Syedyshev Oleg
Syedyshev Oleg

Humorous essays
Guestbook Contacts

Humorous Essays Based on students' memories

"All have died
except for those who are alive, and those whom we remember"Confucius

Essay 18. How I was a trade union organizer...

It happened so that I was elected to be a trade union organizer in our group. For the first two years the trade union organizer was Dima Mkheidze, but when he took an academic leave, I was elected. It was a position not burdened with many responsibilities, yet it was my first position. Not much was required from me, just to collect trade union dues: those who did not receive stipend paid 2 kopeks, and those who received it - 10 kopeks a month. Once a semester groups' "triangles" gathered together - a group monitor, a trade union organizer and a Komsomol (Young Communist League) organizer; they kind of influenced the awarding a stipend to those students who were in need. Though I do not remember any of such cases. So, my main task was to collect dues.

Well, there I should be given credit for: everyone paid dues with me. Though how it happened that I managed not to take the collected dues to the trade union committee was a mystery to me. For some incredible reasons the collected dues were used for the needs of the group. Yes, for the needs of the group, and not just like that, but after the voting of the whole group. For example, Arkasha Blyakher was a Komsomol organizer, and he also collected two or ten kopeks from each student a month, and the Komsomol dues were taken to the Young Communist League Committee, but the trade union dues collected by me were not taken anywhere.

And then everything was growing on like a snow ball. The next month I was collecting four kopeks from each student, then six ..., twenty kopeks ..., a ruble, etc. For some reason as soon as I finished to collect the money forcing it out of everyone, a spontaneous "trade union meeting" gathered, and a decision was made about how to spend it, for example on a party dedicated to a wedding of Tatyana Yanchilina and Sashka Plokhikh. You just do not assume that the money was literally spent on drink. For example, if that was an examinations period, the money was used to buy chocolate to a secretary or a laboratory assistant of a department where an exam was supposed to be held. One could not call that money spent on drink, it was spent on a sacred thing: to assure that the examination papers were arranged in certain succession. Then everyone would not hesitate and took his or her last from the right or last from the left examination paper and gave an answer with no worry.

Well, I, perhaps, should not even bother to finish the story. You, my dear readers, already realized that after the state exams all the university leavers were filling out a clearance chit (the so called loan slip), so when the students of our in the final year already 618 group came to the trade union committee for a signature and a stamp, they were drawn a quite an impressive bill for the dues not paid. I, a trade union organizer of the group, had to pay the bill as well. So, now I am curious: why I was not kicked out from the position of a trade union organizer? Kicked out not by the group, but by the trade union organization of the institute? I believe that that was a disgraceful fault of the trade union organizer of the institute. That's it, well, did he expect any kind words?..

july 10, 2011

© Copyright: Oleg Syedyshev, 2012
Publishing licence #21202100558

Translated by Viktoria Potykinato content ↑


Copyright © 2001-2024
oleg.syedyshev.name
All rights reserved