Ukrainian Canadian

Back in 1983, Radio Quebec’s Planète featured the first documentary on the Holodomor on TV. A very good programme, it featured many testimonials of heartbreaking stories from this intentional genocide. It even features James Mace, the prominent Harvard researcher who published works on how the Holodomor was in fact genocide. It also mentions the Walter Duranty of the New York Times who denied the famine out right to the West, as well as the complicity of the British government not to help because of it’s relationship with the Soviet Union at the time. Please give it a watch:

From the Province:

The Olympic party may be over but at least one country’s hospitality house may be facing a stiff bill for broadcasting the Games to its visitors.

Ukraine House, sponsored jointly by a local non-profit group and the country’s Olympic organizing committee, learned halfway through the televised Games it was infringing on CTV’s broadcast rights for turning on two TVs in the hall.

The screens went dark before the Canada-Slovakia men’s quarterfinal hockey game on Friday night after CTV asked for $8,000 because Ukraine House was rebroadcasting its signal to an audience.

“If we had to pay the full amount, we couldn’t pay and without the Olympics on TV, (the house) just wouldn’t work,” said organizer Adam Kozak.

“We’re just a little guy,” he said. “We’re going to lose money and we had a very limited budget and we didn’t know about the (fee).”

He said the $8,000 amounts to almost a quarter of the house’s entire operating budget.

Ukraine House, which charged no admission, offered home-cooked meals and a cash bar, isn’t expected to even break even after paying suppliers and rent for the hall on Ash Street near 16th Avenue.

“We didn’t have huge crowds, but we were the friendliest (of the countries’ houses),” said Kozak.

Kozak said after a call, CTV agreed to waive the $8,000 fee in lieu of a $1,500 donation to the Rick Hansen Foundation.

CTV’s Andrea Goldstein said she wasn’t able to provide an executive to comment on the fee or if other houses were charged similar fees for broadcasting the Games to their patrons.

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Shame on you CTV!

From BlogTO:

Out in the west end at Royal York station, you’ll often find TTC busker Yarko Antonevych calmly plucking away at a strange lute-like instrument. The scene so charming and anachronistic that it’s no wonder commuters are instantly drawn to him. “What is that you’re playing?” they’ll ask, and it has become such a common question that Yarko has the  bandura’s history hard-wired into his brain for anyone who cares to know.

Humble Yarko says he is but a bandurist and not a  kobzar, or a traveling Ukrainian minstrel who would historically entertain and teach those around him. But if you ask me, with his natural storytelling capability and eagerness to share what he knows, there is no description that better fits him than that of a modern-day kobzar.

…

For me, being a TTC bandurist is a way of continuing the tradition and legacy of these kobzari. They played in marketplaces; the TTC is my marketplace. I’m introducing the instrument to people who wouldn’t normally hear about it. I’ve been a TTC busker on and off since 1987. It’s a nice way to round out my income, too.

…

A kobzar is more spiritual, more of a teacher to other people. A bandurist is someone who plays the bandura. Kobzar is a term that I wouldn’t be able to use on myself. Someone else would have to call me that, and I have been called that by certain people.

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Next time you are taking the subway to the West end, be sure to stop by!

From the CBC:

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has cancelled his visit to Vancouver to attend the closing ceremonies of the Winter Olympics on Sunday evening, CBC News has learned.

The announcement comes as a surprise because Russia is the next host of the Winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014, and Medvedev had planned to attend.

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Russia has also fared poorly in the medal count at the Vancouver Olympics, holding fifth place behind Canada as of Thursday morning with 13 medals — less than half of their predicted results.

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International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge called out Medvedev for his country’s repeated doping violations in cross-country skiing and biathlon.

The suspicions surrounding the Russians, who have had eight biathletes and cross-country skiers banned for doping since the end of the 2009 World Cup season, were raised repeatedly during Rogge’s media conference in Vancouver on Feb. 9.

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From the The Toronto Star:

The next Winter Olympics is shaping up as a Cold War-style battle between Canada and Russia after a blistering editorial in Pravda labeled us as a nation of cowardly, incompetent war criminals.

The editorial, entitled Vancouver: Mutton Dressed as Lamb, goes straight for the eyes from the outset. “Vancouver is not fit to hold the Winter Olympics,” it declares in the opening paragraph.

And that was before Canada whipped Russia in the hockey quarter finals. Today, the site was less expansive.

“The Red Machine Runs into a Maple Tree,” was Pravda’s headline. Other newspaper banners across Russia included “Nightmare in Vancouver” and “Down and Out.”

Reading back on Pravda’s screed, the schadenfreude will be thick for Canadian supporters. The website’s main athletic complaint is about a short-notice drug test issued to Russian skier Natalya Korosteleva. It neglects to mention that VANOC organizers have no input into the drug-testing regime of any particular sporting body.

It also impugns us for the decision to give the gold medal in men’s figure skating to American Evan Lysacek over Russian Evgeni Plushenko – as if we had some say in that, either.

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“Even more diligent critics of Vancouver 2010 have been astonished by the editorial,” the Times of London wrote today.

Last night, Russian hockey stars were being … well … Russian about their loss.

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