Winter Holidays in Ukraine

What are Winter Holidays like in Ukraine? Why do Ukrainians say Happy New Year and Merry Christmas instead of Merry Christmas and Happy New Year?

Winter Holidays in Ukraine do not start with Christmas, because the

Christmas is celebrated on the 6th and 7th January. Eastern Orthodox

national churches, including those of Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Macedonia,

Montenegro, Serbia and the Greek Patriarchate of Jerusalem mark feasts

using the older Julian Calendar. December 25 on that calendar currently

corresponds to January 7 on the more widely used Gregorian calendar.

The New Year is celebrated mostly in the eve of 31st December and in

Ukraine this holiday is still more popular that the Christmas.

Traditionally families get together to celebrate around the festive dinner

table. There is LOTS of food and also lots of drinks. One of the normal

things to do is to watch many musical shows and popular movies which are

broadcasted that day. Few minutes before the midnight all the channels

broadcast the congratulation speech of President of Ukraine (there is the

same tradition in Russian Federation as well).

People exchange gifts on the New Year's eve and kids usually find their

gifts in the morning of 1st January under the pine tree which is put up in most of the private apartments (if you go to offices in Ukraine around the New Year's time you will also see decorated trees in most of them). The gifts are brought by the Ded Moroz (means Grandpa Frost) and his grand-daughter Snegurochka:

During the times of Soviet Union religion was oppressed and therefore

celebrating any religious holidays was very risky business. During the

Stalin time this could easily send a person to Siberia for 15 years which

in most of the cases meant capital punishment, because of the conditions

created by the Stalin regime in those work camps. During 70 years Jews,

Muslims or Christians could not celebrate their holidays due to the

communist anti G-d policy. Hence the attention and the importance of

religious winter holidays (Hanukkah and Christmas) was shifted to the New

Year's. As an example, it became a tradition to place a red five corner

star which symbolized the Soviet state on the top of the pine tree:

Most of the cities and towns of Ukraine and Russia have large pine trees

usually placed on the central Squares, the cities are also decorated with

the lights, here are few pictures made in Kharkov around the Winter

Holidays time:

Liberty Square- "Heart" of Kharkov Mordinson office is 450 meters away

Return to Mordinson web site

Check out the HD quality video slide show made of high resolution pictures of the ladies from Mordinson gallery (part 2):

http://www.mordinson.com/ukrainian-women-video-real.html

What are Winter Holidays like in Ukraine? Why do Ukrainians say Happy New Year and Merry Christmas instead of Merry Christmas and Happy New Year?

Winter Holidays in Ukraine do not start with Christmas, because the

Christmas is celebrated on the 6th and 7th January. Eastern Orthodox

national churches, including those of Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Macedonia,

Montenegro, Serbia and the Greek Patriarchate of Jerusalem mark feasts

using the older Julian Calendar. December 25 on that calendar currently

corresponds to January 7 on the more widely used Gregorian calendar.

The New Year is celebrated mostly in the eve of 31st December and in

Ukraine this holiday is still more popular that the Christmas.

Traditionally families get together to celebrate around the festive dinner

table. There is LOTS of food and also lots of drinks. One of the normal

things to do is to watch many musical shows and popular movies which are

broadcasted that day. Few minutes before the midnight all the channels

broadcast the congratulation speech of President of Ukraine (there is the

same tradition in Russian Federation as well).

People exchange gifts on the New Year's eve and kids usually find their

gifts in the morning of 1st January under the pine tree which is put up in most of the private apartments (if you go to offices in Ukraine around the New Year's time you will also see decorated trees in most of them). The gifts are brought by the Ded Moroz (means Grandpa Frost) and his

grand-daughter Snegurochka:

During the times of Soviet Union religion was oppressed and therefore

celebrating any religious holidays was very risky business. During the

Stalin time this could easily send a person to Siberia for 15 years which

in most of the cases meant capital punishment, because of the conditions

created by the Stalin regime in those work camps. During 70 years Jews,

Muslims or Christians could not celebrate their holidays due to the

communist anti G-d policy. Hence the attention and the importance of

religious winter holidays (Hanukkah and Christmas) was shifted to the New

Year's. As an example, it became a tradition to place a red five corner

star which symbolized the Soviet state on the top of the pine tree:

Most of the cities and towns of Ukraine and Russia have large pine trees

usually placed on the central Squares, the cities are also decorated with

the lights, here are few pictures made in Kharkov around the Winter

Holidays time:

Check out the HD quality video slide show made of high resolution pictures of the ladies from Mordinson gallery (part 2)

Michael Mordinson on Kharkov TV show Randevu- брачное агентство Мординсон в теле програме Рандеву

Vlad: "Hello! This is a TV show "Randevu", a show about singles and

• for singles! How popular are the "marriage agencies"? How often do the matches made in Internet end up in real marriages? Is it true that nowadays it became more popular to meet on-line?"
  
  
• Nastia: "to answer all of those questions we have talked to a

  psychologist and interviewed a manager of a marriage agency.

  Elena Pochueva (a psychologist): "Look, the internet itself isn't a bad thing at all! It's a good thing, and it's the reality, we can't

  change anything about it, so we will have to live with it.
  
  
• If ten years ago somebody would sat that only in a decade it will become possible not only to meet people on-line, but also see them- that was like a science fiction thing! When people meet in the internet- that's only the first step, people choose who they want to speak with! But why can internet be a bad thing as well? When people hide behind the anonymity, this can be negative thing.
  
  
• When people do hide- this can be explained by several reasons- it's either desire to to hide oneself from the people who don't seem to be the right match, or other way round to hide oneself because of the fear to be turned down. It's important to treat this with a light heart, you should be pessimistic about it, but don't set yourself on the thought that you will quickly find your soul mate!"
  
  
• Vlad: "Do you know that the recent surveys have showed that  only 10% of the people who are listed on the free on-line singles sites actually met in person somebody who they chatted to."
  
  
• Nastia: "And only 10% of those meetings have grown into marriages" Vlad: "Then let's talk about marriage agencies! What are they offering? How can one tell a good marriage agency from a bad one? And who are the potential clients of the marriage agencies? About all that in the next part of our program.
  
  Let me ask you a couple of questions! Let's say, you've decided to join a marriage agency, which one would you pick- the one that has 10 thousand profiles in its data base, or only 200 profiles of people who are in fact interested in finding their soul mate? One more  question: will the experience of the agency matter to you? And the last one, would it matter for you if the agency has its own offices abroad, or it works as an affiliate of another agency?

• 
  
  Nastia: "The answers to those questions are apparent! The agency must have a long experience of work, the data base of the agency must consist only of the people who are real! And also the agency should have its own offices abroad!
• 
  
• Vlad: "Most of the agencies in Ukraine are oriented on the  foreign men. What does it mean? Man lives in the USA for example, or EU and the lady is Ukrainian! This raises a question: why do our girls want to marry men from abroad?

  To get the answer to that question I turned to Michael Mordinson- who is a manager of the "Mordinson" agency in Kharkov.
  
  
• Michael Mordinson (manager of the "Mordinson" agency): "In reality, the fact that a man or a woman joins a marriage agency doesn't mean that he or she can't meet somebody in the city where they live, or in their social circle, it doesn't mean that at all! What does the desire to join a marriage agency mean? It means that the person is looking for something better and doesn't see a worthy partner around! 
  
  
  If you were born in Kharkov, Ukraine for example, who said that your soul mate, a man of your life must also be born in Kharkov? It's not true! Our marriage agency doesn't charge its female clients for any of the services we provide.

  •  назад
  • We have male clients from all over the world, mainly our clients come from the United States and Western Europe. We have two representatives in Europe: in Berlin, Germany and Vienna, Austria.
    мес. назад
  • We don't have thousands of clients and thousands of profiles- neither of men nor of the women. We are in fact, a rather small marriage agency. But every man and every woman who is in "Mordinson" is a real person and is currently interested in finding a soul mate! And this is the most important thing for us!
    азад
  • We don't want to have 20 thousand profiles with 99% of all those people who either lost the interest or simply not real! It's vital for us, that every woman in our agency is real person with real intentions- I mean serious intentions of course. Because we are a "marriage agency"!
    ес. назад
  • Elena Pochueva (a psychologist): "Look, there is a difference between on-line dating sites and marriage agencies. Even in the names you can see a clear difference. Posting a profile on the dating site may mean desire to date people where marriage agency is for people who are interested in a marriage as a result of meeting the right person. And mainly, you know that, marriage agencies are the places where people from different countries find each other!
     мес. назад
  • Nastia: "By the way, abroad it's considered to be normal for people to meet through marriage agencies"
    
    
    Vlad: "Mordinson" agency has invited us to their photo studio where the ladies take pictures."
  • Michael Mordinson: "Once the pictures are ready and posted on our web site, ladies start communicating with the men. Communication is a great chance to get to know each other before the personal meeting. Our agency arranges the personal meetings in Kharkov. Of course there are no fees that the ladies have to pay to meet the men.
    мес. назад
  • Vlad and Nastia: "In this issue of "Randevu" we tried to answer some of the questions that are frequently asked, but if we missed something- it's not a big deal, we will leave them open for discussion. We will turn to them in future!

    
    

    Learn more about Mordinson marriage agency: http://www.mordinson.com/cgi-bin/gallery.pl
    
    

    

    
    

  
  

Как Меня поменяла Жизнь Зарубежом? Рассказы Девушек которые Вышли Замуж За Иностранцев

Замужество за иностранцем и переезд в другую, такую далекую Америку должно быть связано с большими изменениями в жизни. Как же меняет жизнь в США славянских женщин? Подчерпнем ответы на форуме для русскоязычных женщин проживающих в США:

-Я чувствую себя здесь замечательно. Моя мама всегда пеняла мне, что у меня нет амбиций, честолюбия - это она про получение образования. Здесь у меня ощущение, что я горы могу свернуть, так много возможностей. И амбиции появились. В Беларуси времени хватало только на выживание, ни о чем другом думать уже не хватало сил. А здесь... Даже дышать легче.

- Ну дышится легко и нет проблем так как вы тут замужем, а вот если одной выкорабкиваться, то будет такое же выживание как и на Родине, а может еще и потруднее, тк надо будет решать вопросы с работой, жильем, кредитами и мед страховкой....

Ну а по теме...что во мне изменилось, ну перестала идеализировать Америку, стала приветливее, улыбчивее, разговорчивее. Мода для меня перестала быть жизненным приоритетом. Не стала париться что о Боже, мне ведь уже за 35! Плюс рядом с мужем появилась уверенность в себе, чувсто защищенности и что ты любима!

- За мои полгода тутошнего пребывания- так же перестала идеализировать Америку, поняла окончательно мотивы своего выбора- тут у меня муж любимый и я для него самый дорогой человечек- но себя приходится лепить заново- там была сформированной и успешной, но очень одинокой личностью, тут договорилась сама с собой, что 31 еще не возраст и теперь грызу чужеродный язык в надежде стать полноценной ячейкой общества, а не бесплатным мужним приложением..Пока верю- что все задуманное- реально и осуществимо, лишь бы Обама в конец страну не убил..

-  Раньше живя в Москве и работая за троих очень была злая, прямо с утра, открою глаза и давай всех крыть по чем зря... а теперь Дети так рады, что мама всегда добрая, смеется и шутит...

- Мой муж изменил мое отношение к питанию и покупке продуктов. Это единственное на чем мы никогда не экономим. А я в России заходя в магазин всегда в первую очередь смотрела на цены на продукты ... а здесь стараюсь в первую очередь смотреть на качество.

-  Что касается изменений во мне самой, то я стала более приветливой и открытой, чем была на родине. Первое время меня напрягало, что незнакомые люди здороваются со мной на улице... а сейчас даже приятно.

-  а я всегда была приветливой и открытой. на родине меня не понимали некоторые ещё в подростковом возрасте меня спрашивали (с непониманием и даже долей издёвки): как ни вижу её, вечно она улыбается. чего такая довольная?

хотя на родине улыбка не всегда к месту. потому что мужчины наши улыбку всегда принимают на свой счёт и думают, что им глазки строят. и сразу знакомиться пытаются. здесь с этим намного проще

- В моём возрасте, характер ещё меняется и сам по себе, но всё же некоторые изменения, думаю, произошли именно из-за проживания в Сев. Америке (Канаде).

Я стала больше улыбваться и меньше стесняться (как ни странно, ведь общаюсь всё-таки не на родном языке), легче завести разговор с малознакомым человеком, что-то спросить (тут ведь часто так делают).

Непривычно стало, чтоб за меня всегда платили :) Это прям шокировало моих друзей (парней) в Украине, которые пытались за мены заплатить если мы, скажем, в кафешку пошли.

Изменилось моё отношение к одежде (не только красиво, но в первую очередь - удобно) и декоративной косметике (на каждый день - минимум, полный "марафет" только по особым случаям, на вечеринку и т.п.).

Пока что это самые заметные изменения, возможно, будут и добавления в будущем.

Источник: http://www.zaokeanom.com

Как найти хорошее брачное агентство в Харькове: http://ukrainian-single-women.blogspot.com/2010/11/blog-post.html

МБА Mordinson: http://www.mordinson.com