1931.08 В камышах - In the Reeds

 

1931.08 В камышах - In the Reeds

(Fergana Region)

by Leonid Solovyov (1906-1962)

The reeds stretch for tens of miles. Among the reeds, scattered in sparse patches, like enormous, frost-whitened mirrors, are swamps, lakes, and streams.

We move cautiously, feeling our way with our poles. The one in front is tied down with ropes, just in case.

A small clearing appears. In the middle is an artificial hill, and on it, like a reed cap, is a hut.

"Nema-kiryak?" comes from the hut, and through the low opening, lazily, on its belly, crawls the occupant of this dwelling.

"Ah! Salamat! Come here."

The owner of the hut is a small, red-bearded Uzbek. He lives here, in the wilderness, alone, and catches fish with snare traps and ducks with snares.

"I catch some and then go back to the village, and the villagers sell them in the city."

"How much do you earn a month?"

"About 20 rubles."

Half an hour later, we see this reed dweller struggling to survive.

Undressed, he begins to wade through the icy water, covered with a thin film. For half an hour, he watches for fish in snare traps and ducks in snares.

Walking in the water, he shouts to us:

"Make the fire hotter! I'm going to warm myself..."

His legs are wounded by ice and reeds. Blood oozes from his wounds in a thin stream, mixed with drops of water.

He cauterizes the wounds with ash. The bleeding won't stop. I give him iodine.

“Here, light it.”

“What is this?” he asks.

"Don't be afraid. It will hurt at first, but it won't hurt afterwards."

He cauterizes, winces, but then, seeing that the blood has subsided, he is surprised:

"How fast! Life is easy for you Urus. You have everything. You're not afraid of disease or anything. But we, the peasants..."

In the evening the fisherman is in the water again.

Afterwards he timidly asks, pointing to the bottle with iodine:

“Master, could you give me some?”

I give it to him. He's as happy as a child. He wants to dilute it with water so there's more...

It's getting chilly. Evening freezes the water. The water rings distinctly. A bloody, molten sunset falls quietly into the reeds.

"My father was a fisherman, too. And I'm a fisherman. It's hard, but what can you do?"

At night the owner coughs dully and lingeringly, whispering in between:

“Allah... Allah...”

The cough drowns out dully in the dense darkness.

In the morning, before dawn had even broken, the fisherman was already in the water again.

A cloudy steam rises from the water, enveloping the tops of the reeds in whitish stripes.

There was a frost last night. There was frost all around.

At sunrise we leave the hut along an inconspicuous path, known only to one inhabitant of the reeds.

 

[500 words]

1931.06 Базар - Bazaar

 

1931.06 Базар - Bazaar

by Leonid Solovyov (1906-1962)

 

There’s a bazaar in the village of Gamash. A huge square, not really a square. A sea of robes and turbans.

People are worried and making noise...

They buy, sell, and act as commission agents...

An Uzbek farmer buys a rope. He examines it carefully. He finds a tear and shows it to the merchant.

He waves his arms, smacks his lips, and swears by the beards of all the prophets of Allah that no decent rope can be made without a break... What kind of rope is it if it doesn't break? It’s not a rope, it’s trash...

The farmer steps onto the end of the rope and tries to break it. The merchant makes an anxious movement. But the rope holds. The merchant calms down.

“I wanted to tear it. You could hang 100 pounds on it, and it wouldn’t break. And a tear—what a tear, it’s nothing...”

The farmer is imbued with faith in the rope’s strength. The bargaining begins, and after an hour of noise, shouting, and arguing, the rope becomes the buyer’s property for 80 kopecks—the “tanga cake.”

The buyer takes it, lists its shortcomings in detail once again, hangs it over his shoulder and leaves.

A minute later he runs back.

“You swindler! You old devil! May they strangle you with your ropes. You cheated me out of one tanga (tanga is 20 kopecks). At the co-op, the same rope is 60 kopecks.”

The seller is unperturbed. The buyer jumps and snorts.

“On the rope. Give me the money.”

“Don’t you know,” says the seller, “that when a person drowns, he doesn’t have to worry about catching a cold in the cold water...”

Shouts and curses begin. A crowd gathers. People laugh.

“Inflatable!”

Unfortunately, another Uzbek passes by. He’s holding exactly the same rope.

“Oh, urtak,” says the buyer, “how much did you pay?”

“Three tanga.

“Where to?”

“Amana cooperative.”

The buyer looks reproachfully at the unwitting seller:

“Eh-eh-eh! - And he goes to the co-op.”

The rope failed to sell. The farmer heads back to the merchant.

“Give me at least a ten-kopek coin.”

He looks around and, seeing that there is no one around, says:

“That’s how they teach fools.”

The impudent eyes laugh.

“Ah. Fools? Well, Miley!”

Naduty stands next to the merchant. The merchant pays no attention to him. Two more people approach.

“How much is the lasso?”

“One sum (one ruble).”

“Go to the co-op,” the deceived man intervenes, “they’re 60 kopecks there.”

“Thank you,” they answer, and leave.

The merchant’s hair stood on end and his eyes widened.

“What are you doing?”

The farmer remains triumphantly silent. Another Uzbek approaches.

“How much is the soap?”

“Thirty kopecks,” the merchant replies, looking pleadingly at the recent petitioner.

“And in the co-op it’s 20 kopecks,” he says into the space.

The customer leaves. The merchant is red and angry. He bares his teeth.

“For your ten-kopeck coin! Go away!”

“Give me a ruble.”

“What? Robber! Burglar! Basmach!”

“Okay then. Give me 80 kopecks.”

At this time, two more people come up and also head to the cooperative with the farmer.

The merchant takes out a fifty-kopeck piece with trembling hands:

“Here you go.”

“Another 30 kopecks.”

“Here you go.”

The farmer leaves triumphantly. The merchant’s eyes pour cold poison after him.

* * *

The co-op’s stalls are lined up in a row. It’s impossible to squeeze through.

Congestion.

“Urtak! I've been asking for 10 arshins for a long time!”

“3 pounds!”

“Change the ruble.”

“Get in line, get in line,” the policeman shouts.

The cooperatives are well-organized, with an understanding of the farmers’ needs. Kerosene, oil, soap, and calico are available.

The spider traders look sadly at the cooperative, their hands folded on their stomachs.

Suddenly:

“T-r-r-r... this... this... tr-r-r.”

“Post! Post-o-post...”

A tractor has arrived.

Where to?

The crowd parted. A tractor with a raised swindler crawled along.

“Yakshi!” laughs one Uzbek. “He doesn't ask for drinks. He doesn’t need food. He only eats when he works.”

The bus is good.

And the tractor hums...

“Here, buy...”

“Expensive.”

“How many?”

“Two and a half ming, brother.”

“Nothing. Two and a half thousand. It’ll pay for itself in no time...”

“If only on credit...”

“Ask, and they will give you a loan...”

* * *

They bring the horses. We mount. We ride.

It takes us a while to get out of the crowd. When we’re already driving across the steppe, I look back.

A cloud of dust hung heavily over the bazaar.

There are quarries along the road.

“Here 25 Red Army soldiers held back the onslaught of thousands of Basmachi,” says the guide.

“How many of them remained alive?”

“One.”

...The steppe stretched far and wide like a wide yellow carpet.

In the village, a minaret rises above the dust.

 

[800 words]

1931.01 Aziz-bay's Blankets

 

Aziz-bay’s Blankets

by Leonid Solovyov (1906-1962)

1

The teahouse was filled with smoke. The farmers were seated tightly around the sandalwood tree. The teapots were cooling, unopened. No time for tea here!

Urum-bay, a resident of the neighbouring village of Pet-Koran, sat in the middle and spoke in a half-whisper:

“Soon, probably tomorrow, people will arrive from the city, and they’ll write. Someone in the city told me that this is done to find out how many extra blankets everyone has. Then these blankets will be taken away and taken to the city...”

The farmers sighed heavily... Something bad is going to happen. The teahouse owner, the plump Aziz-bay, mentally calculated how many blankets he had. He had more than ten. They’ll surely take half of them. I should hide them...” “Are they coming tomorrow?” — he asked Urum-bay.

“Probably so,” answered Urum-bay.

The village didn’t sleep that night. Everyone hid their blankets, burying them in adobe, in the firewood. And Aziz-bay, the teahouse owner, thought sadly:

“They’re hiding. They can hide. They’ll believe them when they say they don’t have blankets. But who’ll believe a teahouse owner when he says he doesn’t have blankets? They’ll dig up the entire yard and, of course, find them. They need to hide them further. But where?!”

Late at night, when the village had fallen silent, when everyone was already asleep, shivering from the cold, covered not with blankets but only with robes, Aziz-bay harnessed his cart, piled all his blankets on it, and furtively carried them somewhere along the road into the steppe. He rode for a long time. Finally, he reached a lake. A huge pile of cut reeds towered on the shore. Aziz-bay looked around: it was quiet. And he began to scatter the reeds. Then he piled his blankets in the middle, covered everything with reeds, and rode away, praising himself for his cleverness...

2

And the next day, the registrars arrived. They entered the tent of Muhammad, who lived on the edge.

Muhammad greeted them unwelcomingly.

“Why do you need to know how old I am and who I am?” he asked.

“You fool! A census. It’s necessary,” the registrar replied.

“I won’t tell.”

“Why?”

“Because you came for blankets...”

“What blankets?”

“You know which ones. We know too. We won’t say anything.”

The same thing happened in the next tent.

Then the registrars called a meeting. Everyone came. One of the census takers, perched on a stump, began to speak:

“Where did you get that idea about blankets? We don’t need your blankets. We have our own. We need to know how many of you live in the village. And this is so there’s no shortage of kerosene and a surplus in the textile industry. You don’t have kerosene in your village. Why? Because they don’t know how many of you there are, or how much kerosene you’ll burn. They’re just bringing it at random. Is that right?”

“Togry” (“correct”), the farmers responded.

“And when they know how many people live in Uzbekistan, they’ll be able to calculate how much sugar, bread, and kerosene these people need... Togry?”

“Togry!”

“We don’t need blankets. We won’t even ask you about them...”

And the census in Kurganchi went smoothly and quickly.

3

As soon as the census takers left, the farmers began pulling out their blankets. And the farmers were ashamed that they had believed Urum-bay’s tale.

Aziz set off for the steppe. He was deeply annoyed that he had twice urged his horse on and worked in vain, burying the blankets in the reeds. And now he would have to dig them out again... The devil brought this Urum-bay with his lies... Aha! There was the familiar willow. Around the bend there should be reeds and a haystack where the blankets lay.

Aziz rounded the bend, passed the reeds, and nearly fell off the cart from surprise, fear, and anger. The haystack was gone. Aziz-bay stood there, his mouth agape. He felt his feet grow cold, and his back immediately began to sweat. He rubbed his eyes. The haystack was gone. For a second, the thought flashed through Aziz-bay’s mind that he’d taken the wrong route. But no. There were three poplars, there was the bush he’d tied his horse to when he’d hidden the blankets, and the haystack was gone!

Aziz-bay climbed down from the cart and walked toward the spot where he’d calculated the haystack was. His legs were shaking and buckling. He approached and clearly saw footprints and the tracks of the cart’s wheels in the damp earth. So someone had come for reeds during the day and taken Aziz-bay’s blankets along with them...

It felt as if someone had struck Aziz-bay on the back of the head with a club. Mechanically, his eyes wild, he climbed onto the cart and rode back to the village.

When he arrived, the teahouse was full of people. And when Aziz-bay told them about the loss of his blankets, the peasants didn’t believe him at first, but then they realized it was true. Some, smacking their lips sympathetically, turned away to hide the laughter that was stifling them, while the more amused ones hurried out and laughed around the corner until their stomachs hurt.

That evening, the teahouse was smoky again. Aziz-bay’s son was serving tea. Aziz-bay himself sat in the corner, his eyes just as wild.

And then suddenly Urum-bay entered the teahouse. He was dressed for traveling, with a whip slung over his belt.

“Did you have a census?” he asked cheerfully.

Aziz-bay stood up. He stood for a moment. Then he approached Urum-bay.

“We had one. And you?”

“We had one too.”

“Did you have a census of the blankets?”

“What blankets?” Urum-bay laughed. “They lied to me in town.”

“Oh, they lied,” Aziz-bay said ominously quietly. “They lied!” he said louder.

“They lied!” he squealed and suddenly grabbed Urum-bay by the beard. “They lied!” “Where are my blankets?!” “They lied to you! They lied! They lied!” Aziz-bay tugged at the stunned Urum-bay by the beard, and then, with all his might, he grabbed Urum-bay by the ear and knocked him to the floor. A scuffle ensued. When the peasants pulled the fighting men apart, and the peasants pushed Urum-bay out the door and told him to go home.

Aziz-bay’s blankets were found the very next day. Mamed-Ali had taken them from Kalyamysh. He was indescribably surprised to find ten blankets in a haystack. Hearing about Aziz-bay’s incident, he brought the blankets to Kurganchi and gave them to Aziz-bay. But now Aziz-bay is constantly being teased. And they won’t stop teasing him anytime soon: the village remembers such incidents for a long time.

Kiit. Kurganchi, Fergana Region.