Interview with Lubomir Canter, a student born in Amneville

One of Perm’s twin cities is Amneville. Lubomir Canter, a student born in Amneville, visited Perm and shared his impressions about the city, the purpose of his visit and also told about himself.

We would like to learn more about you, what is your age and occupation?

I am 18, and I am a student at the faculty of law in Sorbonne. I have two brothers and one sister, I live in Paris, in an apartment, while my parents live in Amneville. I am very interested in Russia – its nature, literature, and I even think of staying here for a while. I have already been to Berlin, Munich, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Warsaw, Krakow, and now it’s the first time when I’m in Russia – particularly, in Perm. But I would like to return here again, perhaps during my next school vacation.

What have you managed to see in Perm already?

I’ve been to Kungur, Khokhlovka, opera and ballet theatre – we watched “Romeo and Juliet” performance. I went to the art gallery, the Perm history museum, the Gorky Park, I took my time to walk around and even went to the cinema. I’m staying with a family of a school girl, who is a student of school #22, and I attend some classes there – Russian, literature, history, I’ve even given lessons of French in Alliance Française.

Please tell us about your impressions. What did you like best of all, what was the most memorable?

Ballet, certainly. Ballet was amazing. I’ve never seen anything like that before. Though French theatres also have ballet performances, they are very different from what I have seen here. Kungur also impressed me a lot, we had the ice cave tour.

I attended events of the Festival of Twin Cities; it was very interesting to learn about different cultures – Chinese, American. I managed to communicate with representatives of various countries. The festival was very showy, and captivating. For example, in Gorky park, Chinese girls demonstrated a great dancing show. I’ve never been to China so far, but their culture looks very interesting to me.

Among things you’ve seen in Perm, what did stick in your memory most of all?

This is a big city, very cultured. You can have a nice rest here, take a walk, shop around, and in spite of Perm is an industrial city, it has beautiful nature and eye-catching landscapes.

Perm is not very different from Paris or Amneville. Well, Paris is bigger than Perm, of course. Paris is more oriented towards business and commercials, while Perm is mostly industrially oriented. Amneville used to be an industrial city too, like 20 years ago or so.

People in Russia are very kind, polite, and it is very pleasant to feel such hospitality.

Have you tasted Russian cuisine?

Yes, I’ve tasted borsch, vareniki, shchi. People here often drink tea with a cake (In France, we rarely drink tea, and I prefer coffee, but earl grey tea with a cake is absolutely delicious). I tasted various pies (they are called pirogi here) and many-many dishes with potatoes. It is very nice to get warm after a walk in the cold with tasty hot meals.