Life without perfume, patience in work and instruction of animals: the underside of unusual professions

What it is like to live without perfume, who is helped by patience and who instructs animals in swimming: the underside of specialties, which many did not even know

In the labor market, their names are not found in the top of popular vacancies. These specialists do not sit in typical offices and do not work according to a template. While the world trusts automation and artificial intelligence, they rely on unique tools: flawless eyeglasses, angelic patience, olfactory memory, and a willingness to take daily risks in a hot vacuum. From powder metallurgy to theatrical backstage, from fundamental science to veterinary pools, we look into the closed world of rare professions in Belarus and learn what the inside-out, romance and price of their piecework are made of. Knights of taste. They do not wear white coats, and their main tools are smell and taste memory. While the world drinks tea for the sake of vivacity, these people spread their throats into hundreds of subtle descriptors - from notes of wet asphalt to shades of dried apricots. We looked into the closed world of teatesters and found out what it is like to live without perfume, why Chinese masters do not prohibit smoking and whether there is a tea industry in Belarus.

Tiester is an expert in organoleptic evaluation of tea leaf and finished beverage. Evaluates samples - from the appearance of dry brewing to shades of taste, transparency and color of infusion. In factories, they act as experts in the procurement of raw materials at auctions, cutting off defects, checking batches for safety and developing complex tea blends, the taste of which should remain stable from year to year. Taste dozens and sometimes hundreds of tea samples per day.

WHERE THE CADRES COME FROM

Professions are not taught in civil universities. Major market players prefer to cultivate professionals themselves, looking for beginners at tea championships. Training is based on corporate mentoring in production. In addition, masters pass specialized courses at tea chambers of exporting countries - India and China.

- A person with any education can become a tester, here the natural predisposition of receptors is important, says the interlocutor, who has been trained in India.

She gave up spirits for the sake of her profession. But the attitude to smoking is ambiguous: in China, teachers do not even recommend smoking students to quit the habit while studying. With a sharp refusal of tobacco, the system of receptor settings breaks down and the taster temporarily loses landmarks.

SALARY

Top master blenders in Moscow and St. Petersburg are piece specialists. Their wages are estimated at hundreds of thousands of Russian rubles. Contracts of such experts are protected by bonuses from poaching. However, for a high income you have to pay with freedom: when taking a tipster, he signs a strict agreement on non-disclosure of corporate secrets and recipes for blends, which is valid even after dismissal.

PERSPECTIVES

Titester services are rarely in demand in Belarus. Our tea business is focused on the import, logistics and distribution of the finished product, so it is not profitable for companies to maintain their own laboratories.

The path of a beginner begins with the assistant level in the laboratory. His duties include routine: preparing dishes, checking the basic parameters of raw materials and brewing samples by timing. Over time, the staff tester moves to independent purchases of standard batches.

The pinnacle of a career is a master blender. He is a strategic employee of the company, who is responsible for the global taste of all brands of the corporation, approves purchases and has the right to veto any batch of raw materials. Lords of fire and powder. The master who creates hardness from emptiness at the intersection of physics and metallurgy: takes porous blanks from metal powders and burns them in protective environments. The work is rare and responsible: one mistake in the degree of the oven - and the whole party will turn into a marriage.

A professional should know the structure of the furnaces, have accuracy in calculating the modes and lightning reaction. On the tape lay blanks, so fragile that they can be broken with your fingers. The speculator checks with the map, adjusts the supply of gases to the chamber (so that the metal does not burn up in the air) and launches the batch.

A few hours later, the same details come out, but now they have changed the color to noble steel and gained diamond hardness. The speckler does what cannot be done by ordinary casting of liquid metal. Under the influence of heat, the atoms of the powder are firmly bonded at the molecular level. At the same time, the metal itself does not melt completely and does not lose shape. This is how the brake pads of aircraft and parts for heavy cars are born.

WHERE THE CADRES COME FROM

The profession comes after polytechnic and metallurgical colleges in the specialties of powder metallurgy or foundry. In Belarus, personnel are trained in specialized colleges, as well as in the workplaces of industrial giants: MTZ, BELAZ or the Institute of Powder Metallurgy of the NAS of Belarus. The qualification category is awarded after practice in real workshops under the guidance of experienced technologists.

At the Molodechno plant of powder metallurgy reported:

- Spectators are trained exclusively in the workplace. To be accepted as a student, secondary education is enough. They are assigned a mentor, they study for three months. They work almost from the beginning, but under the guidance of the master.

SALARY

Due to the harmful conditions and shortage of personnel, the rates are very decent. A young specialist earns from 2300 rubles. An experienced professional who manages complex vacuum complexes or sintering rare alloys gets more. A pleasant bonus to a high salary is the right to preferential experience and early retirement.

PERSPECTIVES

Previously, skeptics predicted stagnation of powder metallurgy due to the transition of the automotive industry to electric cars. However, the industry survived, finding itself in space, green energy and medicine. Today, the global market is experiencing a powerful boom: according to forecasts, by the mid-2030s, its volume will grow several times, exceeding the bar of 10-13 billion dollars.

For Belarus and the CIS countries, which have maintained a strong industrial base, the development of this area is a matter of technological sovereignty. The profession of spectacle will not be a thing of the past. It transforms: the worker will have to control the artificial intelligence that controls the clutch of atoms in a hot vacuum. Hairmakers. The postmaster The illusionist behind the scenes. While the viewer admires the luxurious curls of the diva, this master manually collects their image one hair each day. Making wigs, chignons, mustaches and false eyelashes is jewelry work that requires angelic patience and impeccable taste. A good postmaster knows the anatomy of the face as well as a plastic surgeon: the slightest mistake in the direction of hair growth - and on-screen magic will turn into a fake.

The postmaster manually makes wigs, chignons, mustaches, beards and eyelashes. His work is divided into two areas: theatrical and cinematographic – the creation of historical images and medical – the manufacture of replacement systems for people who have lost theirs due to illness or chemotherapy.

This profession is considered rare due to manual labor. Modern machines are not able to replicate natural hair growth. A high-quality wig is made only with hands, hair to hair. Work requires patience. The master manually weaves hairs into the thinnest base (tule-grid), adjusts products to the size of the actors, is engaged in painting, cutting and laying.

WHERE THE CADRES COME FROM

Special higher education is not required. Basic skills are obtained in colleges in the areas of “hairdressing” or “makeup and makeup”. The subtleties of weaving are taught in highly specialized courses at theaters or in the process of working as a student at the Belarusianfilm film studio. The secrets of mastery are transferred “from hand to hand” in theater workshops, and educational institutions remained a few.

SALARY

In theaters, the salary of a novice master is from 1600 rubles. In the commercial sector and the film industry, revenues are many times higher. A high-quality handmade wig costs up to 10 thousand rubles and above. Top posters working on the set of historical films or in elite studios of hair prosthetics, can not deny themselves anything. In Minsk, there are several hair studios that offer tailoring wigs for anatomical casting of the head.

PERSPECTIVES

The future of the profession correspondent “R” discussed with the head of the dressing and post-dressing section of the NADT named after M. Gorky Natalia Tarasova. When asked if the new technology will replace posters, the answer is:

- This specialty won't die. Implantation is a surgical procedure, a serious approach to it. Not everyone can do this for medical reasons. The same theater without a poster can not live. It will always be necessary. There are many diseases in life. Consequently, women lose their hair. And in order to feel attractive, you have to buy a replacement. A great handicraft will always be expensive. Wood code keepers. Dendrochronologist Detective Interrogating Trees. While historians argue over manuscripts, this scientist is reading the chronicle of nature. According to the annual rings, it determines with an accuracy of up to a year when the oak is cut down for the ancient castle, when superdroughts raged and in what year the volcano exploded. His tools are a thin drill, a microscope and graphics. The dendrochronologist turns the stump into a historical chronicle.

A dendrochronologist is a scientist who deciphers history, climate and catastrophes from tree rings. Age determination is only a percentage of work. The main interest is the reaction of nature to climate change and man. According to the structure of layers, specialists calculate the dates of forest fires, droughts and record cases of pollution of ecosystems of past years.

Today, science has gone into computer analysis. With the help of drills, scientists in the forest select cores - thin cylinders that do not injure the tree. With fallen trunks or elements of ancient buildings make cuts. The material is scanned, downloaded to the software and verified. The researcher notices defects: false or fallen due to frost rings. On the basis of this data, dendrochronograms are built, helping archaeologists to date buildings, and ecologists to model the future of the planet.

WHERE THE CADRES COME FROM

There is no pure specialty “dendrochronologist” in universities, legally people are listed as scientists. Basic education can be anything. Most often come graduates of the biofaculty (the Department of Botany of BSU) or forestry profile (BSTU). However, technologists and IT specialists look into this sphere. Modern dendrochronology requires the skills of statistical analysis and work with complex time series, where you can not do without a strong mathematical base. Full-fledged personnel cutting takes place in practice, in magistracy, postgraduate studies and internships.

SALARY

Income in this field is tied to a scientific position, academic degrees and participation in specific research programs. On average, the salary of a qualified employee who owns this method is from 3 to 4 thousand rubles.

PERSPECTIVES

On a national scale, people professionally engaged in the topic can be counted on the fingers of one hand. If we take into account those for whom the method is auxiliary, about ten people will be recruited. This profession remains elitist for three main reasons.

The specialist must simultaneously understand botany, archaeology, climatology and mathematical modeling. A narrow academic niche is fundamental science, laboratories exist only at institutes or reserves. A high threshold of patience is required. The work involves many hours of data verification, which not everyone will withstand. The profession has a bright future as an effective discipline to other directions. Step into the water on four legs. Veterinary medicine in Belarus has reached a new level, and the profession of a swimming instructor for animals is a vivid confirmation of this. This is a rare specialty at the junction of veterinary medicine, physiotherapy and zoopsychology. Only two centers are available for Minsk residents, and demand from dog owners and injured pets is growing avalanche.

Hydrotherapist is a rehabilitation specialist who helps pets recover from severe injuries, complex operations or diseases of the musculoskeletal system. The animal comes to him after examination by a veterinarian-rehabilitologist, selecting a set of exercises. The hydrotherapist personally accompanies the dog in ammunition in the pool or on the water treadmill. He controls the load on the joints and muscles, monitors the safety, proper breathing and psycho-emotional state of the pet.

In water, body weight decreases, the load on the joints falls, and the muscles work at full capacity. This allows you to literally “run” the paws even to those patients who on land can not take a single step.

WHERE THE CADRES COME FROM

The foundation is profile education. The ideal option is a diploma of a veterinarian. Hydrotherapy and veterinary rehabilitation are trained in specialized commercial courses and seminars (most often in educational centers of St. Petersburg), where the biomechanics of animal movements in the aquatic environment are thoroughly studied. Then there's self-study. There are no barriers to sharing experience other than personal barriers.

SALARY

Our interlocutor Tatiana Andriyash admits that now pet hydrotherapy is one of the lowest paid segments of veterinary medicine. There is no state structure, and commercial is kept in the country on pure enthusiasts. In Russia, the situation is similar: there, the salaries of veterinary rehabilitators are significantly lower than those of the same in-demand veterinary orthopedic neurologists.

PERSPECTIVES

They are both moral and material. The approach to veterinary care is changing. There is a growing awareness that an injured animal will not recover on its own. Low prices for rehabilitation are still largely based on the desire to help the pet. The appearance of less emotional managers in the segment will lead to its equalization in profitability with other veterinary services.

The direction itself will develop, the demand for specialists will increase, they will begin to be prepared in universities. Pools with powerful water purification systems and new waterways will appear. The structure of consumption of the service will change: it will expand at the expense of owners of overweight dogs.

The romance here is pure and cinematic. This is the moment when a hopeless spinal cord, who was offered to be put to sleep a month ago, takes his first independent steps on land and sticks a wet nose in your palm. Feeling like you're bringing life back is like no other. The devil's eye in the gemologist's magnifying glass. The profession at the intersection of exact science and jewelry art, where the expert guarantees the authenticity and market value of each carat. With the help of an eye meter, crystallography and laboratory equipment, the specialist examines the weight, color, purity and faceting of gems. In an age when synthetic diamonds are visually indistinguishable from natural diamonds, its precision and eye-witting are essential to protect the market from counterfeiting.

In Belarus, a rare cohort of specialists - experts-gemologists. Armed with microscopes, refractometers and spectrometers, they take a concentration exam every day. The main task of the inspector is the authenticity, origin and calculation of the value of the stones. The gemologist acts as a shield of the state and consumer in the market, examining samples according to the international system: weight in carats, color, purity and quality of cuts are evaluated. Special attention is paid to the identification of traces of artificial “ennoblement” of minerals and the identification of synthetic analogues that flooded into the world market. The product receives a ticket to the counter only after the Belarusian expert makes a verdict.

WHERE THE CADRES COME FROM

The forge of basic knowledge is the leading universities of the country: the Faculty of Geology of BSU trains specialists with fundamental knowledge about deposits. However, to obtain the status of an expert with the right of branding, yesterday's graduates pass a rigid school of specialization in production. In addition, future masters study the intricacies of crystallography at specialized courses, and full-fledged cutting of specialists occurs during many years of practice in real laboratories under the guidance of experienced technologists.

SALARY

A young specialist in commercial networks and pawnshops of the capital can count on a salary in the region of 1700-2500 rubles. With the growth of authority and gaining experience in state institutions or in large industries, such as OJSC Gomel PO Kristall, revenues significantly increase. The bonus is high demand in the market.

PERSPECTIVES

Looking into the future of the industry, analysts agree: gemologists will not remain without work. The main driver of demand was the technological boom in the production of laboratory (synthetic) diamonds. It is impossible to distinguish lab-grown stone from natural stone without sophisticated equipment, which makes the profession critical to protecting the market from counterfeiting.

Prospects are open to deepening integration within the Union State. The recent unification of the Belarusian diamond valuation system with Russian national standards removes barriers to the recognition of expertise. This broadens the horizons for specialists whose opinions have equal legal force in the single Union market.

slav@sb.by