The main goal of the ? agricultural practice? was obtaining material profit. No pedagogical objectives ever existed. One spared a lot of financial resources if one used the students in Agronomy (the weediest areas were cleaned by bare footed students). The tried to comfort themselves by the thought that they could sunbathe.

I remember that once I cut myself with the hoe because I was not accustomed to work with it and moreover I was tired.  There was no first aid. I had to go to the farm and wash my wound. The sad thing was that, both at school and at the university, we were accompanied by university professors of various titles, doctoral trainees. They had to stay from morning till evening, too.

Once when we were picking grapes, at Merei, Buzau, we were confronted with a lot of difficulties as far as hygiene was concerned. At daytime, we had to use grapes to wash our hands because there was no water. We lived thirty girls in a room and a lot of us got an eye ulceration, because of the lack of drinking and washing water and because of the filth. We were taken all of the 70 students to the communal bath in Buzau. And it was the first and last experience of this kind. (A. I. I., 63)

We were glad we did not have to go school and that we got to wear what we wanted. They took in buses and gone we were. I was to Chiajna, sorting onion, picking potatoes, peaches, peas, corn.  When we ate our fill, we stopped working: they stopped us in the middle of the field, we ate our lunch packs and we had fun. Once the bus almost went away leaving us behind. They hooted like crazy. We were reprimanded and the teacher threatened to give us a bad school report.

When picking up peas, we ate more than we picked up. Once, the boys threw potatoes at the math teacher?s head, because they had become a it tipsy. They were in danger of flunking the final examination. (A. I. I., 50)

As a school teacher, I did cultural work. We had festivities, artistic brigades. On Sundays we used to go to pick corn. We planted fruit trees in the school garden, grew silkworms. Each class had experimental plots. We cultivated potatoes. Potatoes were planted in square holes. The Colorado beetle had appeared and we had to kill them. He whom found one received a prize. He was given money. The children chased these beetles like mad. We had to pick medicinal plants: chamomile, milfoil, plantain, hawthorn ( the flowers and the leaves) in the forest.

The wheat threshed by the cooperative farms was gathered in plots. The teachers had to watch these areas. They had to read the newspapers for the men who came to thresh the wheat and to organize artistic programs.

One a control brigade came and I was on a plot, a threshing machine was out of order; they were party men. I did not go to the car that had stopped nearby. The mayor was accompanied by the party delegation. They became angry and called names because I had not reported to them. My husband and a colleague, both of them teachers, were forced to mow. The party men asked where they were. They brought them from the field, from the mowing, sweating, dejected and they took us to control the Archives of the Sports Association, ? Vointa?.

They forced us to go pick up peas, wheat reaping, to load corn cobs. Once, one of the activists took somebody?s motorbike for a ride. He fell and broke his hand. He thought he had been cursed by those he had scolded. (A. I. I., 62)