December 14, 2020

More Dead Souls


More Dead Souls
Rostec. Employees: 14 less than you'd think. Ivtorov, Wikimedia Commons

Life reflects Gogol, too often.

An executive at one of Russia's largest high-tech firms, Rostec, is under house arrest following a legal scandal.

Alla Laletina, director for legal support and corporate governance, has lost her position after it was discovered that fourteen of her employees didn't exist. Instead, she collected salaries from the nonexistent workers at Novosibirsk Artificial Fiber Plant JSC, which manufactures military equipment.

The total amount in salaries collected totals more than R5 million ($68,500), and the scheme reportedly included other beneficiaries, as well.

At least they were employees, and not serfs (or students).

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A Taste of Russia

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White Magic

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The thirteen tales in this volume – all written by Russian émigrés, writers who fled their native country in the early twentieth century – contain a fair dose of magic and mysticism, of terror and the supernatural. There are Petersburg revenants, grief-stricken avengers, Lithuanian vampires, flying skeletons, murders and duels, and even a ghostly Edgar Allen Poe.
Marooned in Moscow

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At the Circus

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