Ukrainian party vs. American culture party

Party expectations in Ukraine are very different than they are in America. It's good to know this before you arrive to your first Ukrainian party, or before you invite your first Ukrainian to your party. The first is that Ukrainian parties are ALWAYS dinner parties, and they will expect a full meal.

Arrive to the party with some sort of edible/drinkable gift, such as juice, chocolate, vodka, wine, etc. In the main room there will be a huge table in the middle set up with chairs/sofas/stools around it. All the food will be set on the table.

Food that will always be present:

* a veggie plate with slices of cucumbers, tomatoes and sometimes green peppers
* a platter of cut sausages and cheese
* at least 2 kinds of mayonnaise based salads (such as krab+corn+chinese cabbage+mayo, or cabbage+peas+sausage+mayo, or eggs+onions+cheese+garlic+mayo, or apples+shrimp+egg+mayo) (oh, and those are real salads--I called my host sister up just now and asked her to tell me the ingredients for some standard mayo salads, so I wasn't being crazy with those).
* Pickled herring
* Sandwiches, consisting of single, small pieces of bread with any of the following on top: butter+cheese, butter+sausage, butter+sausage+cheese, caviar, mayo+small fishies
* Shuba (a layered salad with the following ingredients in descending order: chopped egg, mayonaise, beets, egg, carrots, onion, and pickled herring).


_{Don't be fooled! Thar be fish in that thar salad.}

* Flattened, fried chicken or fish
* Galuptsi (meat rolled up in cooked cabbage leaves)
* Hot chicken or cutlets
* Some hot potato dish, such as mashed potatoes
* Bottles of vodka, a pear soda which they call "water," congac or wine


_{The food keeps coming and you keep staying in the same place}

At the beginning of the party you would choose your spot around the table. This will be your place for the entire evening, so choose your companions wisely! You will then sit, eat, and talk. That is the party. Food would come out in stages, there would be tons of toasts, you'd be totally full, tipsy, and have made great friends.

Near the end of the party, your hostess would ask if you would like coffee or tea (black or green). Along with your coffee or tea you'd get sweet dishes, which may include cake, chocolate, or cookies. You will NEVER be served sweet things without coffee or tea. According to my Ukrainian friends, they're just not tasty without tea or coffee. So your slice of birthday cake (well, they don't really do "birthday cakes") will be accompanied by tea. :)

That's the standard Ukrainian party.

My parties, however, are nothing like this. As an American English teacher, I like to have parties that are high on culture and low on drinking. My parties are a great place to practice English, learn a little about American culture, and do some fun activities! My parties in Ukraine have been very successful, and they're something I plan to continue in whatever country I'm in, so I thought I'd share my party prep ideas.

Step One: Choose a theme
This step is crucial. If you're doing a holiday party, the theme chooses itself. Go all out and embrace that holiday. If you're doing a birthday party or a non-holiday party, it's important to select a good theme. It will drive everything else: the music, the food (to some extent), the costumes (if you're doing that), the games, etc.

My theme this year is Flora and Fauna.

My party is a costume party. Everyone is expected to come in costumes and bring food and drink to share. In Ukraine none of these are typical, so I make sure to tell them via sms. I also teach them the word "potluck" :)

Step Two: Choose the decorations/your costume
For my party this year I'm dressing up as a lounge jaguar :) I have my awesome jaguar-print pjs, will do makeup and make ears and a tail to go along with this and I'm done. For decorations, I bought some self sticking, dark green scotch paper that I will cut into long, wavy grass and stick on the walls, along with flowers, butterflies, etc. I'm making a bumblebee pinata, and the like.


_{First time doing cat makeup! Pretty darn good if I say so myself!}

Step Three: Choose the activities
For me, this is what really drives things. This is the part I very much enjoy, and something that makes my parties stand out. If you have an awesome theme and awesome decorations, sure you can just let the party be, but if you want something great for non-native speakers, something that will give them a chance to practice English/learn about American culture, this is super important. Plus, it's fun for native speakers as well.

* Songs. I like to pick some songs to teach that fit with the theme. For my V-day party I picked "The Riddle Song," "Love Me Tender," "Can You Feel The Love Tonight" and "All You Need is Love." I print lyrics, my friend plays guitar, and we all sing together. For my Flora & Fauna party I think we're going to do "Jeremiah was a bullfrog," and not sure which else yet.

* Crafts. This is something new for me, but it worked really well at my Valentine's day party. I gave everyone the tools for making V-Day cards. That way we could hang out, people could chat, work on crafts, and have something to show for their night. For the Flora & Fauna I'm doing origami!

* Games. I like doing things like scavenger hunts or pictionary or taboo. For V-day we did a kissing game--one partner had a bright lipstick on and had to kiss their partner on the face as many times possible within 15 seconds. We then counted kiss marks. Another game was for a partnership to open a candybar together with their hands behind their backs. :)


_{The girls are counting how many lipstick marks Daniel has on his face}

* Food. By asking people to bring food/drinks to share, you ensure that you will have enough food, but not TOO MUCH food. I like to provide something theme-y like heart shaped cookies or red/pink foods for V-Day, or traditional Thanksgiving food for T-Day. You can do fun things like serve eggnog or spiced wine at a Christmas party, green beer at St Patty's day, etc. The more "traditional" or theme related, the more fun it is.
* Etc. For Halloween I'll do things like bobbing for apples, pumpkin carving and the like. On Valentine's Day, we composed proverbs about Love--I provided the word LOVE+a random word. They came up with gems like "LOVE is a HOUSE I want to live in always" and "LOVE is like WINE--it makes you feel good and you want more."

I teach people the word "mingle" and show them how to do it (really, they don't usually do it amongst themselves). I also occasionally like to have prizes to encourage certain behaviors. Want people to have fabulous outfits? Give a prize for best costume. Want people to put lots of effort into a game? Give a prize to the winner. It helps to let people know that ahead of time. Also, if you really want everyone in a costume, provide for those who have come without costume--for my party I'll have animal hats/masks for them to wear.

I make sure to tell people early, then a week before, then a day or two before. People are very forgetful, so it helps to have an initial invite and then two reminders. I also don't have drinking at my party. If someone wants to bring alcohol, they can, but I ask them to bring nothing stronger than wine, champagne, or beer. I like showing them how to make mimosas. :)

That, my friends, is something that takes up a fair bit of my energy in Peace Corps. So far I've thrown about 6 of these parties, and they get better and better. At my Valentine's day party I even had my English club put on a play! :) As you can see, it fits Peace Corps's 2nd goal very well, which is to teach host country nationals more about America and Americans. I put a fair bit of time and myself into these parties, and I've even seen results--I went to a girl's birthday party and she'd pushed the table to the side of the room and had activities! It was really great. People were surprised, but they had a great time.

Other things I've learned: If your party is big, it can be a great idea to have responsible friends take on this role: emcee, dj, bartender, even host. If you do want to have a bar, I recommend making a SINGLE party drink based on a SINGLE kind of alcohol. For my "high school stereotypes" party in America, we made a punch. For my "runway models" party in America I made the mistake of wanting a full bar, and as a result, half my budget went to alcohol. If I did it again I would serve just mimosas, and invite people to bring other alcohols. I also like to give people the opportunity to do different things. If the space is large enough, I like to have a quiet room for conversations, a louder room for games, a dance floor, etc.

Enjoy!

I designed a Ukrainian wedding cloth!

Okay, so I'm really excited: my host sister is getting married this fall. It is common for the bride to stitch herself a breadcloth--a long table-runner looking thing, with decorations on the two edges. I offered to do her bread cloth, and she was very excited. Then she said she'd rather me do their "good luck" cloth, or something like that. It is used during the wedding--laid on the floor and the bride and groom run to see who is the first to step on it. Whoever does will supposedly have the control in the marriage. I am so thankful for the links to Ukrainian patterns, because tonight the both of us came up with some designs for her cloth! Yes, yes, that is the Tree of Gondor on the top of one. We're going to see which her fiancee likes, but I'm REALLY hoping for the geeky version ;)

This is a rough draft mockup. It was us piecing together designs, so the proportions aren't exact, but it gave us a good idea.

NOW, there is one thing "wrong" on this. I plan to do the ends in a handstitched lace, which would REPLACE the greenish border at the bottom, but would be essentially the same design. Whichever design is chosen will be stitched on both ends of a long cloth. In the middle will be a ukrainian saying meaning: for happiness, for love (or something like that).
With the tree:

From Stroke of Midnight

Without the tree:

From Stroke of Midnight

[edited to add the following]

The wedding cloth was finished, though a little later than I'd hoped. Still, it was finished in time for the wedding. It turns out that the wedding cloth is what the bride and groom stand on as they are getting married. It literally covers the wedding altar, and as such, it has a very special place in the hearts of the couple; here is a picture of the final piece. I taught myself hardanger for this. Hardanger is the cutwork on the ends that makes it look like lace:

A fairly normal day in Ukraine (but a bit spendy!)

Today was a really fun day. On the docket for the day: picking up my boots, getting my clothes repaired (oh crap—now I am forgetting my English—do we say “repaired” for clothes?)

My boots are pretty sweet. I found a place that does custom boots. They will make nearly anything you want for a decent price—for me a “decent price” is less than $100. This is one price I absolutely compare with American prices, because I’m planning to take these puppies home with me! So this pair is knee high with the Battlestar Galactica logo stitched into the sides—specifically the phoenix/angel from the logo.


_{The boots in question}

So my friend Maryna and I plan to meet at 11:30 near the tank. Every town in Ukraine as “A Tank” as a monument to some war or victory or historical event. History isn’t my strong suit. We were both late, as usual. I had a baba bag with me—a very large, plastic, zippered bag that the locals carry. It had all my clothes to be repaired in it. I was wearing a pair of black slacks and tennis shoes and my winter coat because the weather didn’t look too bad. Man was I wrong.

While waiting for Maryna, I was happy to spot my favorite lady near the tank. She sells Piroshki. These are amazing. They’re (I think) potato dough with cabbage, potatoes, or meat inside, that are then deep fried. OMG DELICIOUS. I like the potato ones. So I ate that while waiting for Maryna.

It was then I realized that a) I hadn’t called the lady to confirm that I was coming b) I didn’t have her number c) I didn’t have her address. Oh well. We’d been there before and decided to wing it. We knew which marshrutka to take (a marshrutka is like a cross between a van and a short bus), so we waited. While waiting we saw a poster for So You Think You Can Dance, the Ukrainian version (something like Танцюють Всi). Turns out they were performing in Zhytomyr the next day!!!! I LOVE SYTYCD, and even though I had never seen the Ukrainian version, I knew it would be just as good.

So we get on the marshrutka and make our way to the boot lady’s house, only to find out she wasn’t there. Maryna had the woman’s daughter’s number, so we called and the lady said they would be ready on Tuesday. *sigh* So we made our way to the tailor.

Maryna thinks I’m lazy, I think, because I don’t repair small holes that happen in the seams of my clothes. J Whatever. I’d rather have a professional do it. I dropped off a bag of mine that had been splitting open, my jeans that needed to be hemmed, two sweaters with holes in the armpits, a coat whose zipper kept popping open and whose pockets needed mending, a pair of pants that had a hole, and my coat whose liner was literally in tatters. Total price 185 griven (around $20). Not too bad. SPENDY for a Peace Corps budget, but that’s what I get for waiting and having them pile up.

We went to the bazaar and I got one of my favorite foods—galuptsi with carrots. It is usually meat that is wrapped in cooked cabbage leaves, but this kind is basically spiced carrots wrapped in cabbage leaves. DELICIOUS. It was around this time that it REALLY started snowing. BIG FATTIE FLAKES. And the ground was solid mud. I’m in the city, but do we have awesome, mud-free sidewalks here? Nope. So it was snowing really hard and completely muddy. The snow felt a bit like rain, as well. I departed from Maryna and walked to the theatre, where SYTYCD would be performing, and met Tanya. By this time my right foot was COMPLETELY soaked. Blarg.

I found out that not only were there seats available, but there were GOOD seats available! So I bought a ticket—just one, because sadly my friends were unavailable. It is nice to have a friend there when you’re negotiating something like that—I did negotiate the ticket sale myself, but I had a backup translator.

Tanya went with me on the marshrutka home, and I had to walk across this nasty mud field to get to my house. By the time I got home, both shoes were covered in mud, my socks were soaked through with mudwater, and my pants were really wet at the bottom. Lovely. And tomorrow night—I’ll be going to see AWESOME DANCING!!!! WOOT!

Танцюють Всi! (Ukrainian "So You Think You Can Dance")

On Saturday I found out that Tantsuyut Vsi (Танцюють Всi) was on tour in Zhytomyr and was performing on Sunday. Next day. Tantsuyut Vsi is Ukraine's So You Think You Can Dance. I lovelovelove SYTYCD So much, and I was really bummed that in America tickets always sold out very quickly. Day before I figured I didn't have a chance of getting a ticket. Well, I was wrong, and I got a fabulous seat--4th row! It was 200 griven (a little more than $20). A lot for my Peace Corps budget, but well worth it. I've come to the conclusion that some things in life are worth paying a little extra for--tickets for a close row to something you love--worth it.



Here is my play by play of Танцюють Всi along with videos from their website!

I dressed in my Wonder Woman gear--Wonder Woman boots that I had custom made for me here in Ukraine, red/white purse, and white undershirt/red overshirt. I found my way to the fourth row, and sat next to Alla, a woman I met right then and there. We talked about dance, she told me her daughter wasn't interested in coming, and that this was her second event. We had a fun time talking.

It was supposed to start at 7pm, but it was closer to 7:15 when they actually started.

Everyone came out dressed like the Nut Cracker--the red and white soldier outfits. It was really exciting to watch, and the host participated in the dance! It was so different seeing in real life--you could focus on whomever you wanted, and you could really get the energy from the dancers! This video shows a show opening that looked exactly like what we had.

The dance after that was a 2-guy dance with Oleksander and Sasha. It was a swing/tap dance number if you only watch a few, this is completely worth watching. I could completely see Tranji doing it.

After that, they transitioned to a freaking sweet Argentinian tango piece with Colya and Toni. Amazing. She came in sweeping the floor and he was a douchey customer at a table. RED HOT!This one is way hotter than any other Argentinian tango I've seen on the American SYTYCD. Actually, it may just be regular tango.

This was followed by a pretty, contemporary dance with Michael and Dasha.

Sasha and Mariam did a really fun hip hop number to Rama Lama Bang Bang.

There was a super sweet number here using a table--I originally thought it would be a rip off of the table dance from the American version, but it wasn't--and it kicked ass, but I can't find any video.

A group number! This is one of my favorites: GLADIATORS! If you only see one number, this is the one to see

Max and Olya did a pretty cool contemporary number where she has a mirror and he's trying to get in the way of her mirror.

Olexander and Tonya did my favorite swing number!

Zhenya and Maria did an emotional waltz. Not sure if I totally got the story, but it looked like she received some letter saying he was going off to war.

A super fun and funky group contemporary number where everyone was dressed as bugs. They came out from the audience! It was really cool!

Masha and Denis did a fun modern dance number where she was dressed as a violin and he was the violinist.

Max and Toni did this really cool "voodoo horror" jazz piece. They made fun use of a cauldron and voodoo doll.

I'm really bummed that I can't find these next two dances as videos. The first was a women's only number. They were dressed as flappers and they danced to All That Jazz.

Then the men came out, dressed as 30's gangsters and did a dance to Wild Wild West.

Dasha and Michael did a Broadway Vampire number to KISS by Tom Jones.

Sasha and Vika came out and did a cool JIVE number that started out on a couch

Olya and Olexander had a super emotional modern number that has what appears to be a cool storyline: he dies in a car crash and she is left to mourn him.

They had two other cool numbers in here. The first was a group number that was set to the sound of wind and it was a contemporary number. Pretty sweet.

Then there was a really really strange number with these aliens? two people were dressed in blue latex and danced with dress forms. I didn't really understand it, but it was entertaining.

Olya and Colya did a freaking amazing jive to Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B.

Dasha and Michael did a super sweet contemporary horror dance. Very fun! The song was "Remember horror number?"

Another fun group dance! This one was a sort of "Adam"/garden of eden story? Maybe? It's weird and totally fun and done to Santogold - You'll Find A Way (Switch & Sinden Remix)

I WISH I COULD FIND THIS VIDEO! It was AMAZING! It was a quickstep to Puttin on the Ritz.

Zhenia and Mariam danced a Jazz number that was--no joke--her cast as a Dominatrix.

This group dance was MUCH BETTER in person...The entire beginning is LOST in this video! What you can't see is that everyone is lined side by side, and one by one they start doing very mechanical movements. AWESOME dance, but poor videography.

Masha and Denis did a very dramatic modern number about a prince and a princess on their wedding night! VERY dramatic!

Victoria and Martin did a really cool smooth contemporary dance number. She started out sitting on a chair, but her partner was under a sheet, and so she stood up and started dancing with her partner covered in a sheet. Very cool effect.

Dasha and Michael danced a tango that started with them standing on two chairs! Cool use of the chairs!

Finally, they had a big band number that was really fun, and again, no video.

The absolute last thing they did was bring out a cake to celebrate Oleksander's 21st birthday--and they smashed it in his face, then they had a cake fight on stage.

It was really really amazing and I'm really glad I went.