Russian Festival in West Hollywood

We've been doing a lot of things as we wait.

Fun things, productive things, cultural things, time wasting things.  All sorts of things, really.  I'd like to highlight some of them, even though I'm a bit behind.

Here's the first one...

In May, we went to a Russian cultural festival in Los Angeles, where we got to see Russian folk dancing, including that squatting dance the Cossacks do.  It turns out that's called Kozachok or Kaзaчoк in Russian.  It actually comes from Ukraine.

Here's our favorite group, Russian Souvenir, doing their routine from last year's festival:



It is held every May at Plummer Park in West Hollywood, which has a large and historic Russian population.  The Russian WWII Memorial is there, commemorating the veterans of the USSR countries.  It's not something that's talked about a lot Stateside, but Russia lost more men in the war, which they call the Great Patriotic War, than any other country.  May 9 is Victory Day in Russia, and they celebrate it as a kind of Memorial Day, which parades and honors for veterans. (These articles discuss it: Wikipedia: Victory Day  Buzzfeed: Why WWII Matters to Russians Today) 

  

The Festival was a lot of fun.  We met up with friends from the a local Eastern European/Central Asian adoption group.  There are several areas to the Festival -- the main stage, the booths (for food and other vendors), and the bounce houses (free of charge for the little ones).

One funny moment for me happened at the DirecTV booth.  They had a spin the wheel of fortune type give away with lip balm, pens, etc.  They also had a raffle for an iPod if you filled out a survey form (all in Russian).  So, I walk up to spin the wheel -- and get a sales pitch totally in Russian.  From what I could gather, it seemed to be focused on Russian language programing and channels.  I kept saying "no thank you" in Russian, and they kept trying to hand me the survey.  "Nyet, nyet."  "iPod, iPod."  "Nyet, nyet."  "iPod, iPod."  Until I finally gave in and admitted that I'm sorry, but I don't speak much Russian. (And, even more relevant, I don't know how to read it -- but, sadly, I don't know the word "read" in Russian.)  Maybe those Russian language channels wouldn't be such a bad idea, after all!

The first show of the day was the Children's Show, where kids get to display their Russian cultural talents.  Everything from singing to ballroom dancing to rhythmic gymnastics was showcased.

Then there was a break, where a magician came out to entertain the little ones.  We were able to move forward for a better view after we grabbed food (pelmeni and shish kebabs) to enjoy while we waited for the second show.

The second show was filled with mostly the grown up performers, but there were a few excellent children's groups who made the cut as well.  It was definitely the more professional of the two shows, though, and featured the wonderful Russian Souvenir dance group (pictured above).  We weren't able to stay for the whole show, because we needed to go home to feed our dog, but we will definitely come back next year and bring him so we don't have to hurry home so early. (We weren't sure if dogs were allowed in the park -- but now we know.)