Show Me Your Hands

Sometimes a man’s hands can tell you more than his portrait… In this post you’ll see many wonderful hands: those that played 5.000 concerts, dug up 150 tons of potatoes, conducted 20.000 operations and some others.

The hands that drew 40.000 caricatures.

Boris Yefimov, a caricaturist, died at the age of 108 years old.

“I had a chance to shake many good hands in my lifetime. I clearly remember the handshake with Mussolini. He received the Soviet delegation of 11 people and greeted everyone in person. Mussolini was gorgeous, spectacular – in a white civilian suit and two-tone shoes. A real dandy! Actually, I happened to deal with many great people. I saw and heard Lenin, I bade last farewell to Lunacharsky. I once talked to Stalin on the phone and dined with Tito…”

The hands that dissected more than 8.000 bodies.

Joseph Laskavy, a pathologist, 68 years old.

“According to a stereotype, a pathologist comes to work in the morning, drinks half a glass of public alcohol, rolls up sleeves, takes a large knife and guts corpses all day long. But in fact, our main work is the study of micro-preparations taken by a surgeon from a piece of a corpse in order to determine the disease. Unfortunately, the stereotype persists because everybody watches a lot of American movies. There is always that little Jew in glasses to whom a detective comes with a small piece of coal in a hand and who establishes that this coal was in the past a white man of 32 years old who ate chicken 2 hours before his death. Or here’s another image: a husky guy with hairy arms and a hairy chest. I successfully combine these both characters: on the one hand, I’m a Jew wearing glasses, and on the other, I have hairy arms. ”

The hands that did more than 3.000 circumcisions.

Ishaya Shafit, a mohel, 41 years old.

“The hands of a mohel are easily recognized among thousands of others. You should just look at his thumb and index finger. The point is that babies are circumcised without surgical gloves because at one of the stages of the operation a mohel has to use his nails, which for this very reason are sharpened in a special way.”

The hands that moved apart the mouth of a predator 4.116 times.

Askold Zapashny, a predator trainer, People’s Artist of Russia, 27 years old.

“If you wonder if I’ve ever put a hand in the mouth of a predator, then actually I do it almost every day. And it’s not only a hand, but the head as well. For this number we specially choose young animals and train them since early age. Not all predator trainers are so lucky to have such an animal, but we are. The tiger named Martin is just funky. We have great confidence in him. It means, he attacks not so often… ”

The hands that conducted 7.500 plastic operations.

Alexey Borovikov, the head of the Institute of Plastic Surgery, 54 years old.

“I am a surgeon. I bleed my patients and this is concerned with the risk of death. And if a patient is ready to take these risks, it means that he has a really strong desire to change the features of the body. My job is to help him. If a girl wants a large silicone breast – why not? My hands can change her fate.”

The hands that played 5.000 violin concerts.

Tatiana Grindenko, People’s Artist of Russia, 59 years old.

“At first I really took care of my hands as I’m a musician. But then I received the blessing of an old man to restore a church and build a church house. Then these very hands kneaded clay, straw and manure. It was the first time in my life when I did not take care of them – the idea was beyond my fears. ”

The hands that built 33 houses.

Nikolay Krasko, a builder, 51 years old.

“I build wooden houses. All by myself, beginning with its foundation and ending with the last nail. People do not believe this, they say: “What about rafters? How do you manage to set them up all alone?” I have a special technique and tools. Why isn’t a climber asked why he climbs mountains all alone? I want to prove myself that I can cope with difficulties. Take in hand the board of lime, it feels like silk. That’s why bathhouses are built of it – you’ll never can get a single splinter.”

The hands that held 260 puppets.

Vladimir Mikhitarov, a puppeteer, 59 years old.

“My first performance was held in Japan. After the show, I asked the audience in Japanese: “How did you like it?” Silence. They are shocked. Then I said: “Now I’m going to reveal a secret. You won’t believe it but everyone who played in front of you right now were puppets.” After a pause I continued: “I’ll reveal you one more terrible secret: “I am too a puppet.” After that there was a tremendous ovation.”

The hands that made 15.000 sessions of healing.

Allan Chumak, 70 years old.

“People often ask me how I can possibly tell about all person’s illnesses only by sliding my hand in front of him. The thing is that I take everything in one complex. But I can work without hands. This is an auxiliary tool. If tomorrow they, for example, are cut off, I won’t lose my gift.”

The hands that tied over 3.000 pioneer ties.

Lyudmila Sosnovik, a pioneer leader, 82 years old.

“A pioneer camp, 1939. When everybody left the camp for a walking tour, I suddenly saw the light in one of the chambers. I came in and found a sleeping homeless boy with lice running on his body. He told that his name was Zhenya and that his parents died. Then he left. But three days later came back again, together with his friends. During WWII this boy received the Hero of the Soviet Union in the Battle of Prokhorovka.”

The hands that dug up 150 tons of potatoes.

Lidiya Morozova, a peasant, 78 years old.

“What is land? It’s our mother, our nurse. One correspondent once said that it’s dirt! Dirt? How dare she say so? These words make me cry. What’s going on in this world? No mowing, no digging – so much land is wasted… I worked both on a farm and in a kolkhoz. In 1961 my friends gave me two rabbits, a male and a female, and I set to rabbit breeding. Now I have 40 of them.”

The hands that made nearly 20.000 cardiac operations.

Leo Bokeriya, the chief cardiac surgeon of the Russian Federation, 65 years old.

“A heart never looks scary. It’s very beautiful. This organ is arranged very cleverly – two auricles, two ventricles and blood vessels that nourish it – nothing superfluous. There are some difficult operations when a patient’s aorta is squeezed and the heart stops for a couple of hours. At this moment you understand how much you now need concentration, patience and a calm attitude to everything that is happening in the operating room.”