The Hematological Center

The Hematological Scientific Centre of Russian Academy of Medical Sciences is an old large building, submerged by the constant and continuous process of repairs. The territory is guarded by relaxed people, wearing a uniform and not completely fulfilling their duty. Their main task is to raise a barrier if cars drive to the hospital. Sometimes they ask: "Where are you going?". If a person is a bit embarrassed and can't answer the question and explain where he/she is going, who he/she is and why he/she doesn't have a pass, the guards may forbid him/her to enter. But since there may be a lot of plausible reasons to visit the Hematological Centre, (from a consultation to a donor blood giving) obtaining a pass is a pointless process. Entering and leaving the centre is allowed day-and-night.

In warm weather the sick people walk around the place. They walk with sticks or are in wheel-chairs, some of them even with medicine droppers. Patients can be easily seen. They wear training suits and their heads and bodies are bald. Women prefer to wear kerchiefs. It seems to make them all look alike. There are a lot of young people in the yard. It's not a rare case to meet a young person with a stick in the company of people of the same age. One day a man wearing a hospital mask was biking very fast along the fence of the hematological centre.

Across the wooden planking which leads to the crossing point of the hematological centre, women in kerchiefs and masks return from the nearby supermarkets with packets of products: the meals of the hospital are nutritious and satisfying but still tasteless and monotonous.