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My name is Kregor Mankovitch. I was born on the 10th of October 1950 in Minsk –Belarus or White Russia as some of the inhabitants still call it. I lived with my maternal grandparents as my parents were divorced. Both my grandparents and I ‘survived’ in a small two bedroom flat in a gigantic block of apartments, built by the government. That was the norm in the Soviet system. There were literall y hundreds of these mammoth blocks all over the country and each block contained at least 2000 individual two bedroom flats with a small space that was called the living room or dining area, a small kitchen, a toilet and a minuscule shower area. It was like living in a submarine. Bath tubs did not exist and there was no space for such a lavish commodity anyway. There was no washing machine, dryer or freezer. The government provided a miniature fridge, normally used in summer only, to save electricity. Washing was done once a week in the public laundrette, which was situated in the basement of the block and that entailed a long queue and waste of some three to four hours. There were not enough washing machines for 2000 apartments.
My grandparents gave me one of the bed rooms, which had some shelves and two bars to hang my shirts or coats on. Books or other articles were either on the floor, in a small box, or loose under the bed. Four single beds only were provided by the government and were part of the flat.

These blocks are identical in design, building and pattern. Each block was constructed on fourteen floors but without lifts. There were thirty two different entrances, clearly marked with the number of the flats to which each entrance led. (For example, entrance (A) led to flats 1 to 60, and because there were not enough letters in the alphabet there were entrances marked (AA) or (AB) as well). Normally the lower floors were assigned to the old, and the higher ones to the robust and the young. I say normally because I came across two very old couples who lived on the eighth floor and it was extremely difficult for them to leave their apartment and to do their shopping or any other errand for that matter.

There was always that claustrophobic feeling when entering such apartments. Most tenants were too scared to enter their dwelling. The walls were thin, so they could hear their neighbours talking and moving and they never felt secure or protected . Privacy was an extravagance. The neighbours knew all the comings and going of every family; where they worked, how much they earned; what they wore, ate, etc.

The walls were dark grey, this being the natural colour of the cement, as painting was not part of the rent, and most of the tenants could not afford to buy paint, which was not available to buy in the shops anyway. Besides, painting a home was considered ‘bourgeois’, wasteful, and not socialist and no one desired to be associated with such  adjectives in those days.

Always dark and with hardly any fresh air, the view from the flats was little better, consisting of walls and more depressing walls. We were not permitted to use more than two small light bulbs. One was in the hall and the other in the kitchen. For the bed room and the toilet, we had to switch on the light in the hall in order to see, or else use candles. The heating in the winter was totally inadequate and it felt cold all year round. The sun never entered the abode, certainly not in ours.

Anyone who exceeded the given electricity quota was punished or paid a heavy penalty or even had the electricity supply disconnected for a month or more, depending on the magnitude of the offence. But all the restrictions and the callous regulations were tolerated, though with anger and disdain, because the rent was less than four percent of one’s monthly earnings and those who were retired did not pay any rent at all. If a man and his spouse were both working and earning, then only one of them paid the rent of four percent.   The average wage was so small that even four percent was considered high, but at least most of the population had a roof over their head. These apartments were not for sale but were for rent only. No one wanted to buy such a place and no one could afford to in any case.

Most of the young spent the time out of their home, in a totally unproductive manner - stealing, damaging walls and windows, forming gangs, quarrelling with one another. There were stones and debris all over the place. The block's surroundings were always in a shameful state. Once each week the municipal workers would clear away some of the mess, but definitely not all of the litter and the other mess that these youngsters created.

When I was six years old, my parents were already divorced and my father moved to live in Nizhniy Novgorod, a small town with a population of about forty thousand, located some eighty miles east of Moscow. The majority of this town were and still are, farmers, and my father worked for the People’s Milk Marketing Cooperative of Nizhniy Novgorod. The Soviet Union allowed citizens from the Soviet Satellite to live and work unrestricted in the Soviet Union, but they were regarded as foreigners and the KGB kept an eye on them. They were always considered suspects for no reason whatsoever, although they were doing honest, productive work for their own benefit as well as for the benefit of the Soviet Union, but they were paranoid, about being spied upon notwithstanding, as the KGB were experts on undercover work world wide including on their own citizens.

My father wrote from time to time to keep in touch with me since I was fourteen years old. I never saw him since he left home. In his letters, he always asked about my education, well being, health, and if I was eating, sleeping well, and said that he missed me and hoped one day he would see me again. My paternal grandfather had died during the First World War and two years later my paternal grandmother died from cancer. There were no other children except my father. I do regret of course, that I never met them, but I was truly grateful to my maternal grandparents, who took care of me and loved me from the bottom of their hearts.

My mother was an only child. She was a dress maker and lived in Babruysk, a small city some sixty miles south of Minsk. She visited me and her parents once, some times twice, each month.

She gave some money to her parents to help towards my maintenance. My mother never asked any questions such as how I was doing at the metropolitan school, about my social life, or about my health and she treated me as if I were an alien to her. I still do not know the reasons for her unapproachable attitude towards me as I never asked and perhaps I did not want to know either.

At the state school I tolerated my studies and was not keen to mix with my fellow classmates. I rarely did my homework, maybe I could not stay long enough in the flat because of the atmosphere inside, the lack of lighting, the drab colour and semi-darkness of the surroundings and so on.

When I finished my baccalaureate, the head master registered my name along with many others, at the university and he dictated what subject each student should read. Most likely, this was according to the instructions he received from his superiors at the Communist Party Head Office, from the Minister of Education, or from someone else higher than him. That was how the socialist structure operated in all the countries under the Soviet Union. Those students who refused to study as dictated by the head master or their immediate teacher were expelled; their certificates were confiscated and they would, most certainly, face starvation because no one would employ them . All the employers were government controlled nonetheless, so they could not work unless of course, they accepted some unusual jobs such as guards in a Siberian gulag, or as a security watchman at a nuclear plant without protective clothing and without head covers and masks, which often led to a type of asthma within six months and sometimes definite death.

These were the kind of jobs offered to anyone who did not toe the line with his superiors. No one was master of his destiny.

I was asked, more like ordered, to study chemical engineering. I accepted it without questions or arguments, even though I was not in the least interested in entering the university in the first place, let alone to study chemical engineering, a subject totally peculiar and of no interest to me. I wanted to trade and to be a rich and famous person. But I knew the consequences if I were to refuse and I had to swallow the ‘pill’ they gave me.

The accommodation, fees, clothing, and a small amount of pocket money, were provided by the state during the four years of study. All students were obliged to attend classes. Most of the time I was bored stiff. I scarcely studied or revised. After each test I completed, I was certain of failure but somehow and to my utter bewilderment, I passed all the tests. I had no idea how the examiner let me get through.

In 1975, I graduated from the only university in the city, having ‘read’ Chemical Engineering. It was not difficult to obtain a university degree in our city as most, if not all, the final exams papers were either stolen from the university office or ‘bought’ for a small sum of money.

For my final examinations, I invited Natasha Kochinsky, a young lady of about my age, and incidentally, the administrator of the office who kept all the exam papers locked until the day of examination, for a drink and a sandwich. Later that evening, she took me back to her office and made photo copies of all the exam papers and that was how I obtained my degree, without studying and without knowing much about Chemical Engineering. I had the feeling that the authorities knew what was happing, but did nothing, in order to show the world that our young were educated and university graduates.

I was allowed to visit my grandparents twice a year and I wrote to them every three or four months. All letters were handed to the office and the clerk mailed them. We were asked not to exceed four letters per year.

After the graduation, I was summoned to see the Dean of the faculty. He told me that a job had been found for me at the oil-fields of Novosibirsk, in the Soviet Union and not far from the Kazak border, some thousand miles, if not more, from my home. The Dean told me that the pay would be very good and that I would be happy there.

In those days, one did not dare to protest, or show a sign of being unappreciative. The Dean was merely carrying out orders he had received from a higher authority. I had no alternative but to agree. Fortunately, I had no wife and no family to worry about, except for my grandparents, whom I loved and adored for taking care of me all these years. I was given three days leave and then told to report to the Soviet Embassy, ‘Work and Colonization Section ’, which was on the sixth floor.

After my three days leave, I reported to the Soviet Embassy and was escorted by special security personnel to the section where I was met by an official, not Russian, but a local man from Minsk. I was asked countless questions; where I was born, where I lived, where I studied, with whom I was associated in my youth, and questions of that nature. Although the official knew all the answers well in advance, he had to ask the questions, nevertheless. I reckoned I was in that office for four hours, with half an hour recess for a drink and to stretch my legs. The reason it took that long was because he asked each question slowly, read some letters of no connection with me or my file, phoned his wife or a lady acquaintance three times and each conversation lasted at least twenty minutes to half an hour. I suppose he had to prove to his superior that he had meticulously and methodically checked me and that is why he needed that extended time. May be he could claim an overtime payment! who knows.

At the end of the session he told me to go to the waiting room and stay there. Three hours later he called me and told me that I was accepted to work in the Oil Field at Novosibirsk in Russia and wished me luck. He gave some papers, an airline ticket, accommodation voucher, coupons for meals at the place of work, and one month pay in advance.

I was told to be at the airport in two days time, in other words, I was given a further two days leave. I visited my grandparents, bought them variety of foods, sweets, some towels, and gave them some of my salary. I also took them to the local cinema and invited them for dinner with plenty of vodka.

Two days later I went to the airport and boarded a plane destined for Sankt Peterburg . My ticket stated, for travel to the Soviet Union, final destination, Novosibirsk. It was up to the airline company to decide how, when, and through which or what route to transport me.

In Sankt Peterburg I was taken to a hotel, not far from the airport and I was told to wait. “we will contact you”. I stayed in that hotel for three days, but there was plenty to see and visit in Sankt Peterburg. I visited the summer and the winter palaces. I showed my acceptance letter to the oil field, as if I were ‘an official’ and was not charged the entrance fees. One evening I wanted to see the Kirov Ballet but I did not want to pay the high price they asked and, although I showed them that letter, alas I was rejected. I went instead to an amateur theatre production. Actually it was an acting stage for actors who have not been qualified as yet. That was free and I stayed  there just over two hours. Better than staying at the hotel and getting fed up. They even offered me Vodka and plenty of meat.

On the third day, the lady at the reception of the hotel phoned my room and told me that the bus would take me to the airport. An hour later I was at the airport. My plane was destined for Omsk airport. I was in Sankt Peterburg airport at 08.30 but the departure time was at 16.30. I had never heard of the place before and I was at a loss to understand why they brought me so early when my flight was at 16.30, but I had to follow what I was directed to do. An argument with these civil servants will lead me nowhere but to trouble and unnecessary nuisance and in certain cases, enquiries as to why I complained. Most likely, they would form a committee or committees to investigate and reinvestigate the nature of the grievance and that would last months, just so that the people in charge will have some thing to do, apart from drinking tea, and at the end I would be the loser and/or I would be blamed for all the predicaments and miseries plus the expenses I caused them and the state.

After an eleven hours flight, I landed at Omsk airport. The airport was undersized, with only a small number of people needed to maintain it and it was used for domestic flights only. The Airport looked tatty and shabby. There were a few chairs but they were in need of serious repair. I was, in fact, very thirsty, hungry and tired so decided to sit on one the stairs, in the hope that one of the workers would ask me what was the matter and how I felt and maybe, just maybe, would offer me some water or a piece of bread, but it was wishful thinking. No one bothered and no one looked at me even. Conceivably that was the attitude of the people who lived in that part of the Soviet Union, or perhaps and quite likely, they reciprocate to the way and manner that their bosses behave towards them. Everything reflects on their conduct to others. That made me think very seriously about my fellow workers in my new job at the oil fields . I shall worry about that later - meanwhile, I was thirsty and hungry.

To the best of my knowledge and appraisal, this airport was used solely to ferry workers allocated for the oil fields because there was no other industry in that area and the local inhabitants would and could not fly but used the public transport which was heavily subsidised.

An hour after I arrived, a tall, heavy duty built man with frightening-killer looks shouted (more like yelled ), the name Kregor Mankovitch. I approached him and told him that I was Kregor Mankovitch. I am Nikitia, “follow me,” he screeched. I mentioned to him that I was thirsty and hungry and asked if he could suggest a place to eat. He started laughing in fortissimo pitch, which got on my delicate and exhausted nerves, and I was truly exasperated but there was no way I could fight or even make an unpleasant remark to such an unrefined and uncivilized brute. I had to gulp down his performance and stay thirsty but calm. He led me to a huge oil tanker with eight compartments and which was sixty foot in length. With his finger, he indicated, as if he wanted me to sit near him. There was no other place but to climb into the cabin of this monster vehicle. It appeared that he was the driver of this tanker. I asked him where are were heading to, but he pretended not to hear and could not be bothered to remove the cigarette from his month even with foul smell from the cheap tobacco he was smoking or perhaps it was not tobacco at all. The air in that cabin was so polluted, I felt I was in a farm with a double do se of fertilizers spread all over it.

I repeated the question, asking where are we heading. He told me that we were driving to Novosibirsk, which was the place of my new employment. The journey lasted about one and a half hours on an uneven potholed road. By the time I arrived at my final destination, not one single grain of energy was to be found in my body. I could hardly descend from that high cabin of the tanker and I was almost dizzy and light headed from Nikitia’s, heavy and non-stop smoking, all the way. I dared not say a word, as the man was obviously a coarse and tough creature.

The smell of crude oil was overwhelming. With each breath, I felt my lungs were clogging and that my chest was compressed and squashed. A face mask would do nothing and be of no help.

Nikitia parked his tanker in the parking area and there was some ten minutes walk to the reception. Needless to mention that he did not offer to help with the suitcase, he just indicated the direction of the office where I should report. My only hope was that the people in the oil fields were not, in any way, another example of Nikitia.

When I presented myself to the lady in charge of the personnel, I asked her if I could have something to drink and to eat. At least she showed some humanity and told me that I could go to the canteen or as it was, a self-service restaurant and could take any item or items with one voucher. I was given ample vouchers in Minsk. I drank some coloured warm liquid marked tea. I had no idea what it was but I drank it anyway as I was very thirsty and I also had two sandwiches. One was cheese, I believe, and the other I could not tell if it was fish, meat, or chicken, but I ate them nevertheless. I was still thirsty and wanted to drink water from the tap, but the waiter (or the chef, I could not tell,) advised me not to drink tap water and he gave me a bottle of mineral water instead which I gulped down greedily in a flash.

I felt a bit better after these ‘nourishing’ sandwiches and returned to the reception room to see what was in store for me. The lady I wanted to catch sight of , the one I met before my meal, suddenly disappeared and I had to wait for two whole hours to find out where my room was, and what I was supposed to do now or tomorrow, I had no clue whatsoever. I could not leave that office, just in case she returned. There was no one to talk to or ask questions.

The office block contains hundreds, literally hundreds of cubicles or divisions, each with a door and glass windows, but I noticed, when I returned from the canteen, that the majority were empty - no tables or chairs, just a small electric wire dangling from the ceiling with a bulb attached to it. I passed at least forty of these cubicles or offices, and all were totally bare.

Two hours later, the lady re-appeared , but I was asleep, I could not help it. I did apologize but she paid no attention to me and to what I said.

“I am Olga and I am responsible for the staff accommodations only,” she said.
I presented the letter addressed to the oil field in Novosibirsk , she read it and then asked me to bring the suitcase and follow her. It took about twenty to twenty five minutes to reach the sleeping quarters of the staff. I asked Olga if I could have my own room, “only senior employees have their own private rooms and you will share one room, a big one, with other three members of the staff.” Olga was a typical trade union type and obviously a member of the party so she had to follow the instructions to the letter.

I was allocated room No.731 which was on the third floor, in the middle of a long badly lit hallway. In that hallway there were at least 100 rooms on each side and it was difficult to find the room number without proper lighting. Olga was equipped with a powerful, and heavy-duty torch. Then, I realised why she was absent from her office for two hours, it was because of the distances between her office and the dormitories.

At last, we reached room 731. It was not locked and I noticed that there was no lock in the door anyway, just a handle from the outside and one from the inside. The room had no character and no soul. Barren and sterile, but at least clean, no dust or cobwebs. The walls were white or perhaps off-white, I could not focus properly and the colour of the walls was my least anxiety. There were four beds, each with a mattress, a sheet, one pillow and two blankets. There was a small tall cupboard near each bed. Each cupboard had four shelves. There was no space to hang long clothing, such as a coat or suits (it seems that no one wears such outfits in any case).
Olga told me that there were fourteen bathrooms in the hallway and tomorrow, I should collect from the supply section of this floor the proper clothing and many other items, like towels, rubber boots, etc. Each floor had a supply room and I should be in contact with them after breakfast. I was so weary and worn-out I could not pay any attention to what was said and I just wanted to hit the bed. I took a quick shower and went to bed. It was around nine in the morning when I woke up and noticed that I was still alone in the room, and no one had slept in any of the other beds.
I was hungry and my body needed a good substantial breakfast and very quickly.
To my utter bewilderment, I could hardly see any other people around, although there were hundreds of rooms in that building. I went to the first floor and asked someone if he could tell me how to reach the dining room, he pointed out the direction of the canteen. It took me a good twenty minutes to reach the self service eating place, that being the ‘official’ name. I presented one voucher and helped myself to coffee (or substance of coffee) with some lukewarm water, some bread, cheese, hard boiled egg, and some cabbage leaves. After breakfast I managed to trace back my way to the office. There was a lady there and I asked if I could have a word with Olga. She told me her name was Valantina, and that Olga would be back in two days time. When I asked her what I was supposed to be doing in this place and when would I start working and what would be my task, she replied, “you will be contacted in due course.”

So, I went back to my room passing by the supply section, collected two towels, rubber boots, some toiletries, soap, and a variety of clothing. I put all these into the cupboard and went out quickly as I could not bear to be on my own in that room.

I started wandering around in the hope of finding someone somewhere who could shed a light about this place. I could not go to the actual oil fields, as I needed special protective clothing, a distinctive hat and above all, a permit to enter the gate. Even if that was possible, a labourer would not know much.

I went to the main entrance of the compound and chatted with the caretaker or the gate keeper and according to what he told me, the management had flown to Moscow for a conference and there was no one of real authority at present. When will they be back, I asked, “no idea” he replied. How many in the management, one, two or ten people. He said there was only one and we called him the management.

What was I supposed to do until the management returned from their (or his) conference?, I could not answer my own question. I went back to the caretaker and asked him if there were any leisure facilities, clubs, pubs, or cinemas, swimming pool, a gym, etc. He mentioned that there were some in the city of Novosibirsk , which is about 10 miles from here. I asked him for his name and he told me it was Dimitri . “Dimitri, what do you do after your daily six or seven hours of work,” I enquired. He responded that, most of the days, he stayed here and possibly once a week he went to Novosibirsk , if there was a transport available from this plant. For the return journey from Novosibirsk , he had to use either the public bus, which was hopeless and totally unreliable, or he paid for a private cab.

I asked Dimitri, what his job was, apart from checking people’s identities, and he told me that he also checked the papers of all the tankers when loaded with crude oil, that is, the number of barrels, the destinations and the consignees. He always kept a copy of the ‘authorization for sale ’ in his office.

I have been now three days in this place, and still I do not know what my job should be or who and when and by whom I will be contacted to start working.

All of a sudden and out of the blue, an idea, a wicked one I must say, started to ferment in my head, and that was how to sell crude oil from this plant and benefit from the sale personally. The supply was there, the tankers were there, so all I needed to do was to ‘enlist’ one or more drivers, befriend Dimitri, the gatekeeper, and ensure that a ‘certain tanker’ or tankers, can leave the plant with no papers or no ‘authorization for sale. ’

Of course, I could not develop this idea any further without first-hand knowledge of where the oil was stored after being extracted from the well, how to register and who with the quantity of each store, who would authorize the sale and to whom and at what rate. This was important because the price would differ if the oil was intended for the local market, or one of the satellite states, or to a non communist country such as Denmark, Finland, Sweden, or Norway.

I decided to sit in Dimitri's Office, and ‘examine’ all the ‘authorizations for sale ’ , making a note of the consignees, quantity they received, price, and so on.

I went to the canteen and bought a packet of cigarettes. Fortunately, there was one brand available and one box of matches. Also, I brought two sandwiches and went to Dimitri’s office. He did not have much to do at that moment and I offered him the cigarettes and one sandwich whilst asking him if he did not mind me sitting in his office, as I was bored with being on my own. Dimitri agreed and we were chatting on a variety of subjects including his family. He told me that he was married with two boys, nine and five, and they lived in Chelyabisk, some hundred and fifty miles north of Novosibirsk and that he saw them once every six weeks or two months.

I asked him if I could see some of the ‘authorization for sale ’ documents, just to ‘familiarize’ myself for when I would start working inside the plant. Dimitri did not mind and he did not think much of my request as, after all, I was an ‘employee’ of this plant. Amazingly, I did not feel I was an employee of this place and I felt more that I was totally remote and disconnected from this place. There were hundreds of oil fields in the Soviet Union but this one seemed to me neglected and deserted, and no one in the Kremlin seemed to pay any attention or interest about this particular one. I have been here for almost ten days, no one has called, no one has asked about me and no one could care less whether I worked or not.

I examined most of the ‘authorization for sale ’ documents for the past eight weeks and noticed that the majority of the shipments went to the neighbouring states of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, and all the shipments were via Kazakhstan. The latter have their own oil fields. Many shipments were made to Finland as well.

Dimitri asked me if I could stay in his office and look after his affairs for about half an hour to register who was coming and who was going as he had to be in his room. “I would be glad to help” was my reply.

As soon as he left, I made a note of all the consignees of the crude oil - their names, addresses, telephone numbers, the prices they paid, and the persons in charge of the purchasing departments.
When Dimitri returned, I had copied all I wanted to know. I asked him where could I find Nikitia, the driver of the tanker who brought me from the Omsk airport to this plant. “You can see him tomorrow morning in the transport depot.”

That evening, my thoughts were fidgety and on edge. I thought it over and over and I decided not to mention a word to Nikitia nor to Dimitri, until I knew the ‘modus operandi ’ of the oil field.

The odour of the crude oil started affecting my mood and possibly my health. I was eating less and sleeping more, which was uncharacteristic for me but there was nothing anyone could do. That repulsive and obnoxious odour was there all the time . I went to the office and spoke with Valantina to enquire if I could see a doctor and I mentioned to her in passing that I was still waiting to be assigned to my work.

The following day, a doctor examined me and gave me some pills. He told me that I would get used to the smell and that I should not worry too much, because it was not a health hazard to any one except those who suffer from asthma and, according to my records, I did not have that. I suppose the body would get used to this stinking and foul smell eventually.

In the afternoon, I went to the office to see Olga and she told me that the management (or the manager) of this plant, a Mr. Alex Lilinkov, would be in touch with me regarding my work. I was pleased to hear it as I was getting fed up, roaming around the place aimlessly. I wanted very much to see how the oil was extracted, stored, loaded into the tankers and then shipped to various customers. I wanted to know if the oil can be pumped out from the well without being registered, like pulling water from an ordinary well. I had to see the machine which took out the oil, to see if there was a meter which registered the quantity taken out. I was hoping that no such meter existed which would make things easier for what I was thinking and planning.

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