Вечером мы с ровесником сидим в парке и обсуждаем планы на будущее.

In the evening my peer and I sit in the park and discuss plans for the future.

Breakdown of Вечером мы с ровесником сидим в парке и обсуждаем планы на будущее.

• сидеть: to sit
• с: with
• парк: the park
• в: in
• и: and
• на: for
• мы: we
• вечером: in the evening
• план: the plan
• будущее: the future
• обсуждать: to discuss
• ровесник: the peer

Questions & Answers about Вечером мы с ровесником сидим в парке и обсуждаем планы на будущее.

Why is вечером used without any preposition? In English we say “in the evening”, but Russian just has “вечером”. What is this form?

Вечером is an adverbial form meaning “in the evening / in the evenings”.

Grammatically, it comes from the noun вечер (evening) in the instrumental case, but in practice you should treat вечером as a fixed time adverb, like:

• утром – in the morning
• днём – in/at the daytime
• ночью – at night

Russian very often expresses “at X time” without a preposition:

• Летом мы часто гуляем. – In summer we often go for walks.
• Зимой холодно. – In winter (it’s) cold.

So вечером here simply means “in the evening.” You don’t say в вечером — that would be incorrect.

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What’s the difference between вечером and по вечерам? Could I say По вечерам мы с ровесником сидим в парке… instead?

Both are correct, but they sound slightly different:

• Вечером – (this) in the evening / in the evening (as a general time)
  
  • Can describe a particular evening or a typical time, depending on context.
• По вечерам – in the evenings / every evening / in the evenings generally
  
  • Clearly emphasizes habitual, repeated action.

In your sentence:

• Вечером мы с ровесником сидим в парке…
  can be understood as:

  • “In the evening we sit in the park…” (generic: that’s what we do in the evenings), or
  • “(Tonight) in the evening we’ll be sitting in the park…” (colloquial, planned action).

• По вечерам мы с ровесником сидим в парке…
  strongly suggests:
  “In the evenings / every evening we sit in the park…” – clearly habitual.

So yes, you can say по вечерам, and it actually makes the “habit” meaning stronger.

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Why is it мы с ровесником сидим and not я и мой ровесник сидим? Is мы с ровесником a normal way to say “my peer and I”?

Yes, мы с ровесником is a very natural and very common way to say “my peer and I” / “the two of us” in Russian.

Patterns like:

• мы с другом – my friend and I
• мы с мамой – my mom and I
• мы с коллегой – my colleague and I

are used all the time in everyday speech.

Grammatically, мы is the main subject, and с ровесником (“with my peer”) just adds who is included with “we.” The verb is plural because of мы:

• Мы с ровесником сидим… – We (together with my peer) are sitting…

You could say:

• Я и мой ровесник сидим в парке…

This is also correct, just a bit more “spelled out.” In conversation, мы с ровесником sounds smoother and more colloquial.

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Why is it с ровесником with instrumental case? Could it be с ровесника or ровесником alone?

With the meaning “together with someone”, the preposition с always takes the instrumental case:

• с кем? – with whom? → с другом, с мамой, с коллегой, с ровесником

So:

• ровесник (nominative, dictionary form)
• ровесником (instrumental: with a peer / as a peer)

You must keep с + instrumental here.

• ❌ с ровесника – wrong (that could only appear in other constructions, e.g. removing something from someone: снять пальто с ребёнка – “take the coat off the child”, but that’s a different meaning of с = “from”).
• ❌ ровесником alone – wrong here; you need с to mean “with.”

So мы с ровесником literally: “we with (my) peer”, idiomatically: “my peer and I.”

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What exactly does ровесник mean? Is it just “friend,” or specifically “someone the same age”? And what about females?

Ровесник means “someone (male or generic) who is the same age as me / as someone else”, i.e. a peer in age. It does not automatically mean friend; it’s specifically about age equality.

• Он мой ровесник. – He’s the same age as me.
• Она моя ровесница. – She’s the same age as me.

So:

• ровесник – male / generic
• ровесница – female

In your sentence с ровесником is masculine (or gender-neutral if context doesn’t specify).

If you wanted to emphasize “friend” and “same age,” you might say:

• мой ровесник-друг – my friend who is the same age as me

But usually ровесник itself implies the age similarity.

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The verbs сидим and обсуждаем are in the simple present. In English we’d say “are sitting” and “are discussing.” How does Russian express this “-ing” idea? Is there any difference?

Russian doesn’t have a special “-ing” form like English. The simple present of an imperfective verb usually covers both:

• English simple present (we sit, we discuss)
• English present continuous (we are sitting, we are discussing)

So:

• сидим (мы сидим) – we sit / we are sitting
• обсуждаем (мы обсуждаем) – we discuss / we are discussing

Context decides which English translation fits better. In your sentence, both of these are plausible:

• “In the evening, my peer and I sit in the park and discuss our plans for the future.” (habit)
• “(Tonight) in the evening, my peer and I are sitting in the park and are discussing plans for the future.” (specific situation, more colloquial/future-like plan)

Russian uses aspect (imperfective vs perfective) rather than continuous forms to express nuances of process vs result. Here, both verbs are imperfective, focusing on the ongoing activity or a regular habit, not on a completed result.

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Why is it обсуждаем (imperfective) and not обсудим (perfective)? What would change if I used обсудим?

• обсуждать (imperfective) – to discuss (process, ongoing, habitual)
• обсудить (perfective) – to discuss and finish discussing (achieve a result)

In your sentence:

• …сидим в парке и обсуждаем планы…
  focuses on the activity: we (are) sitting and (are) discussing. It can be ongoing right now or a repeated action.

If you said:

• Вечером мы с ровесником сидим в парке и обсудим планы на будущее.

this would sound like a plan/decision about the future result:

• “In the evening my peer and I will sit in the park and (we will) finish discussing the plans for the future.”

So:

• обсуждаем – neutral, process-oriented; works for “what we usually do” or “what we’re going to be doing.”
• обсудим – emphasizes that by the end of the conversation, the discussion will be completed (a single planned outcome).

That’s why обсуждаем is more natural in a general description like this.

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Why is it в парке and not на парке or в парк? How do I choose between в and на, and between location vs direction?

Here, в парке is location: “in the park.”

1. Location vs direction

• в парк (accusative) – to the park, movement into the park
  
  • Мы идём в парк. – We are going to the park.
• в парке (prepositional) – in the park, location inside
  
  • Мы сидим в парке. – We are sitting in the park.

In your sentence, you’re already there, sitting, so it must be в парке.

2. в vs на

You generally use:

• в for inside enclosed or defined spaces:

  • в парке – in the park
  • в доме – in the house
  • в магазине – in the store

• на for surfaces, open areas, events, some institutions:

  • на улице – in the street / outside
  • на стадионе – at the stadium
  • на концерте – at the concert

A park is treated as a space you are “in”, so it’s в парке, not на парке.

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Why is it планы на будущее, literally “plans for the future”? Could I say планы о будущем or будущие планы instead?

Планы на будущее is the standard natural phrase for “plans for the future.”

• на + accusative very often means “for (a period of time / for the future)”:
  • планы на выходные – plans for the weekend
  • планы на завтра – plans for tomorrow
  • билеты на завтра – tickets for tomorrow

Here:

• будущее (accusative) – “the future” as a time period
• на будущее – for the future

Alternatives:

• планы о будущем – sounds unnatural in this meaning; we don’t usually use о with планы in this way.
• будущие планы – literally “future plans,” but in Russian it usually sounds like plans that will exist in the future, not “plans about the future as a time period.” It’s rarely used and is stylistically awkward here.

So for “plans for the future,” use планы на будущее.

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Why don’t we say наши планы or свои планы? The English is “discuss our plans for the future,” but the Russian just says обсуждаем планы на будущее.

Russian often omits possessive pronouns (мой, наш, свой) when the meaning is obvious from context.

Here, мы с ровесником обсуждаем планы already makes it clear whose plans are being discussed: presumably ours. Adding наши or свои is possible but not required.

Options:

• обсуждаем планы на будущее – natural, default
• обсуждаем наши планы на будущее – also correct, a bit more explicit
• обсуждаем свои планы на будущее – correct and emphasizes that these are “our own” plans (not, say, someone else’s).

In many everyday contexts, Russian prefers the more compact form without a possessive when there’s no risk of confusion.

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Is the word order fixed? Could I say Мы вечером с ровесником сидим в парке… or Мы с ровесником вечером сидим в парке… instead?

The word order in Russian is relatively flexible. All of these variants are grammatically correct; they just change rhythm and emphasis slightly:

1. Вечером мы с ровесником сидим в парке…

   • Neutral; вечером sets the time frame at the beginning.

2. Мы с ровесником вечером сидим в парке…

   • Slightly more focus on the people first, then time: “We (my peer and I), in the evening, sit in the park…”

3. Мы вечером с ровесником сидим в парке…

   • Emphasis: we (in the evening, together with my peer) sit in the park…

All are understandable and natural in the right context. The original version is probably the most neutral and typical for written Russian.

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Could I drop the pronoun мы and just say С ровесником сидим в парке и обсуждаем планы…? Would that still be correct?

Yes, you can drop мы here:

• Вечером с ровесником сидим в парке и обсуждаем планы на будущее.

This is grammatically correct and sounds quite natural in informal spoken Russian.

Russian often omits subject pronouns when the subject is clear from the verb ending:

• Сижу в парке. – (I) am sitting in the park.
• Сидим в парке. – (We) are sitting in the park.

Here, the -им ending on сидим / обсуждаем already tells us it’s “we.” The phrase с ровесником clarifies who is included.

Using мы just makes it a bit more explicit and is slightly more neutral, especially in written language.