tv [untitled] October 8, 2012 6:30pm-7:00pm EDT
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postman nicholai simeonoff will now take his heavy bag and head to remote villages where the people illegally await him as well as letters newspapers and magazines he also brings them food all the village grocery stores have long since vanished not even a loaf of bread can be bought. he won't. you know you want me to write down pies yes plays and tangerines. one kilogram as an elf. the elderly people here only manage their lives in these villages because of the postman's help. track to. every single day. travels to these hamlets without fail. to his health
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some need to have a new floor others. needs to be plowed or a roof repaired. high. look this is the man who used to be. flooded after his rotten roof sprang a leak following a downed pole the postman puts his mailbag aside and sets about patching it up no one else can do it. for. the wood. but also worked as a postman for the best part of his life. he had
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a daily round but in those days there were only newspapers and magazines and he sank to the point. when i was a post there were many people in the villages. i would bring in the newspapers as. possible those. back then there was no need for me to help the residents. but now the. anybody around. so the people who need help. you know i have my house only an old woman lives there by. someone younger i come to see her. and she visits me at my place not yours in those ten hens will be pensioned off soon. for the few surviving households left in the
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village this postman is now a lifeline. are what we it's leaking as you can see it's completely ruined which means. if you fix your roof everything will be ok again the roof doesn't leak anymore. so he brings us you food firewood and so on. and shorty is a real treasure. nicholas to me almost postal route takes him through about a dozen old villages young people have long since abandoned them and moved to the city. only elderly people remain living in their dilapidated houses. these rural communities a far from major roads in some of the country lanes are clogged with mud.
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in winter it's snow as for sightseeing there's only an old church which fell into ruin in the one nine hundred thirty s. it stone threatens to fall on passers by it at any moment. and the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights and the waters increased and bore up the ark and it was lifted up above the earth but the rain has been pouring down on the villages where nicholai works for more than a week the postman's are called something unusual human communication mutual assistance and selflessness these qualities are rapidly fading away from the face of the world today. or can i come in.
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there i've run out of milk but now this much will last a long time well no really i think it will last until wednesday. i think so too. i'll fetch you some firewood. eighty year old make. is the last inhabitant of this hamlet because former neighbors sometimes come here but he prefers to steer clear of them. see i can't even raise my right hand. i'm like a skinny accordion. there were seventy eight households in a village. we were a close knit bunch. we always helped one another. but now you can count the people still living here on the fingers of one hand. for some reason they're quite mean
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i'll be damned if i know. i makes a point of seeing the elderly man several times a week michelle's son died a long time ago and his wife died recently the postman is now his only visitor. is just me all alone i often talk to my mother and wife when looking at these photos sometimes i even with. time for me. thanks for coming. but. i wish nicholai came to see me every day then we would talk our heads off and i would be better off. under stand that he too has his hands full.
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he has to go places all the time. he little troublemaker. that's not everything. now let's take the bag. depending on the time of year uses different means of transport sometimes he drives a car but generally a tractor is the better choice if a tractor can't handle the journey he rides his horse. was there any one receipt. yes one. thousand you didn't bring me anything pies or sweets because you're on horseback.
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what you know what do you want from me don't touch don't touch. oh are you talking to me i'm not talking to you i mean the whole. nikolai's horse has been with him for more than ten years and the postman knows his mood all too well and thinks the horse is pretty lazy. delivering mail to people is no fun for him he'd rather be back at the stable as soon as possible. so that when we. get back you hold again. the mailman is also a mouse to craftsman of stoves villages can do without them in winter they keep their homes warm and in summer males are cooked on top nicholai boasts that
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he's already made more than one hundred such stoves. you're still like a trying to set some time aside for work on the hug but you share it turns out that i've got no toy but i try to scale down my work in the villages and do something for my own household but such plans never come to fruition in that case i'd have to choose between doing something for them and my own for example i have a beehive to take care of the honey needs to be harvested in good time otherwise basan wasps will pinch it old. villages a surprise to the postman's high morals he doesn't drink or engage in idle chit chat he prefers to turn up his sleeves and get down to work. many women here hold him up as an example to their husbands and sons.
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there's an old oak tree near the house where the village postman lives with his family it was planted by nicholas ancestors three hundred years ago. the back yard is set aside for pets and chickens while the house is full of children. and gold spoken to noah saying go forth from the ark the wife invites sons and by sons wives with the bring forth with the every living thing that is with all flesh . is like no it's all. told no it to build an ark and bring animals of every description on board and he ordered them to multiply again forty days and nights here. have seven children two of the daughters a married and live elsewhere but the still drawn back to the house where they were
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born they often bring their families to the village nikolai's younger children are about to finish high school with my oldest daughter taste twenty six years old in dashes twenty four in martial. soon to be twenty three then comes out to a woman who's eighteen is seventeen will be sixteen and it. will be fifteen soon when all members of the family get together sixteen people show up at a time postman nicholai often jokes that he has a whole village under his roof. with these four kids were born right here not in a maternity ward and june was born in late march when no evidence would have been able to get here i didn't like the idea of being driven back home in a tractor certainly not with a baby in my arms so i did what needed to be done without leaving home. mario tell maria shown to. her in rolled into our city. yes how long we would be here i'll be here another week
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just so we could. yes so you're helping your father. his father take bread to nearby villages the roads between them all but impossible in spring and autumn especially if it's raining and nikolai has to hurry because people are waiting for. the bread van stops at the old church in congo any further because the road ends here the van visits just twice a week people from a dozen villages flock here to queue for the loaves in eager expectation of the vans arrival. many travels several kilometers on foot for the chance of getting a fresh loaf. in the winter that the roads are covered no how can you get around. the way he used to drag it. i tied it together and
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came to town to get groceries. there's no other way. a sled is not an option because it rolls over. yet it can be awful at times. a while ago grocery stores were a common sight in these villages. as the local population dwindled the shops disappeared the owners realized that carrying supplies over difficult roads was not paying off. at this one two three.
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five. do you have any bones that we've caught. on. if. you. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harkin welcome to the big picture.
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but. since ancient times russia has celebrated the day when ripe apples are harvested. these women have baked many cakes and place them out for both the local residents and those coming here to their country houses. people don't stay at home on this day. they sing songs and congratulate each other instead as the haymaking marking the end of summer is complete. milledge postman nicholai simeonoff also drops by to celebrate the holiday. when he arrives the locals reveal what the newspapers have been writing about him. headlines call him a remarkable person for helping his fellow villagers. and the
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award goes to nikolai simul known for his active participation in the life of the village. thank you. get back the next day nikolai heads to a local bank to take out a loan for a new car his old one often breaks down because he's been taking it over country roads but the bank won't lend to nikolai. i don't know why i got turned down or used to get money from the bank before and don't forget to take your documents with you show of course. i wanted to buy a second hand car. i was going to borrow one hundred thousand rubles about three thousand dollars but the. last time i went there.
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they told me that there was no money available it was. absolutely nothing. better shame. the villages love nikolai and feel a little sorry for him because they believe that his profession will soon be made redundant newspapers letters and transactions are becoming increasingly electronic i have a daughter who is sixteen i think that her generation is unlikely to use postal services we already live in the new century that offers a variety of computer technology so i don't think they will need the post office i think up some twenty to thirty years from now there won't be a village here nothing will remain as it is now.
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when i started working. used to be a big village. and now there's no more no vo vendor square i phone in and creche cause there's only one house remaining. they say we're going to see the end of the world on december the twenty first wherever they will which december the twenty first of all go this year like. this year the group or you feel yes. so it's time to build the bunker. yes it's time but a bunker is not the solution you'll get drowned here. ok it's time for me to go. have
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a good time here. ok. me you see me just come out. on. come on take the bread. come here. take it or what's up don't think give you any brand. comes here yes he wants the bread practically all the family has gathered at nikolai's house this get together is devoted to his granddaughter victoria she's just started school and they've given a new bag they've also promised to get her a smartphone with internet access as a present. of the samee on a family except nicole i use the devices even though this multi-talented postman
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can repair a track to install the stove and cover a roof he stays away from computers but now our dad has a hard time using a south phone and has to resort to mom's help daddy can have made headway with the t.v. set should be a presser on the button on their mode control he always asks me to help out as we used to spend on paper before and now computers have to play replays them i write down when potatoes are planted how many rows and what kind and when it's time to get out and how much of a yoga i got. my struggles with the thought that one day a soulless machine and e-mails will take over the role of postman and letters. his children though trying to convince their father that there is something. good to bad computers to. talk here like on a telephone but with the keyboard. just wrote. he says hi.
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and immediately on says. well it is usually longer. you can write loads here. people prefer letters that's just out of habit well first you can send everything via the internet especially business less is all possible still yes there was no telephone or internet before but now the technology has become faster of course. a lot has happened during the life of former postman. today or uses a mobile phone and has a satellite dish but he remembers when the village saw its first t.v. set a major event for everyone. once the t.v. set was bored screen was facing the window. to watch it. oh neighbors gave me this and i
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know i don't know whom to call. nikolai has come to visit vastly again with his son jim they want to finish the repairs on his roof and have also brought him a fresh newspaper up. the road is changing rapidly but human values remain thanks to people like nikolai simeonoff. the home is on the way nikolai and his son have laid a new roof giving vasily to tide home to live in for many more years.
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