Author Archives: RomanInUkraine

Putin’s Mosque

A recent opinion poll, published by the Levada Center, an independent agency, found that 51% of Muscovites, who are overwhelmingly Orthodox Christian, are against further mosque construction. Only 4% said they support mosque building.

But the Kremlin, usually sensitive to popular sentiments of this kind, appears to be paying little attention to the concerns.

The ceremonial opening of the Cathedral Mosque, near the city center, was overseen by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Foreign dignitaries also attended, including Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas. …

Putin, who is stepping up military backing of the Syrian government, also used the mosque opening to push his anti-ISIS message.

“We see what’s happening in the Middle East, where terrorists from the so-called Islamic State are discrediting the great world religion of Islam, planting hatred, killing people, destroying world cultural monuments in a barbaric way,” he told the hundreds of invited guests.

“Their ideology is based on a lie, on a distortion of Islam.”

http://www.vdare.com/posts/putins-mosque

***

Picture from Moscow today:

CPpfOJ4WUAAylb8.png:large

Ukrainian Diaspora embracing cultural Marxism (the descendant of the Bolshevism they fled)

By Zenon Zawada

Whether consciously or not, the Diaspora leadership in North America has begun to embrace the same Marxist ideals of the Bolsheviks that persecuted our parents and grandparents, and murdered their relatives.

Here’s a letter to the editor that I submitted to Roma Hadzewycz, chief editor of The Ukrainian Weekly, that she declined to print. I distributed it on July 1, Canada Day.

Dear Mr. Grod,

I was shocked to read your column in the June 21 issue of The Ukrainian Weekly, “Canadian Values are Ukrainian Values.” You claim that the shared values of Ukrainians and Canadians are healthcare, education and a better life for children and grandchildren.

Is that it? Our shared values all boil down to social welfare?

I’m not a Canadian, but I know enough Canadians to know that free health care and accessible education are not the key values that made their country great and they are not what make conservative Canadians proud today.

The values that made Canada great were in fact its work ethic, self-sacrifice, commitment to the traditional family, suspicion of government and an aversion to dependence, as the economist Brian Lee Crowley aptly illustrated in his book, “Fearful Symmetry: The Fall and Rise of Canadian Values.”

These are the shared values of Ukrainians and Canadians. Crowley neglects to mention another shared value, which is the shared faith of many Canadians and Ukrainians in Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

As Crowley also illustrated, these values were undermined during the 1960s in favor of state subsidies and benefits, creating a welfare state that has eroded the nation’s work ethic, the spirit of self-reliance and the traditional family.

It’s apparent to conservatives that the downside of universal medicine is its long wait periods and reduced quality. The downside of accessible higher education is that it loses its value. With so many being issued, a bachelor’s degree just isn’t what it used to mean 30 years ago.

It looks like Mr. Grod has been caught up in the rising tide of socialism and its government hand-outs and freebies, and losing sight of the values of our ancestors that brought Canada its peace and prosperity that it enjoys today. Either that, or the UCC needs some better writers.

Zenon Zawada
U.S. citizen
Resident of Ukraine

***

I am working on an article detailing how the Diaspora leadership in North America has begun to embrace the same Marxist ideals of the Bolsheviks that persecuted our parents and grandparents, and murdered their relatives.
Please send along any examples you’ve seen.

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress, for example, continues to embrace multiculturalism and diversity (reflecting the Marxist ideal of cultural relativism) at a time when the mass immigration of Muslims to the West threatens to gradually replace liberal democracy with sharia law (not in Canada yet, but certainly in some Western European countries). This is not the multiculturalism of Paul Yuzyk’s generation.

Meanwhile, the LGBT lobby (also being embraced by certain Diaspora leaders) has succeeded in dismantling the Christian family as the model and foundation for Western society. This is also part of the multiculturalism and diversity being embraced by the UCC, and which was implemented by the Bolsheviks when taking power.

Ukrainian vs. Russian-Owned Businesses (you can tell)

Russian vs Ukrainian owned businesses.

Ukraine has only had capitalism for 25 years, and unlike in Poland, its development was severely stunted by rent seeking, subsidies, and inertia. Everything is getting better, and it’s been a thrill to watch — from the breadth of goods and services offered, to the quality of customer service, to the reliability of deliveries (I love you, Nova Poshta).

Though you still have the feeling that if the market was more accessible, western businessmen would run circles around the local competition.

You can often tell whether a business is Ukrainian owned or Russian owned.

The UKRAINIAN OWNED businesses tend to be like incompetent families.

– Things don’t happen on time.
– There are no processes — instead of one competent staff person helping you, the entire office will get involved in something that you can’t imagine isn’t a standardized, daily task.
– They may try to hike prices for westerners. (They assume all westerners are millionaires.)
– Customers are asked to accommodate the personal travails of the staff — they have to go next door to get change, they haven’t had time to update the prices on the menu, can they pay you later because they paid for their uncle’s dental surgery.

RUSSIAN OWNED businesses tend to be like the mafia. Everything revolves around rules and status.
– The staff will demonstrate their authority by ignoring you.
– There can never be enough vulgar attempts at sophistication: pleated curtains, lights, rhinestones, and Russian pop music. This, I think is byzantine style. More is better. There is no efficiency or functionality. Perhaps the mentality goes: everything sucks, so more is better. More wins.
– There are rules. Forget the fact that all but one table in the entire place is empty. They are all reserved. The staff will flex their authority by telling you the table you sat beside is reserved, then watch you go to the next one so that they can get another status boost and doing it again. It’s not their fault, they insist. Those are the rules.
– Authority trumps usability. Forget the fact this is the obviously the door to use. It may be the only door, and it won’t have any signs or barriers indicating any restriction. It will only have a grave, suited man standing beside it (not in front of it, but beside it), who say in a guff, irritated manner, as if it’s obvious, that the door is closed. Those are the rules.

The dietary advice I’m trying to follow

The dietary advice I’m trying to follow:

It is ridiculous that humans know more about distant galaxies than human nutrition. The hard part with nutrition isn’t finding information but sorting through lies, pseudo science, wishful thinking, and mis-information. Here’s what I’ve come up with. Comments welcome.

1. Vegetables (all different colors, and especially leafy greens).
2. Garlic.
3. Ginger.
4. Fruits.
5. Berries.
6. Nuts.
7. Turmeric (applied both before and after cooking, with black pepper).
8. Coffee (with cinnamon when convenient).
9. Tea (black for taste, green, occasionally hibiscus).
10. One meal a day without meat.

also,

11. Little refined sugar.
12. Beans.
13. pro biotics: live yogurt, sauerkraut, pickled vegetables.

also,

14. Vitamin D supplement.

Ukrainian comic opera Cossacks in Exile (Zaporozhets Za Dunayem)

Ukrainian comic opera Cossacks in Exile (Zaporozhets Za Dunayem). First premiered in 1863.

20150904_190305

Ivan pretends to be a Muslim and goes to see the Sultan, his daughter and her lover have been taken as slaves by the Ottomans.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaporozhets_za_Dunayem

I love the spectacle of opera, and I enjoyed this one’s comic scenes, but as a writer, I’ve always been especially annoyed at the pathetic narratives. This one was typical.

My two big objections to the story:

1) God from the machine. A letter from the Sultan seemingly fixed everything at the end. It’s completely unsatisfying. Happy endings need to be earned by the characters.

2) Hiding the drama. (A common error of cowardly story tellers.) Ivan the Kozak pretends to be a Muslim and goes to see the Sultan, but the meeting, and supposedly the turning point of the story, happens off stage. A lot of writers do this. I think it’s either fear of the intensity, or fear of screwing up pivotal moments.

For a counter example of avoiding the big moments, read the last four chapters of Conrad’s fantastic The Secret Agent. (My video review here: https://youtu.be/qrLTlYNFUaM?t=2m50s)

S​aakashvili says Yatsenyuk’s Cabinet thwarts reforms, serves oligarchs

Mikheil Saakashvili has lashed out at Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk and his Cabinet, saying that they are sabotaging economic, customs and other reforms and serve oligarchs’ interests.

Saakashvili, the ex-Georgian President who became Odesa Oblast governor in May, has launched sweeping changes.

He has cracked down on corruption at the customs office and is planning to introduce faster registration procedures, cut government staff, increase their wages and replace them with new people.

Yet now all these changes, as well as reforms nationwide, are being scuttled by the Cabinet, he argues.

Yatsenyuk countered on Sept. 4 that Saakashvili’s accusations were unfounded and claimed that the Cabinet had approved the governor’s requests.

“We are all in one team here. I understand his emotions because he bears all the responsibility for Odesa Oblast,” Yatsenyuk said. “But it is inappropriate for an ex-president to bring unfounded charges against the government.”

Saakashvili told Channel 5 on Sept. 3 that the Cabinet was the main culprit for the country’s slow pace of reforms.

“Every day I talk about sabotage not by Russia, which is interested in sabotaging me, and not by local clans – they are widespread but they’re unlikely to thwart me,” he said. “We’re talking about sabotage by central government.”

He added that the Cabinet was “giving with one hand and taking away with the other.”

He said that he had “fallen victim to their talk and confidence tricks. I believe I’ve been deceived. Lies should have some limits. I hear lies every day.”

He also called for a thorough reshuffle of the Ukrainian government.

“Now the government is paralyzed,” Saakashvili said. “There must be a total reset of the Ukrainian government on all levels.”

http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/s-aakashvili-says-yatsenyuks-cabinet-thwarts-reforms-serves-oligarchs-397217.html

It seems like an empty Facebook profile was tracking me.

I sent this to a few dozen friends:

Hello. I’m writing to you about Facebook profile “xxxxx xxxxxx”. 30 of his 100 friends seem to be mutual friends with me. This includes you. I think it’s a Russian profile used to track me because I’m a person of interest (journalist and American businessman) in Ukraine. I don’t post anything secret on Facebook. All my posts are global. But nevertheless, please consider unfriending him.