Never Ending Holidays!

In one of my last entries I wrote about my love for history and holidays, and sometimes the history of holidays. If holidays were a narcotic drug then I’ve been in a hypnotic condition for the past month. The western Christmas has come and gone and New Years 2008 has past, but that is only the tip of the ice berg of holidays for Ukrainians. They have all of our holidays and then celebrate Orthodox Christmas on January 7th, and then they follow up modern New Years with Old New years a week after their Christmas. And I can’t forget about St. Nicholas day which involves a saint from Turkey who doubles up on Santa Clause’s duties, except he dresses like the pope and will leave you a stick if you’re bad. I was celebrating end of the year with some fellow co-workers and one of them turned to me and said with his thick Ukrainian accent “today is the first day of drinking, and then we drink until the end of January. So I will see you in February. Toast to a good year, knowing new people, family, friends, and seeing you in the New Year.” We, the Americans at the party, thought he was kidding and laughed. But actually we were the only ones laughing while everyone else was already pouring their next shot of vodka. In between the holidays there are “the days before” to get ready for the holiday, “the days after” to rest, and since consequently there are 4 holidays back to back in January,(due to an unexplainable “old calendar”) they literally will party until February. To say the least, the bond of holiday cheer is fantastic here just as it is in America. Especially amongst friends and family where you go gift shopping with the motto “it’s us against them”. (Them being everyone else in the store.) Here in Ukraine, people generally have that same motto except it’s applied mostly on the buses or trains. “Us” is normally just you and “them” is cab and bus drivers who seem hate life even more than normal and charge you double the fare to make sure you know their distaste for you using “their” bus/taxi. I’ve found the key to any solo adventure on a bus or train is to make friends with a babusya, or a grandmother/older women. After 45 minutes of speaking in Ukrainian, they will typically make two assumptions; regardless of age, you are a small child lost in a land where you don’t understand anything and that they need to protect you and your things with the fierceness of a polar bear. One thing to remember is to never underestimate a baba. They are as fierce with they’re machine gun like language as they are with their sack of potatoes, which can turn into a small battering ram with the correct aim and velocity. Once, in a bazaar with my Ukrainian host mother, a food booth caught my eye and I went over to investigate. Near by was a group of guys about my age, maybe a bit younger, and as I bought my food they over heard me and my horrible Ukrainian. They connected the two that I was a foreigner started to hassle me. Just as I was turning to walk away my host mother shot off a rapid succession of phrases that obviously said something along the line of “get lost or I’ll kick your…” Disarmed and ashamed they left me alone. At the time, I was a child in Ukraine, and from experience I know that in a normal scenario if my mother would have come to my rescue like that at that age I would be embarrassed. I would’ve retaliated as any angsty teenager would with “mooooom, that’s embarrassing. I can take care of myself” as she drags me off by the collar of my shirt. But in this situation I was very happy to have someone on my side in a country that I knew nothing about. In Ukraine, life is harsh and cruel with out someone to vouch for you in the “us versus them” world of surviving the cold and extensive holidays. It’s comforting to me to find this similar situation so far away from home and I’m very grateful to be a part of an “us” during this unusually long holiday season. Thanks to all of the people who hung out with me in the west over the past few weeks. It was awesome to have all of you.