Russians name their children and liger cubs after Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson’s death may trigger another wave of Jackson Mania. The first vestiges of this phenomenon have already appeared in Russia and Ukraine. The media of Ukraine’s Zaporozhskaya Region reported that one of the local villages would be renamed after the late King of Pop. In the meantime, a couple of Jackson’s fans from Russia’s Novosibirsk Region have already baptized their newborn son as Michael Jackson.

Photo: Russians name their children and liger cubs after Michael Jackson

The news about the new name for a small Ukrainian village appeared on the Zaporozhskoye Vremya website. An official from the regional government told the website that his colleagues decided to submit the question on the agenda of their forthcoming session in July.

It goes about the village of Oktyabrskoye (named after the Great October Revolution). The deputy said that the village would be renamed as Jackson.

Moreover, several officials from one of the factions of the Kiev Municipal Council said that they had supposedly decided to rename one of the city squares after the late US singer.

In the meantime, a big fan of Michael Jackson from Russia, Yevgeniya Shalenko, 29, decided to name her newborn son in honor of the legendary singer. The boy, who was born the day when the King of Pop died, would have a hyphenated name – Shalenko-Jackson. The woman has already submitted the adequate application to the local Civil Registry Office.

Another Russian fan said that the Moscow government should remove Lenin’s body from its Tomb on Red Square and have Michael Jackson’s body placed there instead for good, Novy Region news agency reports.

The fan, Alexander Valov, a music producer, told the news agency that he went to the US Embassy in Moscow soon after the news about the singer’s death. “I wanted to pay tribute to him there, to lay some flowers. I thought on the way to the embassy that it would be great to have his body embalmed and placed in Lenin’s Tomb on Red Square,” the man said.

Alexander Valov is certain that Michael Jackson would see the true value of such a suggestion. The man even said that he was already in talks with the sponsors who would be ready to invest in the project, as well as with the singer’s family – to have the body delivered to Moscow.

Another interesting story related to Michael Jackson took place at Safari Zoo in Russia’s Volgograd. The family of ligers (a hybrid cross between a lion and a tiger) gave birth to a healthy cub for the first time in Russia. The rare cub was named in honor of the late US singer.

“I thought – why not? I like listening to Michael Jackson’s music. I have nearly all of his CDs. His songs are the songs of my generation, so we decided to name the cub after him,” the director of the zoo, Gamlet Kasyan said.