Today is Christmas Eve according to the old calendar, and tonight millions of people (including Ukrainians like me) celebrate with a twelve-dish dinner.
With the disaster surrounding us and a house full of smoke, this is going to be an odd one.
Today is Christmas Eve according to the old calendar, and tonight millions of people (including Ukrainians like me) celebrate with a twelve-dish dinner.
With the disaster surrounding us and a house full of smoke, this is going to be an odd one.
Today is Christmas Eve by the old calendar, and is still celebrated by millions of people around the world, especially in Eastern Europe.
The 6th of January is also the date of the beginning of Koliada, an ancient Slavic winter festival that predates Christianity. The festival is now incorporated into Christmas festivities.
Koliada in the Mogilev region of Belarus at Christmastime in 1903.
The festival in Lviv, Ukraine.
Yuletide Fortune Tellers in Ukraine in an 1888 painting by Mykola Pymonenko. Ukrainians still celebrate the Christmas season by the old calendar, as do many neighbouring regions.
This Soviet stamp featuring Ukraine was issued in 1991, the year the USSR collapsed and Ukraine declared its independence.
Despite heavy restrictions on religion, Christmas was celebrated in various capacities during Soviet years, as this depiction of a wintry Christmas scene in a Ukrainian village shows.
Vintage Christmas decorations from Soviet Ukraine can be found for sale now.
Christmas is celebrated by Catholics and Orthodox Christians in the east of Europe in January. The 6th is Christmas Eve, and the time when the main Christmas meal is eaten.
Ukrainian artist Jacques Hnizdovsky created this card in the 1950s.