Christmas, 7 January 2004
A Christmas greeting for the January date, from a year when I was still learning what the season looked like here.
A happy Christmas to everyone marking it today.
In January 2004 I had not yet arrived in Kyiv, and what I knew of a Ukrainian Christmas I knew at second hand — from people describing it to me, always in more detail than I expected. The twelve dishes. The kutia at the centre of the table. The place left for someone who is not there.
What struck me even then was that nobody described it as a religious obligation. They described it as an evening. A long one, with specific food, in a specific order, with the people you belong to.
To everyone at such a table tonight, and to everyone keeping the day at a distance from home: a peaceful Christmas.
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