Part One – There
(Eastern Hemisphere)
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR – PHYSFAC. FIRST YEAR. EVENTS
In the first week of September, senior students came to see us between lectures. They were looking for “talents” – athletes, artists, musicians for competitions, amateur performances and… for a new for me phenomenon in the life named “Physicist Day”. It was such a student holiday. But what exactly meant the word “was”? It was not official holiday, we organized it ourselves. And what was done on their own in the Soviet Union was considered something “not quite legal” and looked like a dangerous thing – freedom. Of course, nonconformity and dissidence was allowed only at the level of humor. But it was at least a drop against the sea of organized actions in support of one’s own government and a foreign government protests. For example, against Israel and emigration – “And now, the group of trained Jews under the control of General Dragunsky will perform in front of you!”
A year earlier, senior students visited Moscow for the well-known holiday of MSU physicists “The Day of Archimedes”. Fascinated by the metropolitan students’ freedom of speech, they decided to organize something similar at TSU.
“What is your skills?” they asked me.
“I played CFI – Club of the Funny and Inventive people,” I replied, remembering my camp humor lessons.
And – it started! For ten whole years I stewed in this humorous juice – five student years and five years after graduation. I wrote humorous reprises, stories, plays, published a wall newspaper, acted in performances, composed and sang songs. It was a celebration of the soul. But, I will honestly say that the time and efforts spent on humor could be spend in another area, for example, professional or scientific.
Sasha was not drawn to humor or amateur performances. But he successfully used the time saved on these activities, spending it on his favorite mathematics. As for hobbies… He also found a hobby. It was called Sonya.
On the very first day of student life, Sasha came to me after the lectures, although his visits to my home were rare. Not only was he embarrassed to visit, but also the investigator on the street once interrogated him,
“Where is their dad? Does he send money, calls (and we didn’t have a phone)? How does he communicate with his family?”
This was enough for him for a long time… Therefore, I usually called Sasha, we met and walked along the streets of the old city, discussing life. But this time was special, there was nowhere to call, and Sasha was eager to share important news with me.
“What classes did you have?” I asked.
“Different, but I sat down closer to one girl.”
“What girl?”
“Well, so… tall and … charming, like in the movie “Once again about love.”
Sasha really liked this movie, and especially its beginning, in which an unattractive, but smart hero, a scientist, energetically gets acquainted with a catchy and inaccessible-looking woman. Apparently, Sasha identified himself with the hero, in any case, he watched this film not just once, although he was not a fan of melodrama.
That is how, unexpectedly for myself, on September 1, 1969, I became not just a first-year student at the Department of Physics, but also the chief of staff for capturing Sonya’s attention, and Sasha, of course, was the commander in chief. To be honest, he didn’t need any advice. He himself developed the operations and only ran them in, discussing them in details with me.
One of the first operations was called “Opera”. Sasha decided to invite Sonya to the opera house. But, as they say, “It is easiest way to cross the border in a crowd,” and Sasha decided to create, if not a crowd, then at least a support group. Eli and I formed this group.
I think that for everyone, it was the first independent visit to the opera. Of course, all schoolchildren were at the opera house during the mandatory trips to Sunday afternoon performances on a school subscription. I remember that once I took my sister to the ballet Sleeping Beauty by Tchaikovsky, interbreeded with locally produced Little Red Riding Hood. Innovation, on the “red” theme, apparently, was approved. But alas, in the orchestra pit, in parallel with the work, they celebrated the birthday of the first violin and drank along the way of performance.
As a result, as soon as the wolf was about to swallow the grandmother, the initial beats of the hunters’ exit were heard. Naturally, the hunters jumped out onto the stage and, despite the plaintive pirouettes of the wolf, shot him.
“Idiots!” shouted the wolf and died.
The children were delighted with such an unexpected interpretation of Perrault’s fairy tale. And the adults had fun too.
Eli visited the opera many times, his older half-brother was a conductor, and Sasha was often taken there by his mother, a teacher at a professional music school. But, independently as adults, none of us showed up there yet. On a solemn occasion, I put on a bow tie for the first time in my life. I like it even now.
I remember very well how we went that evening to see an opera “Rigoletto” with Zurab Anjaparidze in the role of a jester. Sasha said to his group of support,
“When they start kidnaping Gilda and turn off the light, I will kiss her.”
Of course, Sonya, and not Gilda. Eli and I sat without taking our eyes off the stage, and Sasha – from Sonya. But as soon as the lights went out, all our attention turned to the couple in front of us. Suddenly, a strong wooden knock was heard on the stage. “Kidnappers” accidentally dropped on the floor the sack, where instead of Gilda was a wooden board. Laughter shook the walls of the opera house. The spectators, musicians, singers – everybody laughed. Among them was our four. Now, kisses were out of place… They had to be postponed.
But we all have been in love with opera since then.
Most of all in the first semester I remember “Physicist Day”. For its grand opening, I prepared humor telegrams. Jokes were based mostly on homophones. For example, the telegram from the children’s book character Mother Hen read, “I am rushing to the Physicist Day!”
The joke was concluded in homophones: Rush and Lay (eggs) sound the same.
A huge crowd of students and passers-by, gathered in front of the entrance to the second building of the old university, greeted the organizers and guests of the fun holiday. Even my unpretentious jokes, sounded all over the avenue, were something unusual for that still spooky time.
We met with great enthusiasm the delegations of three Moscow main Institution – our leaders in physics and recreation. How many jokes and songs they brought to our city! Why, do you think, did we have a student theater of miniatures at our physics department, or why did I start playing the guitar?
But even simple communication between students of different cultures is very valuable. In the evening, having met the first guests at the airport, we fraternize with them, treating them to hot Georgian bread from the clay stove, cooked sausages and cheap wine. And they, having found grace-filled listeners, sing enthusiastically Kukin, Klyachkin, Okudzhava, Vysotsky. Truly, “Gaudeamus Igitur!”
One of the Moscow guests, Viktor, asks his new Georgian friends,
“And now you sing.”
And the national polyphony shvidkatsa (six men) sounds.
“Are you a choir?” Victor is amazed.
“No, these are family table traditions,” Gogi explains.
“Happy people! In your movies you sing the same songs as at the table; and we sing at the table what we have in movies! Gogi, can you say a real Georgian toast, I want to remember it.”
Gogi nods in agreement, and thinks for a moment.
“Here is a toast in honor of the guest. I want you to die!”
Everyone falls silent in surprise.
“And to be buried in a coffin made of a hundred-year-old oak, which you and I will plant tomorrow.”
Furor! Shouts, applause, hugs. The feast continues. And after a while, when the degree of intoxication increases, another delegation tumbles in, and then – “a victory day” comes! And Victor yells,
“I h-have such a w-wonderful toast to s-say! Wh-who is the co-commander?”
“I am!” boldly replies tall blond student with a guitar.
“L-listen! I w-want you to d-die!”
Guests understood that this is some kind of joke, not an insult by our approving smiles and winks.
“And to b-bury you in a c-coff-in made out of a h-hundred-year-old oak, w-hic, s-sorry, w-which you and I will c-cut down to-morrow!”
I made an interesting acquaintance. We traveled with the guests in the bus on an excursion. I talked with the Baku delegation:
“My mother is from Baku. I went there as a child and remember the city.”
“And my mother has a friend from the institute who lives here,” said the big-nosed guy, but I did not have time to get her address from my mother.
“My mother has a girlfriend there, his mother has a girlfriend here, it’s interesting, but you can’t draw any conclusions yet,” I thought and noticed,
“It’s not a problem, all Tbilisians are familiar to each other. Give me the name of a friend, and I’ll ask around right here, on the bus.”
“Wow-wow-wow! On the bus! These physicists think that everything in nature is determined!”
“What does “these physicists” mean? And who are you?”
“Dima and I are philologists, but from the CFI team of the city of Baku. We were taken to enhance the physics department’s humor. As for the last name… few people know her maiden name, but by the name of her husband, indeed, I can find out the address at the information desk.”
At the word “philologist”, my heart skipped a beat, since both the husband and the son of Aunt Ada, my mother’s Baku friend, were philologists and journalists.
“Do you know your mother’s girlfriend husband’s last name?”
“Certainly! Neiman!”
“Then you don’t have to inquire at the address desk. I know her address perfectly. But not only that. I know what your name is. Are you Bertie?”
Then it was time for the students from Baku to be amazed, because usually everyone called their friend Bert, although according to his passport he was Bertie.
“And you are..?”
“Nick!”
“Ha-ha-ha! Nicka with the open “mout”.
“Yes it’s me!”
I knew well this phrase of two-year-old Bertie, who saw two-month-old Nick yawning widely in a carriage. We hugged.
More than forty years have passed since then, and Bertie is still my best Baku friend, although he lives in Israel, and I live in the States.
The first semester was spent in the works on the study of higher mathematics, which we did not encounter in our mathematical class. It’s a pity. The transition to supreme school (University) would have been easier. At first, I even thought that I entered the university too early, all these epsilon-delta arguments were so unusual for me. But the beauty of the university was that it gradually taught us a lot.
Associate Professor Pandekov, “Whoever says who Ulysses is will get an “automat” (word for the automatic credit without the final test).
Everyone really wants to get an automatic credit in math analysis, but they are silent, only the super-read Eli shouts out, “It’s Odysseus!”
Pandekov, obviously not expecting to meet an expert on Greek culture in the audience, finds a witty way out, because an automat is a name not just of automatic credit, but a machine gun also,
“Well done! You’ll get an automat at the military department, and if you don’t pass higher mathematics, they will give it out to you in the army!”
Everyone laughs, but at the same time they remember Ulysses, and someone will even read James Joyce…
In addition to fleeting encounters with culture, we have regular lectures and seminars on history. Alas, on the history of the Communist Party of the USSR. But even in the study of this controversial political subject, there was a charm, because we were required to read primary sources. And we, at least the most stubborn and persistent, went to the department of the history of the CPSU and rummaged through books, sometimes old and insufficiently edited by censors, and bit by bit discover the truth for ourselves. The fact that the Bolsheviks, was the name of a party minority (Bolshe- means more, bigger); the full text of Lenin’s secret letter to the Communist party congress; and the identical date of death for communists of an entire group…
We had lectures together with philologists. This is a lot of beautiful girls, and a different vision of the world. How amazing!
We were all taught by Bezhanova, a stocky middle-aged woman with a bleached mustache and masculine irrepressible energy. She was clearly missing a Mauser at her belt.
From the very first seminars, repulsive forces arose between us. She lied, as befits a true communist, and I, as best as I could, stood up for the truth dug up from the old books. And our secret confrontation led to the fact that in my first year I lost an excellent diploma. It was like a rape, which happened like follows.
The university was supposed to get at least a little knowledge of the history of physics. Not a bad idea. Not the wide approach, just Soviet physics. It also fits! But the subject was not included in the curriculum, teachers were not paid, and only a couple of seminars were allocated at the expense of the party history course.
Bezhanova announced,
“Prepare reports on outstanding Soviet physicists. Everyone will make a short message, and friends will criticize them.”
I immediately had a plan. Since the state policy of the USSR in connection with the war in Israel was anti-Semitic, and the popular opinion in Georgia, accustomed to fighting the conquerors, on the contrary, supported the small nation in opposition to the many times superior forces of neighboring enemies, reports on outstanding Jewish physicists would sound like a kind of protest to official Brezhnev policy.
In high school, I picked up a good library of popular science literature, including biographies of various scientists. Among the famous Soviet physicists, Jews clearly stood out. And I suggested to my friends books and materials for reports about famous Soviet Jewish physicists. Everyone, except for Oleg, who was not accepted at Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, agreed. It was not that he was shy or opposed, but he decided, as a resident of Georgia, to tell about a good Georgian physicist, whose name none of the physics students even heard.
And then what? The seminar was going on, everyone reported, but somehow dimly – mostly works and discoveries. And others praised the speakers – also in standard, in the Young Communist’s way. And here it came to “Papa Ioffe”, so to speak, the father of the Soviet school of experimental physicists. And again – achievements and praise for the short report. I could not hold myself. I took the floor and said, despite the fact that the report belonged to my friend Ethel Greenberg, who soon, the very first of all my friends would emigrate from the country,
“To talk about Abram Fedorovich like that is like not talk at all. What kind of person was he? Extremely polite and modest, not allowing himself any ridicule or irony in relation to much less titled colleagues and even students. And how many physicists he saved from repression, fearlessly turning to Stalin himself! Isn’t it a civil courage?!”
The dead silence stood in the audience.
“Well,” said Bezhanova, “This is a wonderful addition to the portrait of a scientist. But I would advise you, Neiman, to follow the example of Abram Fedorovich and be more modest in relation to colleagues.”
But I felt like I was struck by a thunderbolt. I already couldn’t stop.
“And I’m taking an example from Lenin, who, for the sake of principles, even broke off relations with his teacher Plekhanov!”
Bezhanova had nothing to parry with. She said,
“Integrity is an important weapon of the party. I think everyone will be convinced of this more than once.”
Her words were prophetic. In the summer at the exam in the history of the CPSU, I felt it in my own skin. Before I had time to pull out a ticket and sit down at a desk to think about the answer, Bezhanova called me to answer without preparation. It was against the rules, and my friend Zalessky at the next desk had his jaw dropped.
But I did not argue – the ticket was good.
“So,” said Bezhanova, “The first question – “Exposing the personality cult at the XX Party Congress.” Any schoolboy will answer such an easy question, and you Neiman with your erudition and knowledge of primary sources – even more so. We believe that your mark for this question is 5 (A).
Zalessky turned pale, as if he himself had been exposed.
Bezhanova continued:
“The second question – “The victorious march of the Soviet Army from Moscow to Berlin.” Take a pointer, Neiman, and show a victorious trajectory on the map.”
“What a bitch! She picked up physicists’ terms! Well, to die, than to die with music,” I decided and drew a sinusoid – first a hump, and then a depression, connecting Moscow with Berlin.
“In principle, it is true, but in essence – not,” said the teacher.
She took the pointer from me and drew her sinusoid – first a depression, and then a hump, connecting the two capitals.
Zalessky turned green, he felt sick.
“For the second question, your mark is 2 (D), and on average… three points (C). Quite satisfactory.”
“Give me better a deuce,” I said, since three points in the diploma immediately deprived me of the right to the diploma with honors, and a deuce could be retaken.
“But that would be dishonest. We didn’t have any disagreements with the cult of personality. And we are people of principle, aren’t we?”
I really wanted to add “Lavrentiy Pavlovich”, but Zalessky already was throwing up even without it.
I approached my first student summer with unprecedented results. I learned the spiritual freedom of student life, began to write humorous stories and miniatures, to play the guitar, to compose songs; I mastered higher mathematics, survived the principles of real communists at the cost of little blood – my red (excellent) diploma and, finally, like Sasha, I fell in love.
It happened like this. Sonya’s birthday was at the beginning of summer. Of course, Sasha, thanks to his perseverance, dispersed all Sonya’s cavaliers and was her main guest. And with him was I. And with me was Eli. And also several University mates from the Mekhmat – my old friends from the Mathematical Olympiad in Kyiv. But one guest, Eteri, was a Sonia’s classmate from an unknown to us uptown high school. I just walked her home after the party and… it started. Actually, nothing but our meetings and walks began. We didn’t even kiss. Every time I tried to hug Eteri, she gently pulled away and whispered,
“Wait, not yet. I’m not ready yet.”
And I respectfully retreated. It never crossed my mind to use some kind of force or give free rein to my hands in search of erogenous zones, although I remembered from the fifth grade Tanya’s advice on where to touch so that “no woman could refuse.” Eteri usually kissed me on the cheek and ran home.
During the day I did practice in the workshops of the university, and in the evenings we walked along the streets, squares, parks. The practice lasted only one month. At this time, I again turned on the genes of my grandfather-craftsman; I helped the master to produce parts for some kind of experiment, until I finally realized that he was making a revolver. Then I understood that the weapon is not so difficult and imagined that, if necessary, I could at least repair it. But I still didn’t want to use firearms. My “Walter” languished, immured in the kitchen wall. Well, violence was clearly foreign to my nature.
At the weekend we took long walks; I took “my child” – my little sister with us and we went to the botanical garden. Our relationship with Eteri remained extremely chaste, but she was the first girl who gave me a real adult gift – a belt made of deerskin covered with animal hair, on which hung a small but very sharp hunting knife in a furry leather sheath. It was impossible to kill a deer with such a knife, but it was easy to skin or bleed it. Much later, after reading Freud’s psychoanalytic books, I realized what message this gift carried and what bloodshed it called for.
Eteri’s message that she was getting married was painful and incomprehensible to me. So, my girlfriend had some kind of parallel life with meetings and kisses, because it’s impossible to get married by mail, and even more so, to give birth to your first child seven months after that.
For a whole week since our last meeting, I sniffed my palm and smelled the scent of Eteri’s perfume, until I finally figured out its true origin. This was my mother’s perfume, with which, in the absence of alcohol or vodka, I washed off the ink and paste from my hands, soiled during repair of fountain pens.
With the insight came the healing.
But, apparently, according to some conservation law not yet discovered in nature, for every “positive” phenomenon there is its own “negative” one. I started smoking. I mean smoke regularly like an adult, not beg for cigarettes. Even in the first year, we, unexpectedly for ourselves, discovered that the school persecution of tobacco and cigarettes was suddenly in the past. Students were allowed to smoke where the ashtrays stood. After each lecture, a crowd of people gathered near them, like savages for initiation, celebrating their growing up with fire and smoke.
However, for me, as for many others, it was just a game. In Georgia, in general, it was customary to treat even strangers with cigarettes. To ask a cigarette and to smoke was not difficult at all. But nicotine does its job. You gradually want to ask more and more often, and you move from classmates to random passers-by. One of them, just in the summer, after practice in workshops and the break with Eteri, taught me a life lesson.
“Do you have a smoke?” I politely addressed a well-dressed gray-haired man.
“Yes, of course,” he exclaimed, fumbling in the pockets of his sandy viscose jacket and, to my surprise, pulled out a small change – thirty kopecks,
“Have it, young man. I understand that you have no money, but, you want to smoke, anyway. Well, take it, take it,” he dismissed my protesting gestures, “A donation to the poor is a much more worthy thing than alms to a beggar. It helps, not corrupts.”
And it seemed to dawn on me: if I, an adult, who knows how to earn money, then why am I behaving like a whining child?
After that, I started buying cigarettes myself and smoking “officially”.
So, I was healed from a romantic affair, start smocking and… barely escaped a real illness. That summer, the cholera epidemic captured the south of the USSR. It also touched Tbilisi, but the cases were sporadic, they were quickly localized and a fire was not allowed to break out.
My classmates, Borya Bichikashvili and tall Vovka, just returned from Russia. Both, alas, flew out of their universities. Borya thanks to the philosophical calmness, with which he learned to drink ten or twelve mugs of beer, and Vovka, on the contrary, thanks to the excitement, in which he plunged the faculty girls until he got in touch with the dean’s daughter.
In this glorious company of our classmates, who have matured in Russia, and their complaisant girlfriends, we went to the botanical garden and did not think of anything better than to win over the girls with our crazy courage. We drank water from a stream that flowed in a cholera city! And the girls did appreciate our courage! In turn.
Later, Borya and I marveled at our own recklessness.
“It’s like a Russian roulette,” I wondered.
“Sure,” Borya calmly stated, “Sveta was treated for gonorrhea five times, and Varya seven times.”
But, apparently, the drum of the revolver, which I produced in the university workshop, spun in my youthful fingers as if it were at one with me. I never got sick with cholera or gonorrhea.
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