest paths... Guerrillas...
“We don’t need anything from the state.” We produce everything ourselves. Just don't touch us! You don't need a store or a bus. We walk twenty kilometers to get bread and salt... We are on our own.
- They returned as a camp. Three families... And here everything was looted: the stove was broken, the windows and doors were removed. Floors. Light bulbs, switches, sockets - everything was unscrewed. Nothing alive. With these hands it’s all over again, with these hands. But of course!
- Wild geese are calling - spring has come. It's time to sow. And we are in empty huts... One thing is that the roofs are intact...
“The police were screaming. They will arrive in cars, and we will go into the forest. Like from the Germans. Once they attacked me and the prosecutor, so he threatened that they would judge us. I say: “Let them give me a year in prison, I will serve it and come back here.” Their job is to shout, and ours is to remain silent. I have an order as an advanced combine operator, and he threatens me - you will go under Article 10... Criminal...
– Every day I dreamed about my hut. I returned: now I’m digging a garden, now I’m tidying up the bed... And I’ll always find something: now a shoe, now chickens... Everything is for good, for joy. On the return...
“We ask God at night, and the police during the day.” You ask me: “Why are you crying?” And I don’t know why I’m crying. I'm glad that I live in my yard.
- And we survived everything, endured...
– I’ll tell you an anecdote... Government decree on benefits for Chernobyl victims... For those who live twenty kilometers from the plant, the prefix “von” is added to their surname. Those who are ten kilometers away, they are already Your Grace. And those who survived near the station - Your Excellency. Well, here we are, Your Grace... Ha-ha...
“I got to the doctor: “Darling, my legs can’t walk. My joints hurt." - “You have to hand over the cow, grandma. The milk is poisoned." “Oh, no,” I cry, “my legs hurt, my knees hurt, but I won’t give up the cow. My nurse."
– I have seven children. Everyone lives in cities. I'm alone here. I’ll sit under their photographs... I’ll talk.... All... All alone. I painted the house alone and laid out six cans of paint. This is how I live. She raised four sons and three daughters. And my husband died early. One.
– I met the wolf like this: he stands, and I stand. We looked at each other, and he jumped to the side... He rushed off... So my hat went up in fear.
- Any animal is afraid of man. Don't touch the beast, and it will bypass you. Previously, you walked through the forest, heard voices, ran to people, but now a person is hiding from a person. God forbid you meet a person in the forest!
– Everything that is written in the Bible is fulfilled. There it is written about our collective farm... And about Gorbachev... That there will be a big boss with a brand on his forehead and the great power will crumble. And then God’s judgment will come... Those who live in cities will all die, but in the village one person will remain. The person will be glad to see the human trail! Not to a person, but only following him...
- And our light is a lamp. Kerosene stove. Ahh... The women have already reported to you. If we kill a boar, we carry it to the cellar or bury it in the ground. The meat lies in the ground for three days. We make moonshine from our own grain. From jam.
– I have two bags of salt... We won’t be lost without a state! There is plenty of firewood - there is forest all around. The house is warm. The lamp is on. Fine! I keep a goat, a goat, three pigs, and fourteen chickens. There is plenty of land, plenty of grass. There is water in the well. Will! We feel good! We don’t have a collective farm here, but a commune. Communism! We'll buy another horse. And then we don’t need anyone anymore. One horse...
“We didn’t return home, as one correspondent was here and was surprised, but a hundred years ago.” We reap with a sickle, we mow with a scythe. We grind grain with flails directly on the asphalt. The owner of the basket is weaving. And I embroider in winter. Tku.
– Seventeen people in our family died during the war. Two of my brothers were killed... Mom cries and cries. And the old woman went around the villages, begging. “Are you grieving?” - says to mom. - Don't mourn. He who gave his life for others is a holy man." And I can do anything for my Motherland... I just can’t kill... I am a teacher, I taught - love a person. Good always wins. Children, they are small, pure in soul.
– Chernobyl... War is above wars. There is no salvation for man anywhere. Neither on earth, nor in water, nor in heaven.
– The radio was immediately turned off. We don’t know any news, but we can live in peace. Let's not get upset. People come and say: there is war everywhere. And as if socialism has ended, we live under capitalism. The king will return. Is it true!?
- Either a wild boar will come from the forest into the garden, or a moose cow... People are rare. Some policemen...
- And you come into my house too.
- And in mine. It's been so long since I've had guests in my house.
– And I am baptized and I pray... Lord! Twice the police cut my stove... They took me out on a tractor... And I went back! If they let people in, they would all crawl home on their knees. Our grief was spread throughout the world. Only the dead are allowed to return. They are being brought. And the living - at night. Forest...
- Everyone is eager to come here to see the rainbow. Up to one. Everyone wants to remember their own. The police let you in based on the lists, but children under eighteen years old are not allowed. They come and are so happy to stand near their hut... In their garden near the apple tree... First they cry at the graves, then they disperse to their yards. And there they also cry and pray. They light candles. They hang on their fences like on fences near graves. It happens that a wreath will be placed near the house. They will hang a white towel on the gate... Father reads the prayer: “Brothers and sisters! Be patient!”
– They take both eggs and rolls to the cemetery... Many pancakes instead of bread. Who has what... Everyone sits near his relatives. Name: “Sister, I came to taste you. Come and have lunch with us." Or: “You are our mommy... You are our daddy... Tatulya...” Souls are calling from heaven... Those who died this year cry, and those who died earlier do not cry. They'll talk and remember. Everyone is praying. Those who don’t know how also pray.
“But you can’t cry for the dead at night.” The sun will set - and it’s no longer possible. Remember, God, their souls. And the kingdom of heaven to them!
- He who does not jump, cries... Here is a Ukrainian girl selling big red apples at the market. He calls: “Buy apples! Chernobyl apples!” Someone advises her: “Don’t admit, auntie, that they are from Chernobyl. Nobody will buy." - “Don’t tell me! They take it! Some need it for their mother-in-law, some for their boss!”
- Here one returned from prison. According to the amnesty. He lived in a neighboring village. The mother died and the house was buried. Came to us. “Auntie, give me a piece of bread and lard. I’ll chop some wood for you.” Begging.
“It’s a mess in the country, and people are fleeing here.” They are running away from people. From the law. And they live alone. Strangers... Stern, no greeting in their eyes. If they get drunk, they'll set it on fire. At night we sleep, and under the bed there are pitchforks and axes. In the kitchen there is a hammer at the door.
- In the spring, a mad fox ran around, when it was mad, it was affectionate and affectionate. Can't look at the water. Place a bucket of water in the yard - and don’t be afraid! He will leave.
– They come... They make films about us, but we will never see them. We have no televisions or electricity. One thing is to look out the window. Well, and pray, of course. Those were communists instead of God, and now there is only God left.
– We are honored people. I am a partisan, I was a partisan for a year. And when our Germans were repulsed, I went to the front. On the Reichstag he wrote his name: Artyushenko. He took off his overcoat and built communism. Where is that communism?
- We have communism here. We live as brothers and sisters.
– When the war began, there were no mushrooms or berries that year. Will you believe it? The earth itself sensed trouble... Forty-first year... Oh, I remember! I haven't forgotten the war. A rumor spread that they had brought in our prisoners, whoever recognizes his own can take them. Our women got up and ran! In the evening, some brought their own and some brought someone else’s. But there was such a bastard... He lived like everyone else, married, two children. He told the commandant’s office that we had captured Ukrainians. Vasko, Sashko... The next day the Germans arrive on motorcycles... We ask, we fall to our knees... And they took them outside the village and killed them with machine guns. Nine people. They are young, young, good! Vasko, Sashko...
If only there wasn't a war. How afraid I am of her!
“The authorities will come and shout and shout, but we are deaf and dumb.” And we survived everything, endured...
- And I’m talking about my own... I think and think about my own... At the graves... Some lament loudly, and some quietly. Others may say: “Open up, yellow sand. Open up, dark night." You can get it from the forest, but never from the sand. I will address you kindly: “Ivan... Ivan, how should I live?” And he won’t answer me anything, good or bad.
- And I... I’m not afraid of anyone: neither dead people, nor animals, no one. The son will come from the city and swear: “Why are you sitting alone? How can someone strangle him?” What will he take from me? Just pillows... In a simple house, all the decorations are pillows. As soon as the bandit starts to climb, he’ll stick his head out the window, and I’ll throw it away with a hatchet. In our opinion, with a seker... Maybe there is no God, maybe someone else, but there, high up, there is someone... And I live.
“In winter, my grandfather hung a butchered calf in the yard. And the foreigners were just brought in: “Grandfather, what are you doing?” - “I’m kicking out the radiation.”
- It happened... People told me... A husband buried his wife, but he still had a little boy. The man is alone... He drank it out of grief... He will remove everything wet from the child and put it under the pillow. And the wife - either she herself, or only her soul - will appear at night, wash, dry and put it in one place. Once he saw her... He called her, she immediately melted... She became air... Then the neighbors advised him: as soon as a shadow flashes - the door is locked, then maybe he won’t run away soon. And she didn’t come at all. What was it? Who came there?
Don't believe me? And then answer, where did fairy tales come from? Maybe this was once true? You are literate...
– Why did that Chernobyl break down? Some people say that scientists are guilty. They grab God by the beard, and he laughs. And we have to be patient here!..
We have never lived well. Calmly. Just before the war, people were taken away... There was a grabber... We had three men... They arrived in black cars and took them from the field, and they still haven’t returned. We were always afraid.
– I don’t like to cry... I like to listen to a new joke... Tobacco was grown in the Chernobyl zone. Cigarettes were made from this tobacco at the factory. On each pack it is written: “The Ministry of Health is at its last! once again warns – smoking is dangerous to health.” Ha-ha-ha... And our grandfathers smoke...
- The only thing I have is a cow. I would go and give it away, if only there would be no war. How afraid I am of her!
- And the cuckoo crows, the magpies chatter. Roe deer are running. But no one will say whether they will continue. In the morning I looked into the garden - wild boars were digging. Dicky. People can be resettled, but elk and wild boar cannot. And the water does not adhere to boundaries, it goes along the ground, underground...
A house cannot exist without a person. And the beast needs a man. Everyone is looking for a person. The stork flew in... The bug came out. I'm glad about everything.
- It hurts, ladies... Oh, how it hurts! You have to be quiet... The coffin is carried quietly... Be careful... Do not knock on the door or bed, do not touch or hit anything. Otherwise, the trouble is - wait for the second dead man. Remember, God, their darling. And the kingdom of heaven to them! And where they bury, there they lament. Here we are all graves. There are graves all around... Dump trucks hum. Bulldozers. The huts are falling... The funeral workers work and work... They buried the school, the village council, the bathhouse... This very light, but the people are no longer the same. One thing I don’t know is if a person has a soul? What is she like? And where in the next world do they all fit?
