Our Hromada received two great presents on 25 March 2017.

The first one is a beautiful embroidered dress from Podillia. Olya Sashko was visiting her family in Ukraine and told them about our community and our dancing group Vodohray. They were very excited that Vodohrai keeps Ukrainian dance alive.

The thought that at the other end of the world Ukrainian traditions are being carried by Ukrainian migrants, moved our compatriots so much that they decided to gift us a precious, old style linen dress as a reminder of a strong connection between the mainland Ukraine and us, as its outpost.

Their names are Olga Bondarchuk (Olya Sashko’s stepmum), Anastasia Fomina and Natalia Sentamog. Natalia is part of the Viinitsia Oblast Folk Art Centre. We will be writing an official Thank you letter to these ladies and hope that may be one day they will visit Brisbane and our Hromada.

This vyshyvanka is from the Barshadsky region of Viinitsia oblast from the beginning of the 20th Century.

This is a very symbolic gift as it has survived the persecution of the Ukrainian culture and now it is in Australia to remind us where we came from. It will be passed to our children and then to our children’s children and hopefully this thread will never be broken.

The dress will be displayed in our Domivka when we finish our refurbishment and everybody will be able to see it’s beauty.

A different gift, of a more modern style but with a strong connection to our history, was presented to our community by Pavlo Angelutsa. This is a beautifully made calendar picturing Ukrainian women in old style folk outfits. One can spend a long time looking at each page at each page as they are so colourful and rich in tradition and meaning. Calendar was made in Ukraine by company Treti Pivni and here is one of the pictures:

Treti Pivni is a photo studio from Lviv and they showcase the beauty and uniqueness of Ukrainian culture and diversity of its regions. Here is a link to the website describing what they do and showing some of their artwork: http://www.uamodna.com/articles/krasa-po-ukrayinsjky-vid-maysterni-treti-pivni/

We hope that with time we will have a special place for our artefacts – from the days when our Hromada was set up in Brisbane to our days and in the future.

Thank you, Olya and Pavlo.