Helper1

For reference: Helpers are a profession that gained popularity after perestroika. Russian citizens, who mostly live near the Chinese border, can, for a nominal fee of one hundred to two hundred rubles (depending on the season), relax in China and purchase the necessary things. As a payment on the way back, tourists are invited to drag a bag weighing thirty-five kilograms across the border. Helping is an illegal profession. Officially, this is called "economy tour". Mostly, women go as helpers. Where the bags are taken and what lies in them, the helpers are not interested. Their task is to drag the bags across the border, passing off the goods that are in the bags as their own, if the border guards arrange a check. The nightmare begins if tourists from four or five groups are going to cross the border at the same time: in each group there are at least fifteen to twenty people. Each person, in addition to helping cargo, has three or four more bags of his own. And the drive is very small and cramped. Crossing the border can last from five hours to two or three days. God forbid at this moment ordinary tourists, who do not belong to the “helper” tribe, are impatient to cross the border. And also helpers are people whom others around all the time “load” with their problems. People who, due to their timidity or innate delicacy, simply cannot say “No!”.

CHAPTER ONE

Messed up bags

- Listen, Kalina! Everyone, relax and don't move! There ahead of the group with the goods arrested! All bags are wrapped back to China! Now the demolition starts!

- Well, everything! It's still two hours away! Listen, what time will we be home? Now in Chinese it's three, in ours it's five o'clock, and we haven't even started crossing the border yet!

- Don't drift, girlfriend, everything ends sometime! Why are you so red?

- Look at yourself! I have only three sweaters, two dresses and a jacket under my fur coat, but how many fur coats are you wearing? Too bad there's no mirror!

- Laugh, laugh! I’ll return home, I’ll sell fur coats, I’ll be with fat, and what will you sell? Three sweatshirts? Well, why are you silent? No, girlfriend, I don’t like you today, you are silent and all red!

- Yes, everything is fine!

No, it's not normal, I can see it! You…

“Tan, don’t shout like that, they’ve already begun to look around!” Well, it's hot, well, the temperature, but what to do? If they find out, they won't let you go home at all! Take it easy!

- Do you want some candy? While you were choosing tea, I was watching two aunts. While the Chinese were fussing around you, his aunts dug two pockets of sweets right from the counter! And also a walnut! They have patch pockets sewn inside their jackets!

"And you didn't do anything?"

— How nothing? Here, I bought candy! Specially for you! And if you are talking about these aunts ... I think everyone lives as they see fit! And it's not for you and me to judge them. Nothing, the Chinese will not get poorer from this! Look, what a settlement - Sunfenhe - on our helpers' torments in seventeen years they reclaimed it. After all, I remember when I was just starting to transport goods, it was a village with a railway station and two shops. The tents were still standing under the awnings, and there was mud, impassable mud! And now, look, in every small store there is an escalator and ... Kalina, what are you doing?

When Kalina came to her senses, it turned out that she was sitting in the shade, in the air. To avoid problems, the head of the group gave Kalina as a pregnant woman. Customs officers did not understand. And who needs it when the sea of ;;;;helpers is noisy and indignant around, when, due to the abundance of bags, there is nowhere to put your foot, and the phone is broken, and the voices of authority threaten with all punishments if the arrested cargo does not go further to its destination. Compared to Tatyana, Kalina's experience as a helper was short, only six months. The trips were hard, but a month passed, and Kalina was going on the road again, forgetting about the previous difficulties. Of course, she did not travel for pleasure, this business brought at least some additional income to the family of a single woman raising a schoolboy son.

A stir began in the camp of the helpers. Kalina woke up from her thoughts, Tatyana ran to her.

- Woke up!? Come on, hurry up! And then the Vladkoles group is rushing ahead of us!

- Where are my bags?

- There, in a heap! Yes, do not be afraid, I did not take my eyes off them! Let's go slowly!

- And what, how many groups have already passed?

— Two. Let's go quickly!

- Went. Wait, what is this aunt doing with young girls? Can intervene?

- Beats them! Don't you see what? She has some kind of business of her own, and she hired these girls, and they got drunk! It is necessary to drag bags, but they do not knit bast! Who would have dragged them across the border! Let's go! You won't be good at everything!

The human sea was agitated, pulled together by the tight frames of the reservoir. Entering the stuffy room, Kalina swayed, but, overcoming dizziness, moved through the human jungle to her group, constantly stepping on her feet and slipping on her bags. They let her through very reluctantly, if not for Tatyana, Kalina would have been stomping around the front doors.

Approaching the group, Kalina saw that the head of her group was arguing with the head of the Vladkoles group. Both women got so excited that steam was clearly coming from them. The dispute was about which groupand will go first, the stage of intelligent conversations was already over and both women switched to direct text.

- Wait your turn! You carry people across the border with mine, then you will be the first to pass! We were the first to get off the bus!

- It's still necessary to see who is the first! There, our bag lies! Lies evenly, but where are your bags? Behind! Natasha, your bag? So get up ahead, what are you squeezing!

- What Natashka, what does your Natashka have to do with it, don’t you see that this is the bag of our group?!!! The handle is tied with a red ribbon!

- It's our bags tied with red ribbon! And you…

Kalina swayed, unlike the comrades, with burning eyes, listening to every word of their leader, she was not up to the showdown at the moment. Her task was not to be disconnected during the long-awaited border crossing.

Helpers from both groups crowded around the leaders and cheered with shouts and exclamations of two women, ready to meet in hand-to-hand combat.

“It’s not for you to sit as a secretary with the boss!” There are rules here and there is nothing to climb forward!

- What, did you remember the Soviet times? And I also remember something! I remember how you were in the store behind the counter shouting “Do not borrow for sausage!” And in the back room...

— What a sausage, what a store! What are you talking about?

The business lady finally dragged her two deranged assistants along with their bags and it was the turn of another group. But the aunts, heated up by the dispute, would have yelled and raged for a long time, converging and dispersing in the middle of the living ring, if the customs officer had not stepped into the middle of the circle. The menacing shout of the representative of the border instantly cooled the heads of the arguing women, and after a few moments the tourists lined up one after another. The procedure of dragging bags and crossing the border began. Previously, Kalina easily coped with bags, but today, as if someone stuffed stones into an immense sack. In addition to the help bag, Kalina had five more of her own in her hands. Kalina began to feel sick and, if not for Tatyana, she would not have been able to overcome the path from the screening room to the bus. There was nowhere to sit on the bus, there was no room in the trunk, and therefore the remaining bags, and this was about ninety percent of all luggage, were piled directly on the passenger seats. The bags closed the white light, and the passengers made their way to the exit from the border territory in the dark and standing.

Clamped on all sides by tired and sweaty bodies, Kalina stood and repeated to herself that "never, never, never ..." again. She will never go as a helper again. But, as Tatyana said, everything ends, and after an hour Kalina was finally able to sit down and stretch her legs. The bus was going home. Bags loaded into the trailer were moving somewhere ahead. Everyone began to switch the clock to our time and call relatives and friends. After all, cell phones did not work at the border. The bus was buzzing. Kalina did not even turn on the phone. There was no one to call her. The only girlfriend was dozing in the next seat. The son was with his mother. And no one was waiting for Kalina at home.