ABSTRACT
In a humorous Dutch song of some decades ago (Drs P., 1974), a family on the way to the Russian city of Omsk riding in a three-horse open sleigh (troika) through the Siberian forest is suddenly faced with a pack of hungry wolves. They try to keep the wolves at bay by singing songs and throwing food, but the wolves soon catch up with the troika carrying the family. The desperate parents then decide to throw one child after the other overboard to mollify the insatiable wolves. In the end, the mother is also thrown out, and the father is left, but he is so giddy that the goal is within reach that he loses his balance and falls off the troika, too. Omsk, the song goes, is a very pretty city, but just that little bit too far away.
