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- have to do the cooking.

By GALINA CHERGOVA

Res KRASNOVA is a turner
in a plant at Saratov, .a_ city
on the Volga; but it is at home
rather than at her lathe that I
shall describe her.
. The Krasnovs had invited me
to lunch and they were telling me
that on Sundays the whole family
spent the day in the woods on
thé opposite shore of the Volga,
or on the beach, and that he
and she both worked in the same
factory.

“And who takes care of your
children while you are working?”
I asked.

“What do you mean, ‘who’?”
Lydia asked in amazement. “But

_our factory has a marvelous’ kin-

dergarten. What don’t they do
for the children! —

“They are taught music, books
are read to them, they go in for
gymnastics. And the toys! But
a strict schedule is kept — naps,
meals, walks, games.

“As far as I’m concerned, I’m
perfectly at ease about my child-
ren and the more so because I
devote nearly all my leisure time
to them.”

“But when you come home you ,
Isn’t it
difficult?” I asked, hoping that I
was not offending her, and I add-
ed, ‘“Doesn’t your husband’s sal-

ary go far enough?”

Lydia began to laugh.

“As to the cooking, no. We
get all our meals cooked at the
factory canteen. The food there
is excellent. I only prepare meals
on Sunday — everyone gets his
favorite dish.

“My husband helps me too. He
does the shopping and gives me
a hand with the housework.”

At this point the husband in-
terrupted:

“Of course, we could live on
my salary. But Lydia is a quali-
fied turner, she earns almost ‘as
much as I do—why deprive one’s
self of the chance to earn money?
Besides she would be bored with
staying at home.”

Without giving him a chance to
finish, Lydia leaned towards me
and said earnestly:

‘Don’t think that I’m working
for the money alone or just be-
cause it would be boring to attend
to the house!

“Tf you just give a moment’s
thought to the great construction
going on in our country and the
enthusiasm of the whole Soviet
people for their work, can you
stay at home? An even more
wonderful and happy life is being
built up for the people, for you

S| Why Soviet women work

This woman is a top worker in the Stalin auto plant.

~”

and for me, for our children!
“How could I, a mother of two
children, remain on the _side-
lines? I also want to contribute
to the general achievement.”
That is why Soviet women work.
x

Evdokia Fedorovna has been
teaching for 50 years. She has

Soviet women have more time and opportunity to develop artistic talents

seen children grow up, genera-
tions have passed before her eyes.

Captains pilot their ships on
long sea voyages. Engineers and
architects construct new  build-
ings. Professors in their labora-
tories discover secrets of science.
Many of these are former pupils
of Evdokia Fedorovna. And even
in her school there are teachers

~ who used to be her pupils.

She opened up to all of them
magnificent horizons of know-
ledge, she taught them to love
labor and to understand the great
works of literature.

Evdokia Fedorovna could have
retired long ago for, like thous-
ands of other members of the
teaching profession, after 25
years of teaching she is eligible

. for a pension. But retirement is

far from her thoughts.

How can she give up the work
that she loves? Retire? Live in
the shadow of that great, inter-
esting life that is bubbling all
around her? How can she part
with those children so avid for
knowledge, interested in every-
thing — how can she leave the
school where she feels that she
is still so useful?

Evdokia Fedorovna, as long as
she has the strength, will go on
devoting her intelligence, her
knowledge, and her experience to
her chosen work.

That is why Soviet women work.

- Where women are the fashion critics

By ROSE HENRY

Nor many people think of-the

Soviet Union as a land
where every. woman ¢an go to
fashion shows, and millions do.
But so it is.

Serious people come back
from visits to the Soviet Union
talking about more important
things, so the frivolous ones,
from ambassadors’:-wives to
streamlined American. women
correspondents, have spread
abroad their upper-class view
ofa world of drab and dreary
clothes. —

To such people it means no-
thing that 30-odd years agg the
ordinary Russian working or
peasant woman was a shape-
less bundle, with rags tied
round her feet. tie

That today she steps out, to.
do all sorts of skilled and ex-
citing work, comfortably dress-
ed and well shod means no-
thing to a woman who shops
in expensive style shops and

has her eyes trained on the
‘exclusive. :

It is true, of course, that no
Soviet woman wears the sort

‘of extreme dresses that make *

fashion head&ines in Paris and
New York. It is equally true
that only a tiny circle of wo-
men in Britain or France, the
U.S: or Canada, wear them.

But Soviet women are just
as much interésted in clothes
as women anywhere else, and
they have far more say in the
sort of clothes they will wear
than we have.

e

Soviet dress designers, work-
ing for the All-Union House
of Fashions in Moscow and
other capital cities, or on their
own, long.ago established the
habit of asking their future
wearers what they want.

Shows of new designs are
taken to the factories, where
-women working there are ask-
ed to judge them, criticize

them, choose their favorites
and so on.

In summer regular shows, ~
for criticism_.and comment, are
held in the big public parks.

As a result of such meetings,
new dresses are chosen for
mass production — such as a’
young girl’s chiffon dance dress
called “Butterfly” which every
student wanted for her “fresh-
ers’ ball” last. winter.

Evening dresses, of course,
are worn a lot in the Soviet
Union. They are usually long
and flowing, in glowing col-
ors and richly embroidered,
for every Russian loves em-
broidery, and most of them do
it too, superbly.

At home in the evenings
Soviet women often wear their
own version of the housecoat,
or very comfortable and rich-
ly embroidered pyjama suits.

For everyday wear Soviet
women give their vote every
time to clothes that are simple,
comfortable, inconspicuous in
style and color, but not at all.

standardised. And they are get-
ting them in increasing quan-
tity and variety. ee

Many of the ideas, the col-
‘ors and the embroideries used
in modern Soviet clothes have
the traditional costume of the
Soviet people for their inspira-
tion. | ;

Recently a whole series of
conferences have been organ-
ised between designers and or-
dinary women, and dress de-
signers and textile designers,
- with the aim of making clothes
not only cheaper and of better
quality, but also better styled
and more varied in the future.

One of their jobs is to im-
prove the design of children’s
clothes — already revolution-
ised in color and gaiety since
the early days.

And it is just typical of a'
Socialist society that clothes
for children are already among
the very best, and that the
foremost designers in the So-
viet Union delight to work at
their improvement.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — FEBRUARY 5, 1954 — PAGE 10 ;

~ tions.

Mel
Colby

E’VE just finished reading at

. old Hansard debate in which
George Cruickshank, former Lib
eral member for Fraser Valley,
told the House of Commons that
Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent
should be paid more money.
Cruickshank made these remarks
in April, 1953, and helped to cut
his own throat in the August elec
Which is unfortunate —
for other MPs. He would be 4
handy man for other MPs to have

around now that the question of

a pay increase is being discussed.
When Cruickshank made his
1953 speech he rose in the House,

_gulped down a huge sob; fought

back Niagara-like tears and in 4
voice which quavered with pity,
opined that the prime minister's
$15,000 salary, plus $4,000 annual
indemnity, plus $2,000 tax free
living allowance, plus $2,000

motor car allowance, was a pitt

ful sum for a man to be eking
out an existence on.

Perhaps we are being too cruel

when we begrudge our prime mit-
ister a miserly salary jump of
$10,000 a year and our MPs 4
piddling $3,000 to $5,000 hike.
Our prime minister does try. He
could charge his entire grocery

bill up to expenses but refuses —

to do it. This year he insisted
on paying back $5,000 of his
household allowance to the fed-
eral treasury, that amount being
his estimate on how much it cost
to shop at the corner grocery
store. :
Imagine that! Five thousand
a year is all the prime minister
and his wife spend on groceries.
If this happens to our prime
minister the country will have
no one to blame but itself. We
can see him now _ shuffling

around that 30-room government °
hut, getting in the way of the

cook and the five maids, while he
wonders whether he can afford to
have a bedtime snack or not.

If the prime minister is on the
verge of starvation, how about
our MPs? Have you ever taken
a good look at an MP? Most of
them have that haggard, tightly-

rawn look, that skin-and-bone

appearance that reminds one of

King Farouk. Most of our MPs

lose money by permitting them-
selves to be elected and going
to Ottawa. By the time they get
their indemnity and their tax free
living allowance and their odds
and ends from this lobbyist and
that lobbyist, well, you know how
it is. Our MPs lose money by go-
ing to Ottawa.. We know one who.

lost 36 cents playing gin rummy

on the train.
e

hurt. an MP is the fact that no
one begrudges paying an old-age
pensioner $40 a month whether
he deserves it or not but every-
one jumps on the idea of increas-
ing the pay of an MP by $3,000
or $5,000 a year. And how many
old age pensioners have you
heard complaining about the is-
sue? Plenty. There are letters
to the editor in every newspaper
column. For the unity of the

nation, for that great, warm feel- —

ing of fellowship that comes from
giving, wouldn’t it be a splendid

_ Sesture if our old-age pensioners

were to take up a collection and
tender the proceeds to the MPs?

And how about the widows and
orphans, the crippled, the blind
and the maimed? Couldn’t they
spare a little for such a worthy
cause? How about the mothers?
Surely they could spare a little
from their family allowance
cheque? How. about the unem-
ployed?
or she dug down real deep could
scrape up a few pennies towards
the fund. If you aren’t getting
unemployment insurance steal a
few dollars from your widowed
mother. ;

Your MP needs your help! Are
you going to let him down?

One of the things that must |

Everyone of them, if he —