On Sunday, August 28, 2022, we celebrate a festival of Ukrainian culture in the parish garden and parish hall, Trierer Straße 20, Weiskirchen. Many people who have fled from Ukraine have found a new home in our region. They naturally feel very connected to their homeland and want to support the people who have stayed there as best as they can during this difficult time. For this reason, Yarina Solnechnaya, together with her husband Yvan Norytschak, initiated this festival as a family gathering to showcase Ukrainian customs and summer traditions. In addition to many culinary specialties, there will also be handicrafts and needlework to admire, such as paintings, folkloric embroidery, Motanka dolls (special protective dolls made according to ancient Slavic tradition), and much more. Food and drinks will be well provided. Alongside a cabbage stew with beetroot (borscht), which will be cooked from early morning in a large pot over an open flame in the parish garden, there will be pork roulades filled with plums (Krucheniki) and a rich selection of Ukrainian sweets such as cherry dumplings, poppy seed pastries (Shuliki), apple with honey (Kalyka), and various cake specialties like apple-poppy seed cake and poppy seed buns. Crisp sausages will also not be missing. Furthermore, the festival will be accompanied by a musical entertainment program on the outdoor stage featuring well-known Ukrainian artists of all ages: Kateryna Dyhalo, Ivan Lugach, Margarita Naumenko, Anna Velyka, Tetyana Konika, Ilya Protsenko, and the vocal duet Tsvit Kalyna will take turns at the microphone. Honorary guests are Totia Sonia and Natanika from Kyiv. Starting at 6:00 p.m., the well-known Ukrainian DJ Karlson will rock the stage and invite everyone to dance to disco grooves.
The patron of this event is Stefan Schuh, the local head of Weiskirchen. The festival is supported by the Hochwald Tourism of the municipality of Weiskirchen and the Don Bosco Parish, Weiskirchen.
The proceeds from the festival go to the Alliance for Intercultural Togetherness, Wadern. It is a coalition of volunteers who support people with integration in the city of Wadern and the municipality of Weiskirchen, for example with administrative matters, searching for housing, and furnishing homes. The members of the alliance assist those seeking help in their daily lives, exchange cultures, spend their free time together, and eat, drink, and laugh with one another. The alliance offers a language café several times a week with a mother-child meeting and everyday assistance in the form of sponsorships, among other things.
