From the Old Photoalbum

1986. Mir Space Station is launched. Space Shuttle Challenger explodes. Nintendo releases The Legend of Zelda. Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen are born, as well as one of the London Underground suicide bombers.

Odessa, Soviet Union. Public School #39 (former Madame Balen De Balu’s Gymnasium for Girls), 3rd grade, group A poses for a picture in front of a patriotic mural depicting the fictional underage foe of burgouise, Malchish Kibalchish. Here’s a modern rendering. If I remember correctly, the remainder of the mural depicted Malchish’s main foe, Main Burjuin and his henchmen. I might be wrong about that though.

Somehow I missed school the day when the picture was taken. Of all the people in the picture, I sometimes chat on ICQ with two.

Update:
An interesting thing to notice is the color of boy’s shirts. There were two types of uniforms – one for special occasions and one for everyday use. No doubt that prior to the picture was taken everyone was told to put the special occasion uniform, which for boys means white shirts instead of blue ones, and for girls – white aprons instead of brown or black ones (like seen in this ebay auction). As you can see, all the girls are wearing white aprons, but most of the boys are wearing incorrect blue shirts.