Ukrainian Easter (Velykden)

 Easter is the feast of Christ’s resurrection, which in its observance combines both pagan and Christian elements. Easter (in Ukrainian: ‘Velykden’ or ‘Paskha’) is preceded by seven weeks of Lent and celebrated on each first week after vernal equinox and full moon. It is the most cheerful holiday for orthodox believers.

In Ukraine Easter is called Velykden (The Great Day). In Ukraine Easter has been celebrated over a long period of history and has had many rich folk traditions.

Velykden was celebrated thousands of years ago as the victory of the Light over the Dark, Day over Night, Spring over Winter. The Resurrection was celebrated only from 988 when Kiev Rus was baptized.

The week before Easter, the Great (Velykyi) Week (Holy Week), is called the White (Bilyi) or Pure (Chystyi) Week.

During this time all the work on a field have to be done till Thursday.

Saturday evening people do to the church for the Easter praying till the morning when priests bless the food. After that people go home to celebrate Easter with their families. If they meet other people on the way they say: “Christ is risen!” and these people should reply “Risen indeed”.

All the people exchange Easter greetings and give each other painted eggs (krashanky).

Easter cake (Paska) and painted eggs (‘Krashanki’) are the symbols of Ukrainian Easter and obligatory food on the table this day. Paska is baked  in the form of cylinder. Krashanka is a boiled and painted egg. On this Day Ukrainian kids play their favorite Easter game: knocking the eggs. If you knock somebody’s egg and you egg is not broken than you are the winner.

Easter is one of the most popular holidays Ukrainians, and there are a lot of festivals held those days, such as: "The Easter egg festival" in Kiev, "The Great Hayivka festival" in Lviv, "The Easter egg festival" in Colomya. Positive spring atmosphere attracts many tourists. People dance, sing Easter songs: "hayivky" and  "mayivky".

Let's go to Hungary :)

12 beautiful photos to make you wonder why you haven’t visited Hungary yet...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Liberty Bridge,Budapest-Csilla Zelko

Budapest Parliament Building,Budapest-Krénn Imre

St. Stephen's Basilica,Budapest-Yury

Bokodi Lake-Arthur Burming

Sunrise at the pools,Egerszalók-Viktor Lakics

Bory Castle,Székesfehérvár-László Gál

Danube River,Budapest-Jacques Szymanski

Normafa Park,Budapest-Csilla Zelko

Underground,Budapest-Joseph Borsi

Széchenyi Chain Bridge,Budapest-Mark Kats

Fort Monostor,Komárom-Viktor Egyed

Lake Balaton,Badacsony

 

Hungarian Easter

Easter is a 2 days holiday in Hungary.There are a lot of interesting folk customs still alive all over Hungary.Many of them are connected with religious holidays,while others have older origins,from early,sometimes from prehistoric years.Two of the mostt common folk customs are sprinkling and egg-painting,and the two go hand in hand.This very old tradition is that people believed in the cleaning,healing and fertility effect of water.

  

 Easter Monday is a very busy day,so everyone gets up early;girls and women dress up in traditional costumes and they are waiting.Boys and men visit all of their women relatives,friends,neighbors,often even if they are not close friends.Boys in small groups,fathers with their sons,or single men leave early in the morning and their "tour" last all day long.They greet girls and woman with shorter-longer poems(mostly with funny poem about "Easter sprinkling").The payment is depends on the age of the guy,usually it's a painted eggs-wich woman prepare for days before Easter,the color is mostly red)-,candy,sometimes money and for men is some spirit-so it's not uncommon to get drunk as the day goes by.It's a shame if a girl is not ready when the first sprinklers arrive,and it is also a shame if she doesn't have enough painted eggs for her visitors.Younger girls often have a friendly competition on who gets the most sprinklers.


The style of eggs depends on the part of the country...

On  this holiday also very important to be with family,and have a breakfast together,when the table is richly laden.Alongside slices of fragnant ham,the table is adorned with a braided Easter loaf;there are eggs,boiled in the cooking liquid from the ham,and grated horseradish,served alone or in vinegar dressing.The accompaniments include mustard,radishes,and young onions. 

Our motto is: "No Easter meal is complete without ham!"