A RUSSIAN VOICE ON LIVING IN UKRAINE

 from Facebook:  

 

This person has said so eloquently what Ukrainians have been trying to get the world to understand. Although I would not call it an "outburst."

Vasyl Pawlowsky shared Kora Smirnova's photo.

An emotional but sincere outburst of pro-Ukrainian fervor by Kora Smirnova:

“I’m a Smirnov and I never forget that my grandfather and his family came to Ukraine from Russia after the war partitioned the land. I'm grateful that Ukraine accepted us foreigners, gave us a home, work, security—and never offended us. No one in my entire life has ever complained that I spoke my native language and that I sing my country’s folk songs. No one has ever called me a ‘moskal'ka.’

“I was born in Poltava. Ukraine fed me and raised me as one of her own. When I moved to Kyiv, I never once heard the word ‘limit.’ I’m 100% Ukrainian, although I have not one drop of Ukrainian blood! Why is it that I never think of shouting, ‘I’m Russian. There are lots of us Russians here, so this land belongs to Russia!’?

“The rest of the Russians in Ukraine, what? Has your memory entirely failed you? What do you mean ‘this is our land’? Thankless wretches! You are all guests here, whom the country has given you shelter and received you like its own. What kind of bastard do you have to be to now chase out and kill the owners, screaming that this is ‘our home’?! ‘Crimea is Russian’? Bastards with short memories! Have you forgotten what your forefathers did with the Tatars? Have you forgotten how much blood of Tatar men was shed and how many tears and grief we brought to the original population there? How entire Tatar families were packed and moved to Siberia?

“Yes, you all will have to spend another millennium on your knees now, begging for their forgiveness! I’m a Russian Ukrainian! And I’m prepared to chase out Moskali from my dear Ukraine with a sword to their necks, together with my dear Ukrainians!

“PS: Stepan Bandera was a hero of Ukraine who spent all his life fighting, with everything that he had, for Ukraine’s freedom! So, yep, I’m a ‘banderivka’!”

Я Смирнова, и я очень хорошо помню, что мой дедушка с семьей приехал из России в Украину, после войны распределили. Я благодарна, что Украина приняла нас чужаков, дала дом, работу, защиту, никогда не обижала. Меня за всю жизнь ни разу не упрекнули за то что я говорю на родном для себя языке и пою свои песни, меня ни разу не назвали москалькой. Я родилась в Полтаве. Украина меня воспитала и вырастила как родную. когда я переехала в Киев, я ни разу в этом городе не услышала слова лимита. Я 100% украинка! хоть нет ни капли украинской крови. Почему мне в голову не приходит кричать - Я русская, нас тут русских много и значит эта земля принадлежит России!? У остальных русских в Украине, что совсем память отшибло, какая это ваша земля? Уроды не благодарные! Вы все тут гости, которым дали кров и приняли как родных. Какой же надо быть скотиной, что бы теперь выгонять и убивать хозяев, крича, что это наш дом?! Крым русский? Сволочи с короткой памятью! Вы забыли, что ваши отцы сделали с татарами? Вы забыли сколько пролили крови татарских мужчин и сколько слез и горя принесли коренному населению? Как грузили в составы татарские семьи и увозили в Сибирь? Да вам все оставшиеся тысячелетия нужно вымаливать теперь у них прощение на коленях! Я русская украинка! И москалей поганых буду в шею гнать с моей родной Украины вместе с родными Украинцами!
P.S. Степан Бандера - Герой Украины, который всю жизнь боролся, всем средствами, за свободу Украины! И да, я бандеровка!

MY TOUR TO UKRAINE THIS YEAR

will not happen.  My travel agency informed my travel agent and me back in late November that they could not approve travel to Ukraine, for safety.  This was when the protest situation in Kyiv were still peaceful.  A wise decision, and the folks who signed up were relieved.   Hoping and praying that all will be ok for next summer.   See you then.

http://greatcanadiantravel.com/tours/europe-ukraine-culture-escorted-tour

UKRAINE'S NEVERENDING STORY

I submitted this OpEd to a few publications.....   no luck.   So, I hope this gets out.  You may share.  I am appalled at the pundits and "experts" spouting the Russian and Soviet lines.  For them, Ukrainians are not worth the attention, and the nation doesn't count.  Disgusting.  And the media still invite them on to comment.   Check out https://www.facebook.com/emaidanua  and other reputable Ukrainian sites.

______

UKRAINE’S NEVERENDING STORY 

Orysia Tracz

He waited until after the Olympics, as was expected.  Then he struck.  Putin proved what Ukrainians have been trying to tell the world for years, but no one would listen.  Finally now, with such disastrous results, Ukrainians are saying “we told you so.”

One thing the world finally realized after the Maidan revolution is that Ukraine really is not Russia, and Russia is not Ukraine.  These are two separate nations.  But throughout Ukraine’s history, it has been a poor rich nation -- rich in geographical location, natural resources, and people, and poor because of greedy neighbours on all sides who wanted those riches, human and natural.   Ukraine’s history has been one of invasion, occupation, persecution, and subjugation.  The few bright lights were wars of independence, some successful for short periods of time until the invasions began anew.  There were no wars of invasion by Ukraine towards any other nation, just defensive ones.  

The occupiers, from the north, west, or southwest, treated the native Ukrainian population as inferior, banning the language (“it never was and never will be”), and yet appropriating the best of Ukrainian culture and science under their own umbrellas.  Whether in tsarist or Soviet times, the people were not free, and were not free to be themselves, to be Ukrainian.  With all the international political agreements and treaties, and with the Soviets/Russians being Allies at the time, Ukraine lost ethnographic territory after World War II.  Ukrainians, living on their ancestral lands for ages and, not moving a step, now became Russian, Polish, Hungarian, Rumanian, and Slovak citizens.  The political powers never bothered to ask them.  As for the Crimea, it was not Khrushchev’s to “give” to Ukraine.  When you steal something, is it yours to give?  Tsarina Catherine II invaded Ukraine, including the Crimea.  The majority of the population was Crimean Tatars whom, after World War II, Stalin deported to Central Asia.  They have been returning to their ancestral home, and support Ukraine.  The Russians began arriving there under Soviet times, to a place warmer than Russia.  

Why is there a Russian-speaking part of Ukraine?  It was not always so – Ukraine was Ukrainian.  But Russians moved into eastern and southern Ukraine with Soviet industrialization, Stalin’s great project in the 1920s-1930s.  Then most Russians moved into Ukraine for the prime real estate when empty Ukrainian villages conveniently became available.  This was after millions upon millions of Ukrainians were forcibly starved to death during the Holodomor of 1932-33 as grain was being exported by the USSR from the breadbasket of Europe.  

The pretext for the Russian invasion of the Crimea is a crock.  It is the Sudeten issue all over again.  Russians and Russian-speakers in Ukraine have not been persecuted, and do not need “protection.”  Their language was never in danger.  But they did not respect the foreign country in which they were and are living to learn Ukrainian.  Whether during Soviet times or in independent Ukraine, Russian was a common and even dominant language in many areas.  Russians strongly “implied” over the years that Russian is a “prestigious” language, and Ukrainian is “just a peasant language”.  

The Soviet/Russian thing was and is such a misnomer.  In theory, Russia was one of the fifteen equal Soviet Socialist Republics. But, as Orwell wrote, one was so much more equal than others.  In fact, Orwell’s Animal Farm was based on collectivization and the Holodomor.  When it benefited the Russians, Soviet equaled Russian.  For them, the two terms were synonymous.  But they should not have been.  For example, it was not 20 million Russians who perished in World War II.  It was approximately 20 million Soviets.   Of those, about 10 million were Ukrainians, who perished between 1939-1945, killed by both the Nazis and the Soviets.  Twenty percent of those who perished during the war were Ukrainian, the largest number of all the dead lost by a nation in the war.

In 1991, after the fall of the Soviet Union, the referendum on Ukraine had 90.3% of Ukrainians (in the whole country, incl. Crimea) voting for independence.

Pro-Russian propaganda has worked wonders in the world, especially in the media.  For many “experts” and commentators, Ukraine still does not exist and has no right to exist.  In the social media, the trolls are doing their job.  Ukrainians still have to fight to get the truth out.  It seems that in this doublespeak world, other peoples can fight wars of independence, but not when it comes to the Ukrainians.  Maybe with this latest hellish action by Putin, the truth has come out and the world will understand.  But it will not do much.

As a daughter of parents who survived World War II, and who lost a baby daughter to the Nazis and many family members to the Russians, I cannot be silent.

Orysia Tracz is a Winnipeg writer, translator, speaker, and interpreter. 

The following two articles are germane:  

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/mar/20/fascism-russia-and-ukraine/?utm_content=buffer3c3b4&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/02/27/anne-applebaum-in-ukraine-the-pressure-mounts/

Celebrities -- their behaviour and lives

Sleaze is the new black -- at least in the celebrity world.  It is totally mind-boggling and beyond normality that nudity, sleaze, offensive sordid trashy behaviour are now the norm, and are in the news.  

Miley, Madonna, Lady Gaga, Bieber, and so many others need the attention and the money that attention brings.  At what price?  What happened to self-respect and dignity?  There are many performers and actors out there who still rake in the dollars, but are dignified and normal.   Ah, yes, "what is normal"?   No splitting hairs here, most of us know the difference between letting it all (and more) hang out for the world to see -- and not doing so.

Don't they have children, parents, relatives?  

Young and not so young women exposing themselves to the world - as if no one else has boobs and cleavage.  At least, if them boobs were real!   But no, she's showing off to the world that the two half-canteloupes attached to her chest are so fake, and she paid a lot for them, so here they are, with the outline so clearly visible.  Yes, mind-boggling.   

And the media eats it up.  Sleaze sells.  But after you've exposed all to the world, what's left to do?   Aha, twerking and sticking out your dirty tongue?  Showing that you don't wear underwear?  Performing bodily functions in public?   Ah, yes, contemporary Western culture....

UKRAINIAN CHRISTMAS GREETING

To all my friends and readers who are celebrating the "first" (Gregorian) Christmas.   For a number of my articles on Ukrainian Christmas traditions, you can scroll through my articles on this blog, and also Google my name and "Ukrainian Christmas" or similar topics.  And a note:  hopefully, by this time next year, my book on Ukrainian Christmas traditions will be out.   Working title:   "First Star I See Tonight:  Ukrainian Christmas Traditions."     [applying for grants right now, but if there is a generous philanthropist out there to help with the publication, will be grateful!  The lottery numbers ain't working....]

 

Traditional Ukrainian Christmas Greetings

(Vinchuvannia)

На щастя, на здоров’я з колядою,

Щоб Ви тішилися як пташка весною,

Як пташка на калині,

Дай, Боже, щастя Вашій родині!

Доброго здоров’я, багато щастя,

Чистої води в криниці,

У полі ярої пшениці,

Хліба й солі на столі,

І погоди на душі!

Христос ся Раждає!

May you find peace, joy, and health for yourself, your family, your children, and your farm animals;

May you be as healthy as the spring waters,

May you be as cheerful as the swallows in the sky,

May your home never be hungry,

And may it be as prosperous as the fields of grain at harvest time,

And as full as the beehives are with honey,

And the orchards are ripe with fruit.

We wish you all this, and may we come together next year to greet and wish each other again.

Khrystos Rodyvsia!  Christ is Born!

Slavimo Yoho!  Let us praise Him!

REMEMBERING NOV. 22, 1963

I had just arrived in D.C.  Was a brand-new eager freshman at George Washington University.  Thanksgiving was about a week away and, of course, everyone was planning on going home for the family feast.  I was walking up Wisconsin Avenue towards my dorm (way past Georgetown), when I stopped into a fabric store for something.  Everyone was watching the TV.  The President had been shot.  It was surreal.  Took a while to sink in. 

That was the Thanksgiving no one went home.  My roommates and I stayed in town the whole week.  We went to the lying-in-state at the Capitol.  As we stood (hung) from the light platforms listening to the ceremony inside, we heard on someone's portable radio about Oswald's shooting.  Someone in the group even cheered.   I did go through the line to give respects at the catafalque.   We were there early sitting on the curb on Connecticut Ave. opposite St. Matthew's Cathedral, listening to the service, and watching the procession back towards the White House.  All the city buses had black ribbons on their antennae.  We watched whatever we could on TV.  

It was sad, bewildering, and historic.  

A dear room mate's father was active in the Democratic Party in D.C., and was on the LBJ committee of transition.  She and I got tickets to the Inaugural Ball.  She went, I didn't.  I had learned that you may get a beautiful engraved and gold-embossed invitation, but to RSVP and attend, you had to pay!   As a scholarship student, I did not have the $150 or $200 or whatever it was for the ticket...   Still have that invitation someplace.  

I loved being in Washington.  Beautiful city.   I walked and walked.  But this was an unexpected and sad introduction to a fascinating historical city.
 

HOLODOMOR COMMEMORATION

To commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Genocide by Famine in Ukraine, the HOLODOMOR:   


http://www.infoukes.com/history/famine/tracz/