Mini-robot vacuum cleaner, good old sunsets and flower bed on the windowsill: how modern students live

Corridor "six" on October - the place for me is no stranger. Ten years ago, she lived here for about a week, when she entered the journalism department of BSU and passed internal exams. The conditions seemed spartan, but, despite the inconveniences of life, we, future classmates, are very friendly. In general, students without life in the dorm can hardly be called full-fledged. The Minsks, non-residents, were sincerely envious of this. Nightly intimate conversations, musical evenings, joint lunches and dinners prepared from what was found in the half-empty refrigerator, and the general eating up of parental programs. Oh, romance!

In total, 503 students live in the ten-storey dormitory of BSU, located on the youth Oktyabrskaya in the center of Minsk, 200 of whom are foreigners. They were given the first four floors. Our guys are all from the Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science.

- We have a hostel for geniuses, notes the teacher Elena Maksimenkova. - Because the passing points for this faculty are the highest in the entire BSU. That year, freshmen came in with 396, in this pass just below. And studying here is so hard. That's why we cherish and cherish our children.

Elena Nikolaevna herself is a mathematician by training, so she knows what students face in school. And to help them unload their heads after tense pairs, she organizes different activities.

Mathematicians are a very creative people. We make such stunning decorations for all holidays from improvised materials - you will pump. We also have a gym, a table tennis hall, billiards, the teacher lists. And one day in the fall, they came back wet, frozen, sad-sad, and I said, “What can I do for you?” And all of a sudden they ordered semolina and cocoa. At first I was surprised, then I thought, yes, there is something more to this autumn. And they made them four pots of porridge.

- Do students often party?

- We do not give up our own, Elena Nikolaevna smiles conspiratorily. It's fun. Brest woman Anastasia Kolesnikova, having learned that she will live in a dormitory with a kitchen, toilet on the floor and a shower on the ground floor, was horrified.

- I was very worried about the neighbors: suddenly we will not get along. I remember even having conversations with my parents to rent a room or an apartment. But it's not cheap, so I'm humbled. And you know, all the fears were not terrible. I got used to the shower, where there are no curtains, and with the fact that you can forget about personal space. These inconveniences are compensated by the fact that here it is fun, everyone knows each other, on the floor so precisely, because we constantly meet in the kitchen, washing up in the morning.

And, oddly enough, in the hostel quickly there is a special sense of trust. For example, many students do not lock the doors of their rooms. Some people don’t even do it when they go home.

Nothing brings us closer together like living in a dorm. Many people in their neighborhood make good friends. Slutskaya Alina Gromadskaya and Mohilevtska Diana Nikitenok are among these. So the map came out that they were settled together in the first year, they became friends and for the fourth year in a row shared the same room.

- Before settling in, I was most afraid of cockroaches, the hostel is still old, says Alina. But what a joy that they are not here. And we never had a life in our four years.

- And I knew that everything would be fine: my older brother studied at FPMI and lived in the same dorm, says Diana. In fact, he gave me all of that. And to my concerns about the conditions, he said: "Life in the corridor dorm is many times more fun than in the block or apartment." Here he was right, we are constantly going to either play board games, or sing songs to the guitar, or just “chase” the seagull.

- In our basement shower, we also go with the whole company. We take a column and wash with songs, Alina picks up.

Of course, good neighbors are a big deal. And then there is a pedantic cleaner, washing the floors only on his half of the room, or a friend curling around a nest of fantasy books, or a lark, fiercely hates the light from the laptop monitor and keyboard flickering ... So many people, so many jumps. You have to be able to put up with them. But there are also harmless ones. Here's Diana, for example, for the second year growing a flower greenhouse on the windowsill.

- We gave her a flytrap for her birthday, says Alina. - It's a predatory flower. It will eat the insects in the room.

- Yes, I was at home in the village, I loved to do gardening. But given that you often do not run into Mogilev region, I decided to plant a flower bed in the room. I like taking care of him, transplanting him is a meditative activity. And it's cozy.

How activists of the student council at the hostel Alina and Diana got a room for two. It has two lockers, beds, desks, a refrigerator. That's what four-year-olds Ksenia Nikolaeva and Daria Mushroom do.

- Here stretch ceilings, laminate, plastic windows - the rooms are in excellent condition. “Everyone is amazed at who we tell them,” Ksyusha said. Furniture - yes, a little old, but it is necessary to bring comfort, bring from the house plaid, tulle, toys, all sorts of cute things for decor - and voila, everything plays in a new way.

The look stops at a miniature device resembling a robot vacuum cleaner. For some reason, the brain immediately drives away this thought. Well, what a robot vacuum cleaner in the dorm, it can not be..

- Is this a robot vacuum cleaner? - I see the same astonished eyes of the photographer.

- Yes, bought at the price of shawarma, the girls boast. - In general, the thing, only 11 rubles - and many times less trouble with sweeping the floor. We recommend it to everyone.

- But an electric kettle in the room is not allowed to keep, it can be used only in the kitchen, says Alina.

Speaking of kitchen. On each floor one, equipped with four electric stoves.

- In the first year of school, we didn’t cook much. Yet at home food, stove, dishes - all in one room, here you need to go back and forth. Not very comfortable. But over time we got used to it, Alina and I had some culinary abilities, just pulled to the stove, recalls Diana. Sometimes, you sit four couples in a row, you want to eat, and already think only that you will come to the dorm and cook the first, second and dessert. And we cooked and ate to death.

- Even a signature dish appeared - chicken in creamy mushroom sauce with mashed potatoes, - picks up Alina. And the simplest is cheese ramen with sausages.

- And we experimented," picks up Dasha, "and baked a medovik. The oven did its job hurriedly.

- I don’t know a guy who still eats his mom’s food. I asked him how long he was going to live like this. He replied that everything suits him, Diana spreads her hands. So not for everyone the dormitory becomes a step into the adult culinary world.

About what students are like in everyday life, Elena Maksimenkova can tell a lot.

- Household independence for children is very different. There are those who are not far from the level of kindergarten left, and there are those who cook, clean, wash, without problems self-organize and get up in the morning to run, then to study. We work with the first one, the teacher assures. I had one room, and they had their own kitchen duty schedule. They singled out the person responsible for the side dish, for the main dish - we are talking about something meat. They always ate together and shared everything they brought home. And I think that's the best thing about a dormitory. We go down to the fourth floor - and then the smell of oriental spices tickles our nose. We are going to it – and for sure: there are guys from Turkmenistan and China in the kitchen.

- It is our students who have the opportunity to go home and bring containers of ready-made mother's food. And foreigners cook, and a lot, says the head Marina Zeleva. Many not only study, but also work: guys from Turkmenistan, for example, taxi.

In the “six” Marina Vladimirovna has been working for 21 years. She was a teacher, and two years ago she became a hostel manager. Every student, even a foreigner, she knows by name. Amazing photographic memory has repeatedly helped to calculate the "illegal".

- We have enough visitors. If I'm on watch, I see someone else. And they are cunning, paste their photo with tape on the pass and convince that here I am your tenant, laughs Marina Vladimirovna.

- Were there lovers who climbed through the windows of their ladies?

- No, we have administration offices on the ground floor, students live higher up. So you can't get in the window. There is such a possibility in other hostels. But I saw a lot of steam. There were those who eventually got married.

- And how many tears were shed because of parting, recalls Elena Maksimenkova. Our guys suffered a lot and beat themselves up if they were abandoned by girls. And you see, the separation of 18 years is very acutely experienced by young minds and hearts. We are always here to help and support. Getting a hostel quickly and painlessly is not the easiest task.

- So that our guys have a place, we enroll them in construction teams. I need to work three shifts. At this time, of course, they are given a hostel. And many people are happy to work. Not everyone wants to go home in the summer: many friends are already here, and want to stay in Minsk, and earn a penny. Some worked on the basis of BSU dormitories, did repairs in them, many got to Minsktrans as controllers, there were microwaves on Horizon, says Marina Zeleva.

As a rule, senior courses settle earlier than the first. I remember how we called the settlement a living hell, because we had to spend almost a day in line. And that's after four hours on the train, with bowls of things... In the "six" students are not subjected to such torture.

- We have everything clear, help the guys from the student Council, who come in the 20th of August and prepare documents for the settlement of the rest. We make contracts in advance, students put only the date and their signature. Get the keys, the pass, the bed and all, welcome to the new house!

- And now students still bring sunsets, potatoes, tomatoes and the like from home.

- It used to be a lot. Parents collected whole noble bags, loaded everything that fits. That's less now. Many people prefer to order delivery - it is faster and easier.

- You’ve been through a generation of students, are they changing?

- They change, they used to be more alive. It's all in computers now. Very heavy on the rise. In the old days, we had events and concerts every evening in the hall: we sang, danced, staged fairy tales. There's none of that now.

- Now the guys have other priorities, Elena Nikolaevna shares her observations. - They are immersed in job search, especially the 3rd and 4th courses. And given what points they received, and the requirements for their work are appropriate.

Having become an adult and surrounded yourself with cares, you invariably recall with nostalgia these spontaneous tea gatherings, evenings with a guitar and, although there was not much money, quite good dinners collected by joint efforts. No matter how life developed later, no matter how many emotions and impressions it gave, the dormitory will remain in the heart forever. Wonderful years!

FIGURES

♦ About 91 thousand places are housing dormitories of Belarusian universities.

♦ About 8 thousand children are settled in nine hostels of BSU, one is provided for university employees, 350 employees with families live in it.

HOW MUCH IS IT?

The cost of accommodation for students depends on the category of hostel. In the hostel of the first category (apartment type), the fee is 1.2 base values - 54 rubles per month, the second category (block type) - 0.8 base value, or 36 rubles, the third category (corridor type) - 0.4 base value, or 18 rubles.

yankovich@sb.by