Chapter 10 Ingredients
"No, that doesn't just mean failure," the instructor said in a serious tone, "it also means that hundreds or thousands of soldiers may lose their precious lives. To them, you are a sinner."
This statement was a bit exaggerated, but Yuri also understood that in the Soviet Union at that time, even the smallest things could be exaggerated, so there was nothing strange about it.
"I'm sorry, instructor. I realize my mistake," Olga didn't dare to talk back to the instructor. She lowered her head and admitted her mistake honestly.
The instructor snorted and ignored her. She turned around and glanced at August again. Seeing that he looked unhappy, she didn't say anything to him. When her eyes turned to Yuri, she paused and said in a soothing tone: "You are Comrade Captain Yuri Arkhipovich, right? I know you. You are an outstanding officer recommended by the Leningrad Military District. It is said that you have made contributions in the war against the Finnish Nazis."
Yuri smiled but didn't respond.
"Since you are an outstanding officer, you should make your position clear," the instructor said, changing the subject. "You are still young. It is not wrong to pursue beautiful girls, but you should also know that some of these girls have very bad family backgrounds. If you hang out with them, it will only affect your future."
There was obviously a specific meaning in these words. Yuri was stunned and subconsciously glanced at Olga, only to find that the girl turned pale in an instant. Not only her, but also the faces of several female soldiers at the table with her looked very bad. It was obvious that the instructor's words had hit a sore spot.
"Okay, continue working," the instructor said no more. She glanced at the female soldiers, said something coldly, put her hands behind her back, and walked away on her own.
The atmosphere in the whole classroom became very strange. August obviously didn't expect such a thing to happen. He stood there looking a little stupid.
Although we don't know what's wrong with Olga and the others' backgrounds, since the instructor said so, there must be a problem. They are probably from rich peasant families, and they should be the rich peasants who were overthrown by the "Poor Peasants' Committee" around 1918. If they had any other backgrounds, they would not have the opportunity to join the army now.
Is their background sensitive? It's hard to say. If they were ordinary people, they wouldn't have to worry about anything, but young officers with great prospects like Yuri must think carefully. The key is that the Great Purge has not ended yet, and no one knows what the future political trend will be. If one day in the future, the Kremlin starts to talk about the rich peasant issue again, then continuing to associate with people like Olga will definitely cause endless troubles.
This might be the reason why August was stunned, but his daze had nothing to do with Yuri. As a man who had lived two lives, Yuri knew very well that Moscow was no longer in the mood to continue to deal with the problem of rich peasants, because the war was coming soon. And according to the memory of the previous life, from the 1930s until decades after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the entire Soviet Union seemed to have no longer been entangled in the problem of rich peasants.
Looking at Olga's pale face, Yuri coughed and reached out to take a piece of cable from the table. This should be a scrapped telephone line, with many damaged outer skins. Olga and the others were probably practicing making a T-shaped joint on the telephone line.
"Is your job to practice making T-joints?" Yuri picked up the cable and took a look at it, then laughed, "Olia, it doesn't take you six minutes to make a joint? That's really too slow."
In these words, Yuri did not continue to call her "Olga", but used a close nickname, which made Olga's eyes brighten up, whose face was pale.
"Ah, ah, yes, yes, it is indeed a bit slow," August also woke up from his initial astonishment. He interrupted with some embarrassment, "Well, but, in my opinion, this is already very good. If it were me, I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to do it in an hour."
The female soldiers around were silent, obviously they had not yet recovered from the blow.
"There are actually some skills to making this kind of T-shaped joint," Yuri said as he lowered his head and searched for pliers, "but the most important skill is to practice more and more. Practice makes perfect."
As he said this, Yuri used a pair of pliers to plier the outer skin of the thick cable, pulled out the wires inside, and took a section of the prepared thin cable, cut a circle with the sharp edge of the pliers, pinched it with his fingers, and pulled off the outer skin of the thin cable. Then he connected the wires, twisted them tightly, and quickly wrapped them with insulating tape several times, wrapping the entire T-shaped joint tightly.
It is estimated that this whole process would not take more than 1 and a half minutes. The movements were so skillful that the female soldiers nearby were stunned.
"I haven't made this thing for a long time, so my hands are a little rusty." After finishing the joint, Yuri handed the cable to Olga and said with a smile, "Try it and see if it's strong."
Olga took the cables in a trance, grabbed the two cables with both hands, and pulled them hard twice. The joints were very strong, and even though she used some force, the two cables were still tightly bonded together.
"How could you do this?" Olga couldn't help asking, curiosity overcoming the blow she had just received.
Of course, Yuri would not say that he had practiced this in his previous life. He just smiled and explained: "I am an orphan. I have learned almost everything since I was a child."
"I'm sorry," Olga apologized.
"That's nothing," Yuri said with a smile, reaching out to take the cable. "In fact, no one can decide their own origins. We can't even change all the innate things. However, we can still work hard. As long as we work hard, we can change a lot of things and prove a lot of things, isn't it?"
"Yes, yes, that's what I wanted to say," August nodded repeatedly and responded.
"Well," Yuri waved the cable in his hand, glanced at the faces of the people at the table, and said with a smile, "Would you like to learn from me? I'm a very good instructor."
Everyone nodded hurriedly. In fact, for Olga and the others, learning was secondary. The key point was that they could find a sense of closeness from Yuri's attitude, which was really rare for them.
Since he has decided to teach students, Yuri will not keep it secret. After all, this is not a great skill. It just includes a few small tricks. In fact, as long as you practice diligently, anyone can find these small tricks.
After two simple demonstrations, Olga began to try her hand, while Yuri was responsible for correcting her. It can be seen that this time, the female soldiers, including Olga, were much more serious.
As Olga and the others were able to do it themselves, Yuri's attention was diverted from this boring exercise. He suddenly thought of a problem that he almost missed - the T-shaped wire clamp.
That's right, in the era when he lived in, communications soldiers still had to practice manual wiring techniques, but this technique was for emergency use. When it came to actually making T-shaped joints, the simple and convenient T-shaped wire clamp was undoubtedly the real weapon.
Yuri couldn't remember when the T-shaped wire clamp appeared, but one thing he was sure of was that it probably didn't exist in this era.
The T-shaped wire clamp is not only easy to use, but also simple to make. To put it simply, it is just two pieces of iron plates with grooves, which can be screwed together or equipped with a tooth groove for biting.
Yuri knew that small inventions like this could not be exchanged for money in the Soviet Union, but they could be exchanged for a certain honor, and in this country, honor was often more important than money.
Yuri started to associate the invention of the T-shaped wire clip with other things. He thought he could bring some inventions that appeared in later generations. But he didn't need to think about things like the atomic bomb and AK47. He thought he didn't have the ability to do that because he had never come into contact with them in his previous life.
Is there something that does not exist now but will appear after the war? And you have to understand it, or at least be able to explain it. Yuri began to rack his brains to think about this problem.
"Pa pa pa"
The sudden applause interrupted Yuri's thoughts. The one who clapped was the instructor. She stood on the podium , looked around the classroom expressionlessly, and said in a cold tone: "This is the end of this morning's class. Dismissed!"
"Great, it's finally over," August whispered, "Hey, I hate this woman, do you feel the same way?"
The woman he was talking about was the instructor on the podium. Everyone understood what he meant, but no one dared to interrupt.
"Let's go. We have a lot to do for the party tonight," Yuri ignored him and said to himself, "But the first thing to do is to finish lunch. Girls, do you have any good suggestions?"
“Maybe we can go to the supply station,” August said.
"Let's go to Gasem's first," Domicheva said hesitantly in a low voice, "we can buy some macaroni and cabbage."
Gasem's store is the only state-owned store in Zagorsk, or, to be more precise, the only store open to everyone.
"I have all of these, but not in such large quantities," August muttered.
"Then let's go to Gasem's store first," Yuri said, "We can also buy some fruits. Yes, I have potatoes and frozen meat, enough for several people."
Several people walked out while talking. After they walked out of the classroom and along the school corridor for a while, Olga, who had been silent all this time, suddenly spoke up: "My father was a rich peasant. Twenty years ago, when I was just born, my family was exiled to Siberia. But that's all in the past. Now, my family has joined the collective farm, and my father was named the farm's 'Stakhanov Model' last year."
