For the former ballerina, who has been reading books in the supermarket for 15 years, they put a sofa

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Anastasia Shevchenko, a resident of the Goloseevsky district, at the age of 78, unexpectedly for herself, became the real star of the Internet. In just a few days, a photo with her participation scattered across social networks. The woman attracted public attention by spending several hours reading books, but she does this not at home, but near a shelf in a shopping center store.

Locals have been watching a woman reading for almost 15 years. And this was enough to give her the title of the symbol of the Auchan store, located on Odessa Square - it is here that the pensioner spends a lot of time near the shelves with books in her hands. Anastasia Shevchenko herself lives nearby, literally a couple of houses from the shopping center. Neighbors speak of her as a quiet and harmless person. Rumor has it that there are troubles in the woman's family, but she does not spread this to anyone. Neighbors have an assumption that the woman has problems with children, and it is likely that this is why she tries to leave home every day.

Kiev journalists managed to have a heart-to-heart talk with the famous pensioner. From her words, they learned that the woman was born in the Cherkasy region and that in her youth she studied ballet. At the age of 15, Anastasia went to a Kiev school to study the art of choreography, and upon completion of her studies, the girl was offered a place at the Opera House. Then the woman got married, but unsuccessfully. As Anastasia herself says, her husband was very handsome, but at the same time an alcoholic and a gambler, so they did not have a family.

Because of her work in ballet, she did not give birth. A career in ballet and pregnancy are incompatible things, says Anastasia. And when she retired, she was already 40, so the woman took care of the children from the orphanage - a boy and a girl, who are now 31 and 33 years old. “And none of them succeeded,” Anastasia Shevchenko says bitterly.

When asked why she chose to go to the store instead of the library, the woman replies that there are no such establishments nearby, and she does not have enough strength and health to go somewhere. As the pensioner recalls, before there were enough books at home, but the children sold all of them, and the resulting "profit" was spent on drink. Most likely, already adult children take away from the woman and her pension, because she cannot even remember when she held in her hands the last due payments. Moreover, she is not even aware of the size of her pension.

Kind-hearted observers asked the administration to install a sofa for the woman who loves to read, but the woman continues to absorb information while standing, although she was nevertheless given a sofa. But everything is not so simple, and Anastasia Shevchenko is not standing because of the principle.

Correspondents also asked why she does not use the sofa, which was set up especially for her. It turns out that many hours of training and performances in pointe shoes, and then an abrupt termination of her career, had a bad effect on the woman's joints, and now it is very difficult for her to sit. According to Anastasia, now she dreams of pointe shoes in nightmares, because they made her, one might say, a cripple. It is interesting, but she learned that a sofa was specially set up for her from the correspondents. “Prices change almost every day - that's what you need to pay attention to,” the woman complains.

Anastasia Aristarkhovna was very surprised that she became popular in her old age thanks to her love of reading, but she refused to photograph for a long time, because considers himself not the best example. In gratitude for the frank conversation, the journalists offered the woman to choose any book as a gift, and this made her very happy. She chose the one that she had read before the arrival of the correspondents and for the first time in all the time of communication, a smile shone on her face.