Аннотация: Vladimir Vasilievich in Kazakhstan. The story.
Vladimir Vasilievich in Kazakhstan. The story.
Sergey Sergeyevich decided to tell in more detail about the work of Vladimir Vasilyevich in Kazakhstan.
'Vladimir Vasilievich and his work in Kazakhstan.
After completing his studies at the institute, Vladimir Vasilievich had the right to choose a place to work during distribution, in priority order (as one of the best, and possibly the best student on the course).
For moral reasons, he considered it impossible to become ahead of his friends. They were a family people, participants in the Great Patriotic War. Opportunities to go to Moscow (the Council of Ministers was indicated as the place of work) or to some capital of the Baltic republics (republican ministries were indicated as the place of work) were not realized ...
But there were other interesting possibilities.
His decision was influenced by the opinion of personal friends of Vladimir Vasilievich. The friends admired his future fame as a tiger hunter in Central Asia.
No one was so naive as to take these jokes too seriously. But they created a general positive attitude for making such a decision, were invisibly pushing towards such a variant.
In a friendly circle, the information circulated about some semi-real, semi-mythical acquaintances who worked in Central Asia in some positions. These friends, as expected, will provide some kind of support.
A shift of the focus of attention of the family to the health problems of the father of Vladimir Vasilievich played a role. This circumstance hindered a calm and impartial assessment of such a choice.
The distribution trip to Central Asia seemed partly an interesting and romantic affair. Maybe a little bit - it seemed a tourist tour to a very interesting places.
It seems that at the beginning of the trip - already in Central Asia - Vladimir Vasilievich really visited someone else's acquaintances who had something to do with his future work according the distribution ...
His path lay farther and farther. He was among the low Kazakhstan mountains, in the middle of the steppe spaces, at a distance of hundreds, thousands of kilometers from settlements.
It were a mines, rudniks! The country hastily developed the economy and the armed forces. The country needed minerals.
Buildings in the mine were covered with (poisonous) dust.
Vladimir Vasilievich lived (at the mine), most likely in some kind of dormitory.
The mine employed mainly persons convicted of serious violent crimes.
These were a different people, people with a different qualities. Some of them had the ability to think, a noble aspirations (a kind of noble impulses), a certain rationalism and common sense.
Despite all the psychological features and twists in the situation, it was clear to each of the participants in the events that the mine should work and that each of them should fulfill duties ... It can be assumed that working under the guidance of a former student had certain advantages over working under the guidance of people of a different type ...
When Vladimir Vasilievich met new subordinates (about 10 convicted people), some of them came up with the idea that if students have the right to breaks, then workers in the mine have the right to rest.
The novice leader faced the task - how to induce subordinates to useful work.
Among the subordinates was a man who apparently exceeded his colleagues in mental and moral qualities. Maybe there was a desire to help? ...
This man approached the worker sitting from the edge and said, "Stand up! Go to work!"
The worker got up and went to the workplace.
The man moved on to the next rebel ...
One of the vacationers did not agree with this turn of events and took out a knife.
His more developed and experienced comrade, by the movement of an experienced person, grabbed the knife with his palm by the blade and pulled the blade out of the handle of the knife. The rebel jumped out the window and hid in the vicinity for three days, after which he came with repentance and set to work.
The whole life of this period (several years) was filled with similar situations, differing from each other only in details.
The people who worked at the mine could tell and were telling many interesting events from their own lives and from the lives of other people.
The task was to maintain a cyclopean (huge) devices in an efficient, working condition, ensuring continuous round-the-clock operation of the mine.
In winter, there were times when people on the way to the mine got stuck on the road, a tractor was sent to help them, but the tractor might have problems - to some extent, all this resembled the stories of Jack London.
Something in the memory was, also, about the locals.
One of the local residents worked in the militia [now - police]. His father (or he?) had several wives and a large herd. There was a certain contrast between the epoch of life before the mine and the realities after the beginning of the work of the mine.
Traditional life in the steppe seemed free, healthy and romantic ...
With the second representative of the local population - she worked as a judge - a memory remained in connection with the dismissal of Vladimir Vasilyevich. Having worked for several years (the time, which was laid down by law), he filed a letter of resignation. The administration refused to dismiss him. Then he sued. The judge did not recognize his right to be dismissed. According to Vladimir Vasilievich, she knew Russian very poorly. When asked how he was dismissed, he remained silent. With this point, apparently, there were connected an unpleasant memories.
A few years later, Vladimir Vasilievich returned to his small homeland, enriched by life experience. Many interesting stories of his subordinates, reminiscent of adventure stories, were forgotten.
Difficulties were erased from memory.
The local flavor, if it existed, was obscured by the need for conscientious, daily maintenance of huge technical devices to support them in a good working order. This activity required not only knowledge, technical skills, technical discipline, ability to do a technical inventions, but also, often, intuition - the ability to anticipate problems and solve them in advance.
There were a vague memories of technical puzzles (situations that had no analogues) that had to be solved without a reserve of time, right on the spot, using the tools that were available.
The main risks were - risks to life and health and the risk of joining (due to some kind of mistake) to subordinates.
Both risks were real, but they remained only risks.
The country steadily received the minerals necessary for the development of the economy and the armed forces. What did Vladimir Vasilievich get? He was enriched by a life experience ... he got an official working period for a personal biography...
The mine did not stop without Vladimir Vasilievich. Even if his successor was somewhat unsuccessful, the head administration of whole enterprise had the opportunity to send specialists from other units on a business trip, also to make the necessary personnel maneuvers ...
If necessary, they could put four in this place, increase their salaries, build comfortable cottages for them ... To provide for them the possibility of a comfortable and long vacation in healthy and interesting places ...
In acute, tense situations, decisions are made ...
Returning, Vladimir Vasilievich met friends. They planned and were making a career without any trips to Central Asia and the prospects of becoming great tiger hunters (they did not have the opportunity to go to Moscow to work according distribution, in principle ....).
The health of father of Vladimir Vasilievich, a disabled person of the Great Patriotic War, was gradually deteriorating. There were recollections of some rights of a graduate of the institute (if there was such a family member) to insist on the employment (according the distribution) in his hometown (and refuse a long and a distant trip) ...'.
Sergey Sergeyevich completed the story with complex feelings.
It would seem that the several years of work in difficult conditions could provide many interesting details for this story.
But, if you approach objectively, the main character was the mine - as the technical and economic system. This system, apparently, worked successfully and smoothly.
To describe in detail the work of the mine is a completely different genre ...
It would be possible to describe the production chain - from a mine to a space rocket or from a mine to a large power plant - but this is also a different genre ...
April 10, 2020 08:10
Translation from Russian into English: April 10, 2020 20:41.
Владимир Владимирович Залесский 'Владимир Васильевич в Казахстане. Рассказ'.