Thiruvananthapuram: 'Minya zav voot Tanya' (My name is Tanya), said Tanya timidly. The sentence which Tanya Nair had been practising for weeks to say at the get-together of Keralites with Russian names held at Russian Culture Centre on Thursday.Five year-old Tanya, a UKG student at Holy Angels School was among the youngest participants in the event, which was attended by around 30 people .Pravada A R, a civil police officer from Peyad, came with her daughter Olga P Suman to attend the event. It was her father's wish, who was a communist to name her Pravada, while the curiosity and interest in Russian names led Pravada to name her daughter Olga, which means holy in Russian.Among the group was Asha C, a homemaker who named her daughter Nilovana, based on the name of a character from the novel 'The Mother' by Russian writer Maxim Gorky.The senior most person in the gathering was 60 year-old Khrushchev. "It was after I searched for the origin of my name I had an interest in learning Russian names. My name gave me an identity due to its uniqueness," said Khrushchev, a retired staff from KSRTC.According to official from Russian Culture Centre, the event was organised as part of the 70th anniversary of Indo-Russian collaboration."The translated literature from Russia had an influence among the people here. While, many of the Russian names adopted as first name by people are actually surnames," said Honorary Consul of Russian Federation Ratheesh C Nair. The majority of participants names were Stalin, Lenin and Pushkin. Actor Nandu was also present at the event. tnn

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