Taras Kuzio’s Blog

Christmas and New Year in Britain and North America

Growing up in Britain I always felt very privileged as a child to celebrate two Christmases and two New Years over a four week period. This was a consequence not only of living in Britain but of having an Italian mother and a Ukrainian father. The New Year according to the old calendar seems to be more of a festivity than in Ukraine where the New Year is celebrated according to the new calendar rather than the old. For us in Britain, Malanka on 13 January was still a big event that we were determined to celebrate with as much energy as we could muster after three weeks of festivities.
While British people were depressed returning to work following the New Year we could still look forward to two further weeks celebrating Christmas and New Year according to the old calendar. In Britain, Christmas has become totally commercialised and materialistic. This has meant that I always looked to the Latin-rite Christmas in the same way as other Britons who over indulge in eating, drinking and shopping. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian Christmas was a far more spiritual affair.
In towns where Ukrainians lived in Britain, carol singing would be the norm when I was growing up. Sometimes we even had vertepy plays. These traditions are less observed today as young people have little spare time and many have become assimilated. When young British-Ukrainian join Ukrainian carol singing groups today they do so in anticipation of a drunken night out, rather than for any spiritual reasons or a desire to support the Ukrainian community (carol singing collected funds for the community).
Nevertheless, a Ukrainian Christmas eve dinner was held this year at the Halifax Ukrainian club which 100 people, including myself, attended. Our family sat on the Italian-Ukrainian table as Halifax has many mixed marriages between Ukrainians and Italians, Austrians, Irish and Germans from Bavaria, a reflection of a large number of Ukrainian men arriving after the war (including 10,000 from the Galicia Division) but few Ukrainian women and of these men being from western Ukraine and therefore Catholics. A carol singing group was organized this year in Halifax as it has been for decades by my father who told me they visited over 35 houses in one day alone.
Living in North America, Ukrainian traditions are both different and similar. Toronto is a major center of Ukrainian diaspora life in Canada and has over 12 Ukrainian Catholic, as well as Orthodox, Churches. At the same time, the Ukrainian area of Toronto does not possess a single Ukrainian pub or restaurant by the older diaspora! The only pub-restaurant in Toronto is the Golden Lion (Zolotyi Lev) established by the fourth immigrant wave.
In my travels throughout the West, including Australia, I have reached the conclusion that the Ukrainian diaspora has inevitably integrated some local customs and culture. This is less true of the older generation than the younger who were born outside Ukraine, but it nevertheless still holds true even for older diaspora Ukrainians.
In Britain and Australia the tradition of pubs has been translated by the diaspora into Ukrainian clubs with bars. The typical Ukrainian community in a British town included a community building owned by the Association of Ukrainians (Sojuz Ukraintsiv [SUB]) or the Federation of Ukrainians (Obiednannia Ukraintsiv), a Saturday school, choir, dance group, youth and women’s groups and a Club modeled on a pub.
In Toronto, it is surprising coming from the British-Ukrainian tradition to find not a single Ukrainian pub. This is not all that surprising when one considers that Protestant Presbyterianism (of the extreme Scottish variant) in Canada and Puritinism in the USA are both similarly hostile to alcohol. This has translated into only the state being allowed to sell alcohol in Ontario and a legal drinking age of 21 in the US. The only region where you are likely to be offered an alcoholic drink at lunch time in North America is in French-speaking and Catholic Quebec. Unlike Protestants, Catholics seem to be able to enjoy themselves on earth.
If we were in Toronto on Ukrainian Christmas, we traditionally attended a meal with friends and their family. Following the meal we would go to midnight mass at the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral.
Toronto is famous though, for its Malanky on 13 January which young people travel to from all over Canada and the US to attend. These Malenky are organized by youth groups, Churches and institutions.
In our nearly six years in Canada we have attended two Malenky. One was in the sprawling Toronto suburb of Mississauga where many Ukrainians live. It seemed very different to what we remembered from Britain as it was held in a large convention hall, rather than in a Ukrainian club (as in Britain). The second Malanka we attended was in St. Vladimir’s Institute in downtown Toronto. A well known institute that goes under ‘Volodymyr’ in the Ukrainian language, the Malanka was a traditional evening of events and music far more similar to the traditional Malanka that we remembered in Britain.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all readers of this Blog!