The Beauty of Irkutsk

Irkutsk is also called "Paris of Siberia". It is a wonderful city with many old wooden houses. Even if a fire in 1879 destroyed most of them. Irkutsk is one of the largest cities in Siberia, situated on the river Angara only 70 km from Lake Baikal.

Many of the old wooden houses seem to lean a lot or they already sank pretty much into the ground.
The reason for this is permafrost.

Permafrost ground forms in areas where the temperature of the ground is less than the freezing point of water. Building a house on permafrost ground causes that the heat from the house melts the permafrost ground beneath it. The ground softens and the house starts to sink slowly into the ground. Some of Irkutsk's houses are already sank to the windowsills. People still live in these homes or you can find shops etc. in these houses.