I haven't been able to figure out what this French song I wrote about in my last journal entry is called and subsequently haven't been able to find it. Maybe Rafael is right and the song is not known at all and only the makers of the Smart commercial were able to come up with it.
I have had much more success with a different song. Whenever you watch a movie that involves Russians (maybe having a celebration or something; but that's not even required), they'll be humming, singing or dancing to a particular tune. Judging from the frequency you hear this tune, it must be the Russian song to end all Russian songs.
So how was I going to find it? I don't speak Russian and didn't understand the words (or for me: the phonetic unions) anyway. For Russian songs there seems to be a last resort and this is searching for "red army" which will come up with performances by the wonderful Red Army Choir. I could skip the impossible candidates (I knew it was not Kalinka;-).
My first attempt was successful: Katusha is its name. The version I found even exists on a webpage.
I was curious to see what was so special about this song that you hear it whenever a Russian enters the scene. I wasn't even sure whether it was natively Russian or a clever invention of someone else (similar to the allegedly Greek Zirtaki which was originally written for the movie adaptation of "Alexis Sorbas").
This turned out to be false alarm. The song has its roots in the second world war and was first sung by red army soldiers as a praise to their girls.
