Happy Easter everybody! Let me tell you, Easter in Ukraine was incredibly different from Easter in America. There are Easter baskets, but no Easter bunny. Just Easter vodka.
My babucya (grandmother) woke me up at 2:30am to go to the Ukrainian Orthodox church. All the women were required to cover their heads in the church, but the men weren't. Before entering the church and before leaving, everybody crosses themselves (the opposite way of Catholics) and bow. The service was extremely different. There were chairs lining the walls for the babucyas, but the service was basically standing room only. The priest was behind some golden doors in a separate room and he would periodically come out to chant and sing, but there was no real sermon. About 5 older Ukrainians were singing/chanting and everytime they said a certain word, everybody would cross themselves and bow. Then they would stop and the priest would chant and then the singing and bowing would start again. That's what we did for about an hour. After that, we went outside and I ran into James, so we chatted for a bit. Then about an hour later (it was FREEZING, mind you), everybody was lined up outside with their Easter baskets full of food for the priest to bless. He came out with a bucket of holy water and a sort of horse tail looking things and proceeded to chant and spray everybody with water. My host brother-in-law was super blessed as the priest soaked him in water. I think the priest took great pleasure in blessing everybody haha. After the blessing, we went home and had breakfast. Babucya poured us shots of fortified wine at 6am. Great way to start the day! After breakfast, I thankfully went back to my warm bed.
I woke up a few hours later and went on a picnic with my host sister and a few of her friends. We proceeded to stuff our faces in between shots of vodka for a few hours. My host sister made sure I ate plenty of food!! We also shot a BB gun (safe, i know) and BBQd. After that, we went out to the local discoteque which was fun. Lots of techno and dancing. All in all a pretty good Easter!
Just like home, guns and booze! You should feel like you are back in Georgia! You have to teach the Ukrainians to say "ya'll" and to use proper English like "I'm fixin' to go to the store." You have a lot of work ahead of you! Remember "cheers" are something you sit on and any street not named Peach Tree isn't really a proper street.
ReplyDeleteLet them Ukrainians know that anybody that drinks their whisky clear is alright by your pappy. chichi ga anata o aishite!!!!