Svanidze Galoshes
Tatiana Blayaslava had been standing in line since five o’clock in the morning.
It was in front of the state-owned shoe store on Nevsky Prospekt. There were about forty people ahead of her, and the line kept growing behind her as well.
— Thud, patter.
The rain had been falling and stopping intermittently, and the ground beneath her feet was already a sea of mud.
Tatiana was wearing galoshes lined with newspaper, but unfortunately, the newspaper had only been out for thirty minutes and was already soaked through like a sponge.
“Comrade, are you here to buy galoshes?”
The old man at the front of the line spoke to her.
“Ah… yes! I was going to buy them at the black market, but when I heard that stock had just arrived, I came to check once.”
She engaged in a short conversation with the old man in front of her.
“Five hundred pairs… Fortunately, everyone who has come so far can buy them!”
“Hoo hoo… That’s still lucky. If it weren’t for ‘that factory’, we proletarians would have been wearing newspaper-lined shoes to work today as well.”
“Proletariat… You speak the difficult words so directly, old man. Yet you don’t even button up the front of your coat.”
Tatiana reached out and buttoned up the old man’s coat front.
The old man smiled and replied.
“Hoo hoo… Thank you, young lady. Without anyone to button my coat for me after sending my wife off, I keep forgetting even small things.”
“If you just leave it because there’s no one to take care of it, you’d have to plan to live alone!”
“Plan to live?”
“Yes! After all, we’re going to live. Until the day we die!”
“… Hoo hoo, you’ve become quite the philosopher, old man.”
The old man smiled and said so.
“Seeing you reminds me of Yakov.”
“Is that your son’s name?”
“No. It’s just my employer’s name. Of course, not exactly an employer, but still called that.”
“Hmm……?”
The old man brushed down the spot he had buttoned with his hand.
It was like checking the place he had buttoned, or perhaps just because he had nowhere else to put his hands.
“By the way… Today, we’ll really be able to meet ‘that thing’.”
A girl said from behind her.
The girl seemed to be having a conversation with her own person behind her.
“That thing?”
“Why, the ‘it’ that suddenly appeared like a comet for a week! The Svanidze Galoshes! We only knew about it through rumors… How we’ve been waiting for this day!”
Tatiana closed her eyes and nodded slightly.
She was here to buy galoshes too.
“So, in Leningrad now, there’s nothing but Svanidze Galoshes?”
“We only make that factory’s product… So, you could say that.”
“I see… Last year, there were many factories producing galoshes, but why only one this year?”
No one could answer the girl’s pure question.
Not even the old man who seemed to know a lot, who just coughed and dismissed it.
A short while later.
With the seven bell rings from the church echoing, the store door opened.
“One pair per person! There are people waiting behind, so please understand…!”
People stepped on the muddy ground and filed into the store one by one.
Soon it was Tatiana’s and the old man’s turn, and they received the galoshes in an orderly manner and stepped aside.
— Ssshh…
Tatiana, following the old man’s instruction, pressed the sole to her nose and took a deep breath.
“… It really is. It doesn’t smell like matches. Amazing.”
The old man smiled happily beside her and nodded.
“Svanidze Galoshes are different from other galoshes. You can think of it as a collection of revolutionary technology. If you ever need to buy elsewhere, first smell the scent. If it smells like something, it’s a fake Svanidze.”
And check the heel of the sole.
Tatiana confirmed the sole after hearing the old man’s words.
Along with a red triangle, there was writing underneath.
“Svanidze (Сванидзе)….”
Tatiana tucked the galoshes into her bosom and walked to the counter.
“Um… I’m trying to calculate.”
“Yes! I’ll help you calculate!”
“By any chance, how much is it?”
Tatiana tensed up.
Her monthly salary at the textile factory was 29 rubles.
After buying intact galoshes at the black market, all she had left in her hand was a mere 9 rubles. Tatiana would have to spend the remaining rubles to survive the winter with her six family members.
“3 rubles!”
“I see, 3 rubles… What?! A galoshes of such quality only costs 3 rubles?!”
“Ahaha… It’s due to the internal guidelines of the demonstration factory… Svanidze Galoshes are sold at the lowest price only.”
Employees who hear the same question hundreds of times a day.
Tatiana’s reaction was no different from theirs, so the cashier at the counter gave an awkward smile.
“If you sell it this cheap, what’s left?”
“Your laughter remains.”
“… If anyone hears, they’ll think the old man is the factory owner.”
“Hoo hoo, this young lady has quite good instincts!”
“……”
“Haha! Just kidding. Well…, to put it simply, it’s thanks to Svanidze’s warm heart who wants everyone in Leningrad to be wearing galoshes.”
The old man took out his wallet beside her.
He took out two 5-ruble bills from his wallet and handed them to the employee.
“Please calculate this young lady’s as well.”
“Yes, understood!”
“Oh! Old man! You didn’t have to do that!”
When Tatiana approached the employee in surprise, the old man raised his hand to stop her.
“As an old man who has nothing but rubles left, this is a small thank you for having the old man’s talk today.”
“Old man….”
Tatiana tried desperately to refuse his kindness, but the image of her five children shivering from the cold at home came to mind, and she could no longer refuse.
With 3 rubles, she and her children could at least live warmly for 5 days.
“Comrade Golitsyn. We’ve been looking for you for a long time, and here you are, leaving warmth with a stranger.”
“Huh?”
It was the voice of a young man.
Both the old man and Tatiana turned their gazes to the source of the voice at the same time.
The old man looked at the young man and approached him with a bright smile.
“Ah. It’s the phantom of Pushkin who came to disturb this old man’s fun…!”
“If you say that, people will misunderstand. Old man Finn (старец Финн).”
“What?! Could it be that you are Ruslan (Руслан)?! And you, this old man has never set foot on Finnish soil since birth.”
“If that’s the case, I don’t have Princess Lyudmila (Людмила) either.”
The old man and the young man burst into laughter almost simultaneously.
Tatiana didn’t understand any of their conversation.
She just thought that people who could laugh like that must be educated.
And she thought that the handsome young man in front of her was probably not just Yakov’s ‘employer’.
“Are you here to buy galoshes?”
The young man suddenly approached and extended his hand to Tatiana.
Tatiana nodded only, frozen stiff.
The young man smiled brightly and spoke.
“I see. Thank you for purchasing our factory’s product. My name is Yakov Svanidze.”
Svanidze…
Tatiana suddenly thought that the word didn’t seem unfamiliar.
She alternated between the word stamped on the sole of the galoshes in her arms and the face of the young man extending his hand.
Svanidze.
The name was in her arms, and at the same time, smiling in front of her.
She didn’t know what to say and fidgeted, then uttered a word she had deeply stored in her heart.
“Thank you… Thank you so much….”
Another ordinary commute day, unchanged.
Thanks to the galoshes, I made it to work without getting stuck in the mud, chatted with the people, and then immediately went into my room.
— Creak… Empty.
The reason I entered the room so urgently was…
Because there were dozens of letters piled up on my desk, Yakov Svanidze’s desk.
I picked one up and read the handwriting.
“Hmm, Tatiana….”
A name that sounded familiar from somewhere, but why does Golitsyn factory director’s face come to mind?
I put the image aside and began to carefully write a reply to Tatiana.
After forcing through Zinoviev’s threats and continuing to sell galoshes, these letters had been piling up on my desk.
People who left me thank-you letters while wasting their precious time.
I thought it was only right for a person to reply to their hard work and warm hearts, so I replied to each and every one of them.
After finishing the reply to Tatiana, I focused on the particularly eye-catching letter.
It was a very high-quality letterhead with a red sickle and hammer stamped on it.
I used the envelope opener to tear the seal, and immediately took out the letter.
Comrade Svanidze.
This is the final warning. Stop selling galoshes.
Although you claim to be the demonstration factory under the Supreme Council of the National Economy, the act of directly distributing the products to the city’s stores violates the distribution order of the Leningrad Soviet consumer cooperative.
Distribution beyond the jurisdiction is an economic disruption that shakes the foundation of the Soviet Union, and it clearly falls under Article 136 of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic Criminal Code; speculation and market disruption.
Furthermore, selling galoshes at a price below cost at the demonstration factory can be interpreted as deliberately hindering the normal production activities of neighboring factories.
If you continue to ignore the warnings and push forward with the work, I will have no choice but to formally request an investigation from the city supervisory committee.
At that time, it won’t end with just your problem.
The person who opened a store route for you, and the person who distributed ‘rubber’ and ‘galosh adhesive’ to you will also have to take responsibility.
Expect a wise judgment.
“Hmm…. I should reply to this letter first.”
I chose the worst letter among the letterheads and began writing there.
Chairman of the Leningrad Soviet Executive Committee,
Comrade Grigory Yevseyevich Zinoviev.
I have received your warning very well.
If I had intended to stop here, I wouldn’t have started in the first place.
However, if you have any intention of licking my shoes, I will readily stop the sales.
Have a good day today as well.
Production Supervisor of the 1st Innovative Technology Demonstration Factory,
Yakov Svanidze.