Syedyshev Oleg
Syedyshev Oleg

Humorous Essays Based on students' memories

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

Essay 91. Here is the one for you, fascist!

Oh, how wonderful and careless time of student days is! We call it careless looking back from present time. Though, sure enough everybody had problems back then. The problems were quite different. Students had their kind of problems, and professors' problems were of different origin. Students did not bother to make long-term prospects. They were concerned about the coming examinations, tests and exams. Professors, perhaps, had another kind of problems. I do not know for sure, but I can guess that they were worried about a curriculum, their vacations, disagreements in their families, if they had them. Professors of a medical institute could have diverse, most various things to take care of. However it looked like, concerns of Lyudmila Vasilievna Krasheninnikova from the Physical Training Department were significantly different from the ones of the general body of professors.
In one of my essays, to be precise in the essay "Briefs" I, when describing an associate professor of a General Anatomy department Larissa Andreyevna Nikolayeva, used such expressions as "The gal of the old training" and "the Old stager", and I also commented that about that kind of women people said: "A gal with balls". Many of my readers wrote to me saying that the expression matched more not L.A.Nikolayeva, but the very Lyudmila Vasilievna Krasheninnikova. And her concerns were in keeping with the characteristic.

Lyudmila Vasilievna was concerned about the country's defence in general and participation in it, in the defence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics then, of the students of the Kemerovo State Medical Institute. And they were expected to participate in it not as military doctors or at least nurses, but like defenders of their Motherland with the last highly-explosive shell in a hand. She kept tirelessly saying that to all groups of students who happened to get into her unwomanly strong hands. "When being killed in a battle, take one or better two or three enemies with you". That was the task Krasheninnikova set for young male and female students, neither more nor less.

She saw no difference between men and women. The Motherland's defender was neutral, at least in her mind.
Galina Veldyaskina's group was the one that got into Lyudmila Vasilievna's hands. Once in their second year the students happened to take a test of throwing a highly-explosive shell. While writing the essay, I am thinking: "How lucky I was that I attended a sports group and did not have to attend PT classes!" Well, back to Galina's group. Generally speaking the group passed the test not just fine, but even very well. The guys all together threw the highly-explosive shell further than the qualifying standard. Galina also did her best and flung, yes, I did not make a mistake; she flung the highly-explosive shell without any training further than the qualifying standard. When the explosive flew up high from her hand and started staggering up in the air, nobody believed it would fall behind the mark. However, Galina's bosom friend Yulia did not get lucky. After all her attempts the highly-explosive shell staggered with the most unbelievable amplitude, but landed two or three meters away from Yulia.

All three tries she was allowed were used. Yulia was almost crying, the group was literally begging to allow her at least one more try, but there was no way, Krashennikova definitely opposed that. She not only turned the students' request down, but started harping on her favorite tune: "... what if it's a war tomorrow...". One could tell that that was Lyudmila Vasilievna's favorite topic. With what relish and intonation she was lecturing Yulia: "What if a war starts tomorrow, if you throw a highly-explosive shell at the enemy like that, all shell splinters will hit you, and the enemy will stay alive, but you must at least wound him". And all that was said monotonously with stress on the words "war" and "enemy". "You must throw the shell here to stay alive during the battle!" And again the accent was on the word "battle". While saying all that she was approaching the qualifying standard mark. "You will practice hard and then come to take the test again". At that moment Yulishna, as she was called in the group, being enraged that she would have to practice and seeing a real enemy of students in the person of that disgusting old bag in front of her threw the shell with all her might while crying "A-aaaaaaaa, I am sick of all that!" It seemed to the group that she was shouting: "A-aaaaaa, here is the one for you, fascist...". They were arguing for quite a long time about what she was really crying after that. It was amazing, but Yulishna herself could not say, what she exactly was screaming. Though, that was really cool. The shell wheezed a centimeter above Krasheninnikova's head and landed three meters further than the mark. "Hurraaaaaaaay!!!! She's passed it!!!! The world record!!!! It's a victory!!!!", - the group was shouting, and Galina was shouting louder than all of them. Yulka was also capering and clapping her hands, as that was her victory.

Krasheninnikova froze because of fear, and she had a good reason for that, her head was almost blown away by the shell. The group was triumphant. It was funny to look at Krasheninnikova: she was embarrassed, wilted, scared; she had not expected that the shell from Yulia's hands would reach her, that was why she was walking to and fro making unwomanly big steps at the other side of the stadium, brainwashing her on the topic: "What if it's a war tomorrow, if there's a march tomorrow...". The students were laughing themselves sick. That was what could result from disbelief in one's students and in one's own ability if not to teach a student than to make him or her very angry. Nevertheless a credit should be given to Lyudmila Vasilievna, she pulled herself together; a grin appeared in her face: "No! She hasn't passed it! It was her forth try!", - she said and closed the group register.
I think, there is no need for me to say how much she was hated by the group at that moment. Everybody was shouting, demanding to give a credit for the throw. Only Yulia was in absolute euphoria, the euphoria of her victory. The victory over herself, the victory over enemy, the real enemy. It was good that the shell was a training one.

And Krasheninnikova, let's put it delicately, a mean person, did not give a credit for the "world record", which almost resulted in a craniocerebral injury for her, and made Yulishna write a paper on "Conditioning to the Cold".

The plot of the story is courtesy of Galina Yurovskaya (Veldyaskina).

13 December, 2011.

© Copyright: Oleg Syedyshev, 2012
Publishing licence #213101900973

Translated by Viktoria Potykinato content