Day of Friendship and Unity of the Slavic Peoples/День дружбы и единения славян: Birds of a Feather, Stick Together!

Today is the Day of Friendship and Unity of the Slavic Peoples.  

With this in mind, I thought, as another of my totally unsolicited public service gestures, I would offer you a brief guide to how you can tell if you are a Slavic person. This is not as simple as it used to be.  Once upon a time, all the Slavic people lived behind the Iron Curtain, but today, some of them live in the European Union, some would like to, and some won’t admit they really want to.  Very Confusing.

 

The Chuds, the Slavs, and the Krivichians then said to the people of Rus:

“Our whole land is great and rich, but there is no order in it…Come and rule and reign over us.”

~ The Primary Chronicle of Russia

Over half of Europe’s physical territory is covered by Slavic people, which are broken down geographically and linguistically into West Slavic (including including Czechs, Moravians, Poles, Silesians, Slovaks and Sorbs), East Slavic (including Belarusians, Russians and Ukrainians), and South Slavic (including Bosniaks, Bulgarians, Croats, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Serbs and Slovenes).

But, as anyone who has tried to check into a hotel in London, or ridden a taxi in New York lately knows, the Slavs have become a migrant people.  So how do you know?

You might be a Slav if…

1.    You believe in your God-given right to a 70% discount on natural gas.

2.    You are sure that more is more in the nail varnish, eau de cologne, and make-up department.

3.    Fur, animal skins, and leather are fine by you.

4.    Sometime during the period December 24th and January 7th, your bathtub is full of a large salted fish.

5.    You know more than one way to cook cabbage.

6.    “Cash reserves” and “retirement account” refer to the space between your mattress and bedspring.

7.    You believe that Kosovo is an immutable part of Serbia.

8.    You are still trying to understand how Barack Obama beat John McCain in the 2008 American Presidential Election.

9.    You consider ice in drinks to be a pre-curser to fatal diseases.

10.    “Job Security” is another nickname for Uncle Pavel.

11.    Your cheekbones are wider than your shoulders.

12.    A large bouquet of flowers is a default position.

13.    You are getting the most hits from male American oil-rig workers on match.com.

14.    You prefer your Champagne sweet and your vodka warm.

15.    Your immediate forbears had more than 3 tons of root vegetables in their cellar.

16.    You are working as a waiter, construction worker, or chambermaid in any of the capitals of Western Europe.

17.    “Stalinist” to you means a better type of domicile or architecture.

18.     You are convinced that Bohemian crystal is the perfect gift for any occasion.

19.     “Olympic Gold Medal” is a synonym for “new apartment.”

20.     Beer is your beverage of choice in the morning.