Here you can see a Russian delegation from Gus-Hrustalnyi, an industrial town in Vladimir region, visiting the Kumera Corporation plant in Riihimäki in April, 1997 (photo by Riihimäen Sanomat). CEO of Kumera Corporation, Vesa Kumpulainen (right) is introducing the gear plant to Director of the Gus Hrustalnyi fitting plant, V.Bereskin (left in front) and Gus-Hrustalnyi Mayor, Boris M. Yumatov (2nd on the left). Andrei Kokov (2nd on the right) acted as an interpreter.

And here is a picture scanned from a local newspaper from the time we toured various municipal facilities and institutions, as well as companies (Ekokem) with guests from Olaine town in Latvia, who were visiting Riihimäki in August,1997 (Riihimäki Mayor Esko Hanninen is on the left, next to him Olaine Mayor Oiars Kienkass; Chairman of the City Council Arto Lapiolahti is on the right, and next to him the interpreter, Andrei Kokov). The intense communication between Finns and Latvians was successfully supported via the Russian language both at working sites and at leisure.

Another successful cross-cultural event took place in November, 1998: then officials from Lithuanian Prison Department visited Central Prison of Riihimäki and other penitentiary facilities by invitation of Finnish Ministry of Justice, Prison Department. I had pleasure to provide successful Finnish-Russian interpretation during this visit.