We were twenty people in a workshop. The first one who came earlier than 7 a.m., we came in turns, took inserted all the coins. When we left somebody was always the last one. In fact, we had two boys who lived in the attic of the factory. They gathered all the coins that were not inserted when they realized there were too many at half past three, the end of our schedule. But this problem was solved for we had a keeper. We gave him a bottle of brandy, one of vodka or something? (I.H., 29)

There was a funny smell inside the tobacco shop near where I lived ? it was the smell of that poor quality tobacco, the Carpati or Snagov. The shop assistant was this very tall and sturdy lady who wore her black-dyed hair in an upward loop which made her look even taller, and lipstick, and big golden earrings, and a fur coat. As soon as it was a bit chilly, she took out her fur coat. She looked like a lady to me, all the more so as she smelled of tobacco. Tobacco shops also put on sale newspapers, shaving blades, toothpicks, after-shaves, you can imagine what they smelled like. There was a deodorant that truly made me feel like throwing up. (114)

TOILET PAPER

In Bucharest, you could see people carrying on their shoulders some twenty rolls of toilet paper stringed together. There were two such symbols: the toilet paper and the eggs. (S. R.-B., D. R.-B., 137)

In the stone age of our communism, that is, at the beginning of the period of fierce decisions, the use of toilet paper was considered an example of ?bourgeois dross?? Instead one could use the Scinteia Paper, to which everyone obligatorily subscribed, and the subscription fee was retained from the monthly salary. It was even said that the printing ink on this newspaper had hygienizing effects.

Later on, when multilaterally developed socialism came to consider this ideological problem, too, the cellulose factories started producing toilet paper as well. This initiative was ardently welcomed by Romanian society.