One couldn?t talk much with the mates about political issues: first they made you a ?falcon? ( in kindergarten) then a pioneer ( at school) and then at high school you had to enter The Communist Youth Organization. My younger brother refused to become a CYO member, but he was threatened to be expelled and he had to accept. Since then he was controlled and followed from a distance being considered a problem pupil although he had the best results in school. (M. C. J., 108)

We?ve moved on from breeding rabbits and picking herbs from the field, to collecting snails.  It used to be very nice in Sindrilita, almost like having a trip into the fresh air. The nicest thing in Sindrilita were the silk worms that could be seen everywhere, even in libraries, as there were no proper conditions for them, but it was all very funny. Things changed with School no 20, where they took everything very seriously, as follows: bring in 5 kg of paper, or I don?t know how many kg of scrap metal or herbs. Where the hell was one to find herbs in Bucharest? It was better if they asked you to bring in lime, as you could climb a tree if needed. That is why the branches of lime tress were broken in spring; well, at that time, I don?t think you know, the authorities had come up with a brilliant idea, related to the cultivation of every available strip of land in Bucharest, so that was why there was nothing to eat, because you couldn?t grow carrots in the middle of the road. So the deeper you got, geographically speaking, spatially, into Bucharest, the more difficult and gloomier things got, the more rigid were the relations, depending on each person. (A.S., 130).

They were organized at any possible moment in a school year: in the beginning of the school year, at the end of each school semester, on the 1^st March, 8^th March, 1^st June, 25^th December and of course, at the end of the school year. One used to recite lofty poems about the country, nation and the comrade leaders, short ?Moralistic? plays were set, emphasizing the adequate behavior of a model pioneer.

The most important festivity was at the end of the year, when they distributed the prizes, the most wanted being the first prize with laurels.