Hunting

Cristine and Corinne with the eternal flame

An uneventful day on the most part, although during our first lesson, a woman came in to talk to Jakob and I - as it happens, we have been asked to go to a school near to Irkutsk, where we are to listen to some children speaking in English, and then we must pick out those who show most promise. From what I understood, we will be getting some sort of souvenir, and I have also asked the lady if she will let us have a look around the town, as it is probably pretty hard to get there without having our transportation arranged for us beforehand! After lessons, Corinne, Cristine and I went to the park to help Corinne on her new quest - to find and photograph Russian couples kissing. This takes on a completely new aspect to Russian culture - unlike in Europe, where couples are generally quite held back in what concerns any show of affection, Russians seem to have a desire to be as public as possible in what concerns their love affairs. We all agree that it seems somehow slightly pornographic, yet it is hard to tear yourself away from staring on in amazement at the passion which these couples seem to generate between them.

One of the founding fathers of Irkutsk

Cristine and Corinne taking a photo of a couple on the bridge

I went around, covering Corinne from being seen by these couples and also taking pictures of some of the statues and churches around in preparation for a blog entry on either one of these. Most curious of these was the statue of one of the founding fathers of Irkutsk. However, he has no name, and Danya and I spent quite a while tonight pondering over whom it might be. After taking a few photos and looking at the eternal flame which is in the centre of the park, we decided to head back to the residence, and had dinner. Lara and I finished learning Katyusha and she taught me a French song, "Ne pleure pas Jeannette". We also learnt a few more Russian words, as we have decided to compile a joint vocabulary list so that I can learn French, she can learn English, and we both learn Russian!