Easter is one of the most important holidays in Ukraine. This day every soul is filled with bright joy, happiness and hope. Easter is called Velykden, which means “The Great Day”. The week before Easter Ukrainian ladies are very busy because they need not only to cook a lot of Easter treats but also to make this day special for everybody.
Of course not everybody in Ukraine is religious and fast before Easter, but Easter always means the new beginnings for every Ukrainian. The last Sunday before Easter is called the Willow Sunday (Verbna nedilia). On this day people take pussy-willow branches to sanctify them in the church. The week before Easter is called the White (Biluy) or Pure (Chystuy) week. People have to finish all their work till Pure Thursday because this day they have to clean everywhere and to clear their mind and body. Of course in contemporary Ukraine it’s impossible to have so many days off, but people at least try to work less.
On Good Friday Ukrainian women and men are not allowed to work and they need to think about Christ and pray. Saturday is a day of preparation for Easter and people as usual don’t eat till midnight. Religious people don’t sleep at the night before Easter and go to a church for the vespers. At that time or at the early morning they take the large baskets with different food to a church to consecrate everything before having the Easter celebration.
A lot of Ukrainian women make the special Easter cakes– Paska and Kulich. Traditionally, while baking them women can’t try even a crump of Paska. Ukrainian women are trying to make their Easter cakes sweet, delicious and beautiful; they create their own recipes and decorations.
There are some differences between Easter cakes – Paska and Kulitch. Russian women bake Kulich – sweet yeast dough with raisins and jam. Paska is not baked, it’s a special dish made with a lot of cottage cheese, raisings and butter. The original shape of Paska is a truncated pyramid, symbolizing the Holy Sepulchre. Ukrainian women made the same Easter cakes, but they call Kulitsh as “Paska” and Paska as “Surna (cheese) Paska”, so the Ukrainian language has no word “Kulich”.
After the morning consecration of food people gather together and begin the celebration with a piece of Paska. Before it Russian brides have to wash their faces with water with a lowered Easter egg, so they’ll be “as beautiful as this egg”.
Easter cakes, symbols of God, are the main dishes at the Easter feast. People save the top crust of Paska the whole year as a symbol of good luck and happiness.
All the Easter week every Orthodox Christian greet each other with words:”Christ is risen!” (“Christos voskres”) and receive a reply “He is risen indeed!” (“Voistuny voskres”). All of the following week after Easter is called the Light week and people have a lot of celebrations that is why every Russian woman should bake a lot of Paskas. But not only Easter cakes, but also painted eggs (Krashanky and Pusanky) are the symbols of Ukrainian Easter.
Easter eggs are the ancient pre-Christian element of the holiday, they and have an important role in the Easter rites. They need to be painted very carefully, because every pattern has the sacred meaning. Krashanka is the Easter egg with only one color and Pusanka is an the Easter egg, decorating with drawings and patterns. Skillful Ukrainian women painted them with special mood; as usual Pusankas are given as gifts or exchanged.
Ukrainian kids play their favorite Easter game: knocking the eggs. If you knock somebody’s egg and your egg is not broken, you are the winner and your dream will come true!
Easter is a time of new hopes and dreams and as you see, it’s a time when Ukrainian women are very busy trying to make this holiday tasty, beautiful and memorable.