Have you served in the army? But in vain. Soviet Union, Odessa Military District, construction battalion. Construction battalion in the mid-80s, when students were mixed with those previously convicted in one pot, where intrigue and contradictions were seething, where the terrible was shaded by the funny, and melancholy was shaded by luck. This is not a collection of tales and anecdotes. What is described is not fiction; despite the improbability of many events, in reality everything happened like that. The action is not limited to the army years; the book is full of sketches of the time when youth coincided with the end of the era. Contains obscene language.