The Sociable Republic of WeHo

They come from Moscow, St. Petersburg, Ukraine, the Caucasus and the Ural Mountains, and they discuss “Dear Abby” on Mondays in West Hollywood.

Abby is a hot topic at Conversation Cafe, a two-hour get-together where immigrants from the former Soviet Union gossip, drink coffee or tea and practice their English at Plummer Park. The approximately 25 men and women hashing over topics from the newspaper one Monday ranged from their 40s to 70s and had been in the states from six months to nine years. Headline of the day: an item about coyotes venturing out of L.A.’s hills into populated areas.

The cafe is one in the whirlwind of city-funded activities held at the park for West Hollywood residents, one-third of whom are Russian immigrants. There’s also the Retired Doctors Assn., the Retired Engineers Assn., the Russian War Veterans Assn., the Russian Literature Club and the Russian Vocal Ensemble.

Like many park stalwarts, Sofia Gelman, 70, has a full social calendar. Gelman, who emigrated nine years ago from Georgia in the Caucasus, where she was a neurologist, attends the retired doctors’ meeting as well as the conversation gathering. And a gang from Conversation Cafe took in an evening of French music at the Hollywood Bowl in July. “This group changed our lives completely,” Gelman says.