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[kittydesade]

Американские праздники. Какие у вас самые любимые праздники? American holidays. Which is your favorite holiday? (All these pictures seem fairly easy.)
День благодарения Thanksgiving!
Рождество Christmas! (Oh, I like Christmas.)
Пасха Passover/Easter
Новый год New Year
День независимости Independence Day
Ханука Hanukkah (apparently this is the spelling Chrome likes best)
День ветеранов Veteran's day.
День труда Back to school day is what the picture implies, but I think it means Labor Day.
День святого Валентина Valentine's Day!

Русские праздники Russian holidays
1 января - Новый год

7 января - Рождество Orthodox Christmas has been a paid holiday since 1992, and since 2006 the week between New Year's Day and Orthodox Christmas, January 1-7, has been a paid holiday. (*whimper*)

13 января - Старый Новый год Many Russians celebrate the New Year twice, on the evening and night of December 31, and again on the evening of January 13, when the New Year was celebrated according to the old calendar (hence, Old New Year. .. ahahaha.) This is not an official holiday.

23 февраля - День защитника Отечества Defenders of the Fatherland Day. Before 1995 this holiday was called День Советской армии и военно-морского флота, Soviet Army-Navy Day, in honor of the founding of the Red Army in 1918. It is considered the masculine equivalent of Международный женский день and both are paid holidays. On this day women sometimes give their male relatives, friends, and colleagues presents. (Huh. Seems fair.)

8 марта - Международный женский день International Women's Day. This holiday was widely observed in socialist countries. Russians still observe this holiday - men give flowers and other gifts to female friends, relatives, and colleagues - but the political edge, the Socialist juridical emphasis on women's equality, is gone.

Пасха - Passover and Easter. Just as Passover dwarfs Hanukkah (ah, thank you, book) in religious significance for Jews, so Russian Easter dwarfs Christmas in significance to the Russian Orthodox Church.

1 мая - Праздник (День) труда / День международной солидарности трудящихся. Labor Day (for everywhere but the US apparently). Once the second biggest national holiday in the former Soviet Union, May 1 (which originated with the American labor movement in the nineteenth century) has maintained its official status, perhaps less as a celebration of the working class than as a marking of the beginning of warm weather and the summer дача season.

9 мая - День Победы Victory Day. This holiday commemorates the surrender of Nazi Germany in 1945. The huge Russian losses during the war - over twenty million dead - give this national holiday a special significance, especially for the generation that was touched by the conflagration.

12 июня - День России marks Russia's declaration of independence from the Soviet Union in 1990 (hey, I vaguely remember that). Thus the original full name of the holiday was День декларции о государственном суверенитете or День независимости России.

4 ноябра - День народного единства, National Unity Day, has a complicated history. This holiday was instituted in 2005 to commemorate the liberation of Moscow from the Polish military intervention in 1612. This celebration was intended to replace the stature of 7 ноябра, День октябрьской революции, renamed День примирения и согласия, Day of National Harmony and Reconciliation, in 1996. On November 7, 1917 (October 25 by the calendar in use at the time) Bolshevik forces stormed the Winter Palace, thus toppling the fragile Russian provisional government. For 74 years the event was celebrated as the high holiday of Communism, with parades on Red Square.


8 days. Still freaking out. Or maybe I've turned into a Luxan and bleed clear. Who knows.

Well, it's Bele Chere today, which either means I have filing to do or I'll be so busy out front I won't have time to freak out. Either way is good. There will definitely be spoiling myself with street festival food of dubious health quality and origin at around lunch time, because Bele Chere comes but once a year. If there's running into my old friend again I may scream. This week has been topsy turvy enough.

In contrast to that, if I'm lucky and/or clever, there will be Dresden Files/Anita Blake fanfic going up soon. Those of you familiar with both books may snicker at the concept behind it, those of you who are not, um. Trust me, the idea of those two guys working together is morbidly hilarious.

Argh. Argh in general and argh in some specific ways. But, off to work a bit early now to try and dodge the damn traffic. So hopefully the day will become less arghy.