In the next few days, the world figure skating championships were about to begin in the Japanese city Nagano. However, Olympic silver medallist Evgeni Plushenko could not go because of an injury.

On Friday subscriber Galina Chernova called our editor’s office:

--"I am on tour right now, and I am coming from Moscow to St. Petersburg with my husband Valentin, an established artist of Russia, and my son Dmitry, she explained. We are jugglers. We will be performing the program ‘What a Wonderful World.’ All of us, especially Dimka, love and respect Evgeni. Having read in your paper a phone-line conversation with Plushenko, we thought, why not invite him to the circus to see our performance?

--"I will come with pleasure!" replied Evgeny.

Fifteen minutes before the start of the performance, Evgeni showed up with his parents at the building of Petersburg’s legendary circus. The girls ran up to him to get autographs. But the athlete did not want to create a commotion around himself, so we quickly went inside into a VIP-box, specially reserved by the Chernov family. The figure skater did not leave this box until the end of the show.

"Mom, can you get us something to eat, please?" asked Evgeny, as soon as we entered the box. So, while the skater’s mother Tatiana and father Victor were out buying sandwiches and lemonade, Zhenya explained that he visits the circus quite often.

"Last time I went just before New Year’s, also with my parents. It was a great show."

Evgeni watched the performance, his mother at his side. The artists, especially the girls in the show-ballet, were obviously aware of Plushenko’s presence in the audience. The scantily dressed dancers, smiling broadly, kept eyeing the skater’s box. Evgeni applauded to all the artists. The loudest ovations in the first part went to the Chernov family, who invited him. Their performance was “Illusion with Transformations,” in which Galina managed to change into five different dresses right in front of the audience in a few minutes’ time. After the performance, Zhenya admitted that he would like to take something from the “Illusion” and make into an element for one of his own programs.

Plushenko also liked the clowns.

“In their program there are moments that can be used in pair skating,” he said during the intermission. “However, to take this seriously would mean having the determination to go with your coach to the performances, to study the different movements.

During the intermission Evgeni, having signed a few autographs and having taken a couple of pictures with a circus employee, sat down next to the door, so as not to attract attention.

“Really, you should hide yourself, my son,” advised his mother.

In the second part Evgeni and his parents enjoyed the acrobatic show the most.

“This program is better than the one we saw in December,” Plushenko said after the performance. “The Chernovs did an awesome job. And their son is very talented – bright, flexible…

After the show the Chernovs invited Plushenko, his parents, and the “Petersburg Express” correspondent backstage, into their dressing room. They talked for an hour. After listening to compliments towards himself and to stories of circus life, Zhenya left his parents with the Chernovs and came out into the hallway, where the girls from the show ballet immediately threw themselves at him. The acrobats also saw the figure skater and came to talk to him.

“That is a beautiful lady,” said Evgeny when a cute brunette passed by him – this of course brought a smile to the girl’s face. Before we left, the Chernovs told us how Dmitry, having found out that Evgeny will come to their show, proclaimed,

“That means he’s a normal guy.”

“Of course I’m normal,” was Evgeny’s reaction.

Story by Alexander Lukyanov.

Translation by Elena