Second Annual Culture Day Celebrates All Things Ukrainian

Steve Bornhoft

November 14, 2024

Photo: Ukrainian dress, foods and crafts all made contributions to an event held to raise funds to support demining efforts.

By Steve Bornhoft

If not for Ukrainian Culture Day, I may never have discovered the 19th-century artist and poet Taras Shevchenko, who spoke powerfully to the oppression of Ukrainians by Russian upper classes and who was imprisoned after being charged with libeling Russian imperial officials.

Found offensive was his satirical poem “Dream” wherein a man sees an owl and flies after it, gaining new perspective on the contrast between human suffering and natural beauty. Shevchenko’s depiction of Tsar Nicholas’s wife — thinner than a “dried-up mushroom” and “troubled with the twitch” — was seen as especially egregious.

Today’s Russian’s war against Ukraine was not overtly on display at the Culture Day event, nor was it very far recessed into the background. A moment of silence was observed for lives lost in the war. The second annual gathering was held Nov. 9 as a fundraiser for altruTek, a nonprofit that is working to raise funds to help rid Ukraine of landmines and other unexploded ordnance.

Employees of ArroTech, a business working to perfect a mine-detecting, autonomous drone, entertained questions about a drone on display and monitored a 3D printer as it turned out a part for the award-winning unmanned aerial vehicle.

About 350 people attended the event, which generated $3,500 in proceeds for altruTek and celebrated various aspects of Ukrainian culture.

Inna Adams, Ukrainian like the majority of the 18 tabletop vendors at the event, traveled from Savannah, Georgia, to take part. She represented an online school dedicated to “humanitarian pedagogy” and an organization that operates a retreat center in Moundsville, West Virginia, that promotes wellness via yoga, dance, sports and meditation.

At her table, cookies, said to be consecrated, were handed out along with passages from Shevchenko on slips of paper rolled up like treasure maps. Unwrapping mine, I read, “He who neither grieves nor weeps will never truly rejoice.”

Saturday was a day for rejoicing and celebration among Americans and Ukrainians, many of whom have been profoundly affected by the war. Some have been in the United States only since shortly before the conflct began.

Mills left her post to lead children and adults in dances. One involved forming a human tunnel through which couples passed.

Earlier, three women — a violinist, and two singers one of whom played a many-stringed bandura — performed Ukrainian songs that were much more somber than the dance tunes. The musicians were positioned beneath the flag of Ukraine, its bands of blue and yellow representing the sky and fields of grain.

Tables overflowed with craft items, and food and dress were stars of Saturday’s show.

Floral headbands and shirts embroidered with flowers brightened the convention-size room at the host building owned by presenting sponsor TechFarms. Sunflower buttons given away by altruTek served as lapel pins and boutonnieres.

Lisa Brady of Lynette’s Custom Cakes and Catering in Lynn Haven sold molded, walnut-shaped special-occasion sugar cookies with caramel centers.

Veronica Urshelevyts served up beef, pork and chicken jerky and encouraged me to try her sugar-free fruit leather; I sampled some made from banana puree, said by Urshelevyts to be the sweetest of them all.

Courtney Henslee and Zac Harshbarger of Better Greens turned people onto the benefits of microgreens. On hand were trays of tiny sunflower, pea, cabbage and broccoli plants, said to be packed with nutrients.

In a corner of the big room, a fish seller named Mykola, a Ukrainian now living in Marianna, Florida, after leaving Ukraine two years ago, had smoked sturgeon for sale. He was joined by a woman, Alena, who gave me no choice but to sample her fish dip, spread on a cracker.

And she was right. It tasted better than it looked.

Smachnyy!

THANK YOU!

Beneficiary altruTek wishes to thank the many businesses that made the event a success.