Standing there, he had to issue the command "Company! At attention!" when the barrack was entered by an officer.
There were 2 on-duty privates daily who replaced each other by the cabinet-box every four hours, and at the mealtime, the one free from the watch went to the Canteen under command of the on-duty Sergeant to lay the tables with the havvage for the company servicemen to have it.
Those 3 (the on-duty Sergeant and the pair of private men) were called "on-duty detail" and stayed it for 24 hours. The current on-duty Sergeant was surprised by my request, yet he gave me a pen and a sheet of paper.
Passing to the end of the barrack, I entered the room which the company political commander, aka zampolit, called "Leninist Room" because its walls were paneled by yellow chipboard and next to the mirror there hung the brown-yellow icon of Leader's profile in a piece of Beaverboard, but in the soldiers' lingo it was "live-mains room" because of the wall sockets for an iron or electric razors and the mirror wide enough to be used by 2 or 3 of shaving men at once…
The song air was no problem – everyone knew the perennial hit:
"Maroosya, a black-haired girl,Picked berriesOf gelder rose…"
But not everyone knew that originally the song was sung as "C’mon, fellas, uncinch the horses…" which meant that it got used to transformations of its lyrics:
"Our parade march is the best,And our song's the loudest,That's the tuneOf our platoon!.."
Sitting over a sheet of paper I twirled the pen in my fingers picking up words in my mind, fitting them this or that way. And gradually the Leninist live-mains around me, and the acrid smell of fresh cotton from my uniform, and the smarting itch in my right foot rubbed to bleeding, all that faded into the woodwork. I was in AWOL from the army…
Yes, we did learn and sing it quite bravely…
~ ~ ~
At the end of the day, the rookies stood at ease about the entrance to the "training" barrack when the Master Sergeant of Fourth Company, a man of about 40 with a round good-natured face and a paunch of the potbelly, was passing by.
He stopped to ask where we were drafted from. Probably, he just wanted to while away the half-hour before the Ensigns and officers, as well as a couple or two of women from the accountancy by the Detachment Staff were to be taken to the Stavropol-City. For the overnight staying in the battalion, there remained only the on-duty officer.
One of us, Vanya by his name, seeing the human disposition of the senior in rank, asked with a sucking-up smile, "Comrade Master Sergeant, could they exempt me because of this?"
Lowering his head, he rested his index finger in a wide scar on his pate, that peeped thru the bristles of the close-cut.
"Fucking smartie, fixin' to fuck the army?" said the Master Sergeant. "No fucking way!" And he slapped Vanya's shoulder blades with his broad fatty hand.
From the sonorous spank, Vanya bent in the opposite direction and pouted to show that it hurt, "Ouch!"
The soldiers readily laughed at the witty remark of the Master Sergeant…
As for the tactical drills, I even liked them. All the three platoons of rookies were formed into one column and marched out of the battalion grounds to the field by the pigsty. The Sergeants explained that "flash" meant a nuclear bomb explosion, and it was necessary to drop flat on the ground with your head in the flash direction.
Then the command "run march!" followed, and when the whole column moved in a disorderly trot, one of the Sergeants yelled, "Flash on right!" With animated yells and screams, we clumsily fell in the grass. The drill was repeated several times.
(…an eternity later, when we also became "grandpas" and the buddies from my draft recollected those "flash on left!" and "flash on right!" as one of the inhuman trials for the startup youngs, I could not understand them.
I still do not understand. Running in the summer field, tumbling in the green grass when you have the strength and wish – it's just fun!
"How young we were at that time!How young we were at that time!."…)
After the concentrated, hard, fatigue-denying, training in the course of the unforgettable four days, we took the Military Oath and became servicemen at the Armed Forces of the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics. No, we were not holding any automatic or another kind of weapons which customarily adorned that ceremonial ritual in the Soviet Army. We just took turns stepping out of the ranks to approach the desk in the asphalt path, pick up the sheet with the text of the Military Oath, read it, put it back onto the desk, sign another sheet (the lieutenant indicated the place for the signature), step back to the ranks, turn about and face the barrack wall made of white silicate brick laid in shiner position.
Behind the desk, facing our ranks, there stood two officers. If somebody, while taking the Military Oath, was not quite dexterous about the reading of the printed text, they did not really pick on him – just finish it off quick and scribble your scratch on the sheet.
In the end, the lieutenant asked if anyone had a medical education. After a moment of refrained confusion in the ranks, a young soldier stepped out and reported his having been a help for the paramedic at the first-aid post in his village. He was singled out to continue his service at Fourth Company, as well as four professional drivers from our draft.
(…how many times in the 2 years that followed, I cursed myself with every taboo word under the sun for missing to step forward and report my 3 years of reading up for admittance exams at the neurosurgery department of a medical institute!.)
Then they announced where each of us belonged. I got to First Company, that of masons. Plasterers served at Second and Third Companies. Fourth Company was for