Читать книгу The Adventures of Kesha the Russian Boy - Константин Воскресенский - Страница 7

Of course, it is very risky for children of such a tender age to travel to whole other villages, but that's not to say home can't be just as dangerous. We had a lift in our apartment block. Boy, what a lift it was! The coolest! Why? Because, from the inside, you had to open and close the large, wooden folding doors by hand. On the outside, on each floor, there was also a large metal door which you also had to operate manually.

Have you ever taken the lift with the doors open? Oh, you're missing out. It's an indescribable feeling. I don't remember who taught us this little trick, probably some older boys in the building. But this is what we did: we headed inside the lift, closing the outside door but not the inside one. Then, we would push our arms to both sides of the lift wall and, feeling steady, would lift up our feet to hang there. The lift senses that there's no one there anymore, and so will wait until someone presses the button on another floor. Next, your partner in crime (which you need to arrange beforehand) would press the button on another floor and the lift would shoot off and the metal bars from the elevator shift would flash before our eyes. If we got dizzy (which was a common occurrence), then we'd just drop back down to the floor and the lift would stop dead. No need to worry, the ride's not over yet, you'll be off again soon.

There's another trick «for the older ones». Why? Because you want to keep the outside door open too. To do this, your partner needs to get in place before pressing the button to call the lift. They must:

1) Open the outer door;

2) Reach behind the wall and find the little switch that senses when the doors are open or closed. Switch it so the system thinks the doors are closed (when actually, they're open). Then, reach into the elevator shaft to find the lever and pull it out;

3) Then, they can twist this lever clockwise to tighten it and put it in the «outside door is closed» position;

4) Then, the doors will stay like that until you undo the lever. So, your partner can go up all the floors, doing this, leaving all the doors open;

5) All that's left if for you to fly up all the floors in the lift, watching all the open doors fly past you!

When these new modern lifts with automatic doors came out in the 00s, parents everywhere breathed a sigh of relief. Now our children will not be able to get themselves into such danger. The elevator shaft isn't a playground, no sir.

But what I'd give for another go right now! Especially with the new mod cons…