History UsefulNotes / RussianHolidays

* Some Soviet fairy tales depicts New Year as a supernatural day, when the%am not sure of this "the"% incarnation of the coming year replaces one of the ending year.

Ded Moroz is usually accompanied by his granddaughter, Snegurochka (Snow Maiden). He carries a staff and a bag of presents. His garments are blue, sometimes red or in some rare cases golden. He travels in a sleigh, carried by trio of white horses.

* Since many people in Russia feel TheGreatPoliticsMessUp is a tragic event, they intentionally refuse to celebrate this day as a holiday, instead just using it as a day off work. This sentiment gave birth to a bitter-mocking misnomer "The Independence From Common Sense Day".

** His another story, ''TheNightBeforeChristmas'', [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin takes place on Christmas Eve]] and is also based on a folk tale that demons are given a free reign on a night before Christmas. It tells a story of a village blacksmith and icon painter trying to woo the Mayor's daughter with the help of a demon he tamed with a sign of the cross.

* The week before Lent (also the seventh ''before'' Easter - a Western translation would be the old Western feast of Septuagesioma) is "Maslenitsa" (from ''Maslanaja nedelja'', "butter week"), (the last day of) which is an occasion to eat sweet pancakes and all kinds of other food. Was often a non-religious family "holiday" (read: excuse to eat pancakes) in Soviet times. Has since become somewhat more public; in particular, [[{{Das}} this troper]] has fond memories of it being "practiced" (again, as an excuse to eat gratuitous amounts of sweet pancakes) at his school when he was in first grade, though that seems to be far from universal. The holiday was a weird mix of pagan greeting/call to spring and last feast before Lent.

* The traditional parade is not really certain event. It ''wasn't'' held in Soviet Union until TheSeventies, and UsefulNotes/TheNewRussia seriously scaled it down, with the vehicle part not being held until TheOughts, and it generally tends to vary in scale, with the most impressive ones held on jubilees.

Celebrated on January 7, which corresponds to December 25 in the Julian calendar. (Russia migrated to Gregorian in 1918, one of the latest countries to do so, but the Russian Orthodox Church still uses the so-called "old style", probably because of the new calendar's Catholic roots, or just not to change its' internal messes calendar which is formed a few years in advance). It's a natural continuation of the winter holiday season, which continues until the "Old New Year" celebrated on January 14, corresponding to New Year's Day in the Julian calendar. Unlike New Year and Christmas, Old New Year is not an official holiday. The wildest party animals and the biggest alcoholics will start "celebrating" on the Gregorian Christmas and continue all the way until the Julian New Year.

* Since many people in Russia feel TheGreatPoliticsMessUp is a tragic event, they intentionally refuse to celebrate this day as a holiday, instead just using it as a day off work. This sentiment gave birth to a bitter-mocking misnomer "The Independence From Common Sense Day

* Easter, or Paskha (first Sunday after... ah, forget it, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter#Eastern_Christianity_2 refer to Wikipedia]]): Celebrated by Christians and non-Christians alike despite its origins. Associated with painted eggs, Easter cakes or quark puddings (paskha), and the stock greeting and response: "Christ is risen!" -- "Truly risen!", with nigh-mandatory triple kisses in the cheeks. The latter is subject to numerous jokes, most of which [[TakeThatUs originated from orthodox Christians, especially clerics. It's a tradition]]. // An interesting note about this holiday: the two main Christian holidays are Christmas (birth of Christ) and Easter (resurrection of Christ).

* Some Soviet fairy tales depicts New Year as supernaturall day, when incarnation of coming year replace one of ending year.

* Cities also celebrates a city day, a kind of city birthday.

Generally, Russian do not celebrate Catholic Christmas on December 25. There is Orthodox Christmas (see below), but it's significantly less important than the real winter holiday: New Year, the single most celebrated Russian holiday. This is a legacy of the early Soviet times, when Christmas and its associated attributes were discarded as "religious prejudice", but the traditions were later "reassigned" to the nearest secular holiday.

* Easter, or Paskha (first Sunday after... ah, forget it, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter#Eastern_Christianity_2 refer to Wikipedia]]): Celebrated by Christians and non-Christians alike despite its origins. Associated with painted eggs, Easter cakes or quark puddings (paskha), and the stock greeting and response: "Christ is risen!" -- "Truly risen!", with nigh-mandatory triple kisses in the cheeks. The latter is subject to numerous jokes, most of which [[TakeThatUs originated from orthodox Christians, especially clerics. It's a tradition]]. // An interesting note about this holiday: the two main Christian holidays are Christmas (birth of Christ) and Easter (resurrection of Christ), the former being more important in the Catholic Church and the latter in Orthodox.

* Since many people in Russia feel TheGreatPoliticsMessUp is a tragic event, they intentionally refuse to celebrate this day as a holiday, instead just using it as a day off work.

New Year in Russia has an equivalent of Christmas trees. A New Year tree is always called a fir tree (yolka) even when another conifer trees is used (like a pine). Kids believe that Ded Moroz (the Russian Santa; literally "Grandfather Frost") puts presents under the New Year tree on the Januray 1 night, when they are asleep.

Some parents hire Ded Moroz impersonators to deliver gifts to their children personally, in exchange for a small poem recited by heart, usually New Year themed. Every children's New Year festival, usually carried out in schools and kindergartens, also has a Ded Moroz and Snegurochka.

On the actual New Year night, just before 0:00, it is customary for families to gather in front of their TV sets and listen to the president's public speech congratulating citizens with New Year, and listen to the national anthem. So far, there were two seriously abnormal speeches — first on December 31, 1991, read by the famous standup comedian Mikhail Zadornov: in the chaos of Soviet Union dissolution few days before no one up there thought about the traditional speech, and Zadornov just happened to be the most universally recognized figure that's been in studio at the time, and the second was on December 31, 1999, when Yeltsin repeated his surprise resignation announcement from earlier that day, followed immediately by a more typical New Year speech by Putin, then acting president.

Celebrated on January 7, which corresponds to December 25 in the Julian calendar. (Russia migrated to Gregorian in 1918, one of the latest countries to do so, but the Russian Orthodox Church still uses the so-called "old style", probably because of the new calendar's Catholic roots.) It's a natural continuation of the winter holiday season, which continues until the "Old New Year", which is celebrated on January 14, which corresponds to New Year's Day in the Julian calendar. Unlike New Year and Christmas, Old New Year is not an official holiday. The wildest party animals and the biggest alcoholics will start "celebrating" on the Gregorian Christmas and continue all the way until the Julian New Year.

* Fool's Day (April, 1) . The day of jokes, sometimes pretty scary.
* Easter, or Paskha (first Sunday after... ah, forget it, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter#Eastern_Christianity_2 refer to Wikipedia]]): Celebrated by Christians and non-Christians alike despite its origins. Associated with painted eggs, Easter cakes or quark puddings (paskha), and the stock greeting and response: "Christ is risen!" -- "Truly risen!" The latter is subject to numerous jokes, most of which [[TakeThatUs originated from orthodox Christians, especially clerics. It's a tradition]]. // An interesting note about this holiday: the two main Christian holidays are Christmas (birth of Christ) and Easter (resurrection of Christ), the former being more important in the Catholic Church and the latter in Orthodox.
* The week before Lent (also the seventh ''before'' Easter - a Western translation would be the old Western feast of Septuagesioma) is "Maslenitsa", (the last day of) which is an occasion to eat sweet pancakes and all kinds of other food. Was often a non-religious family "holiday" (read: excuse to eat pancakes) in Soviet times. Has since become somewhat more public; in particular, [[{{Das}} this troper]] has fond memories of it being "practiced" (again, as an excuse to eat gratuitous amounts of sweet pancakes) at his school when he was in first grade, though that seems to be far from universal. The holiday was a weird mix of pagan greeting/call to spring and last feast before Lent.

* Ivan Kupala (July 7): Named after a weird amalgamation of John the Baptist and a pagan Slavic deity, although the origin is forgotten nowadays anyway, as well as the "meaning" of the single weird tradition that defines this holiday. It involves the youth running around shirtless and pouring water at each other.

* Creator/NikolaiGogol's ''The Eve of Ivan Kupala'' takes place exactly when the title says. Having nothing to do with the modern tradition of pouring water on everyone, it instead refers to the holiday's pagan roots, telling the story of a man trying to find a fern flower, which, according to legend, only blossoms on that day.

* The traditional parade is not really certain event. It ''wasn't'' held in Soviet Union until TheSeventies, and TheNewRussia seriously scaled it down, with the vehicle part not being held until TheOughts, and it generally tends to vary in scale, with the most impressive ones held on jubilees.

* Many job's days. Only a few are really wide known, like teacher's day (September 1)

* The classic Soviet comedy ''Irony of Fate'', its 2007 sequel and the MagicRealism film ''Day Watch'' all take place on New Year's Eve.
** Watching ''Irony of Fate'' on New Year's Eve, often on repeat, has become something of a tradition among many Russian households.

* The week before Lent (also the seventh ''before'' Easter - a Western translation would be the old Western feast of Septuagesioma) is "Maslenitsa", (the last day of) which is an occasion to eat sweet pancakes and all kinds of other food. Was often a non-religious family "holiday" (read: excuse to eat pancakes) in Soviet times. Has since become somewhat more public; in particular, [[{{Das}} this troper]] has fond memories of it being "practiced" (again, as an excuse to eat gratuitous amounts of sweet pancakes) at his school when he was in first grade, though that seems to be far from universal.

** In other words, it's exactly like the traditions of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrove_Tuesday Shrove Tuesday]], spread out over a week. In that sense, it's distantly related to [[ItsAlwaysMardiGrasInNewOrleans Mardi Gras]] (which developed out of the Latin Catholic tradition of ''Carnival'') but it's closer to the other Slavic traditions (Poles in particular are noted for consuming doughnuts and pancakes).

** In other words, it's exactly like the traditions of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrove_Tuesday Shrove Tuesday]], spread out over a week. In that sense, it's distantly related to [[ItsAlwaysMardiGrasInNewOrleans Mardi Gras]], but it's closer to the other Slavic traditions (Poles in particular are noted for consuming doughnuts and pancakes).

* Nikolai Gogol's ''The Eve of Ivan Kupala'' takes place exactly when the title says. Having nothing to do with the modern tradition of pouring water on everyone, it instead refers to the holiday's pagan roots, telling the story of a man trying to find a fern flower, which, according to legend, only blossoms on that day.

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A funny detail is, that New Year is not one day: it starts at december, 31 and continues about week officially and at least until Old New Year unofficially. Students often run alco-maraphon this days, and this long holydays are so exhausting, that rest is really needed before going back to work. Michail Zadornov, mentioned earlier, said once, that if some American ring Russian company near New Year, he may hear recommendation to ring again in April.

* Old New Year (January 13) i.e. New Year in Julian calendar. Ш

* Many job's days. Only a few are really wide known, like teacher's day

* Old New Year (January 13) i.e. New Year in Julian calendar.