Postscript to Побратимы

I didn't think there would be much use in publishing this text without the picture. (Go ahead! Click on it!)

P.S. At my dad’s sixtieth birthday party last Saturday, the 22^nd, one of his guests, Trilby (I don’t think she’d mind being identified), showed up with an old something-or-other (what is the doo-dad in this picture exactly? A bannerette? A mini-sash?) acknowledging cooperation between the two blood-brother cities. Back in the ’80’s, she had apparently hosted an engineer from Novosibirsk studying in Minneapolis on a research stipend, and he’d brought this over. I don’t think that this is meant to commemorate the inception of the Sister City relationship because I think she hosted him before that…

Nonetheless, I thought it was pretty awesome.

Trilby offered to try to find this guy and see if he’s still in Novosibirsk. If he is, how cool would it be to talk to someone else with a connection to both places? (Pretty cool, if ya ask me.)