Ukrainian Christmas is a very beautiful tradition,
full of ritual and fantastic food. Actually, you can
catch us eating borsht, perogies, cabbage rolls, etc.
pretty often, just not usually not all in the same meal.
We're in the perfect place to celebrate Ukrainian
Christmas this year. Traditionally, it's the one night
of the year the farm animals can speak. The animals
are given a special snack, thanked for their service,
and wished a long life and good health. They are then
left alone to jabber away to their hearts desires.
Just before midnight we went out to give the animals
their special treats. We were surprised to see
they were all up, and a very strange thing happened
during our rounds. For about three minutes we
felt a very warm wind. All of the sudden, it felt like
summer - and then it was gone. We're not really
familiar with the weather out here - maybe it was
a chinook? It was strange, but exciting.
Of course, Marek had other ideas about what
a warm wind which appears on the stroke
of midnight whilst performing an ancient ritual
on the winter solstice really was.
-Pat
