Ha-ha. The main comic character of the Soviet school system—the perpetually drunk military instructor—is back in the ring. In 2023! Who would have thought. When I tell children about school in the USSR, this sweet duo naturally comes up again and again: the military instructor and the shop teacher. The kids laugh and think I’m exaggerating. Well, now with the return of NVP (basic military training in Soviet and Russian schools), they’ll see for themselves. I only experienced one year of NVP myself before it was replaced by OBZh (a school subject on basic life safety), but that was more than enough. Those of you who are outraged by the militarization of schools can relax completely. There won’t be any real militarization there. In 95% of cases, NVP means a retired colonel yelling obscenities at unruly schoolkids, who ignore him anyway. It means ridiculous attempts at drill practice. And it means kids pooling money for a bottle of cognac for this drunk so he’ll leave them alone. Oh, and they’ll be putting on gas masks from time to time. Those were the funniest lessons, though the girls were unhappy that boys in gas masks kept chasing them down the hallways. The 21st century. New problems, new opportunities, the world is moving forward. And we’ve got NVP. Every parent wants their child to graduate from school actually knowing a foreign language. That would really come in handy in life. Maybe we should add more foreign-language classes? No. NVP. Modern finance has become part of everyone’s life. Maybe we should introduce a class on that? Loans, deposits, interest rates. How to buy stocks. Investment risks. Everyone clearly needs that. No. We need NVP. Russia has an epidemic of drug addiction, an HIV epidemic, and an unthinkable number of abortions, including among teenagers. That is exactly where a school course is needed. Absolutely not—NVP. At 15 to 17, schoolchildren are beginning their plunge into the lifelong abyss of relationships. Partners, spouses, children, aging parents, mothers-in-law, jealousy, passion, and suffering. All of that is what really shapes their lives. So maybe some classes in emotional intelligence? Conflict resolution, coping with depression? No. What we urgently need in schools is some guy with the intelligence of a stool, twice a week, lecturing students on his view of global problems. It seems the officials themselves have already given up on Russia’s future. You can just imagine them sitting there in the ministry saying, “What future? None of this has any prospects anyway. To hell with it all—let’s bring back NVP and get it over with faster.”