On January 14th, 2013 the Orthodox New Year is happening. This is because it is really only just January 1st according to the Julian calendar which is used by the Orthodox to keep track of the days of the year. So since we just had Christmas on the Gregorian calendar of the 7th of January and now according to the Gregorian calendar it is going to be the 14th of January, when the Orthodox celebrate the New Year on the Julian calendar…
Confused? I use to be until I live it every year and I still love all the holidays…
So lets back track and see what we get to celebrate in Russia…
1. Gregorian December 25th 2012, Materialistic Western Christmas…
2. Gregorian January 1st 2013, Materialistic Western New Year and Eastern Materialistic New Year/Christmas… (Russian Santa Clause Time!)
3. Gregorian January 7th 2013, Eastern Orthodox Christmas… (actually Julian – Dec. 25th, 2012)
4. Gregorian January 14th 2013, Eastern Orthodox New Year… (actually Julian – January 1st, 2013)
That is the basics and I have to tell you that everyone of those nights is presented with tons of fireworks until 2 or 3 in the morning. Any excuse is a good excuse for a Russian to fire off fireworks and when you have so many New Years/Christmas celebrations, well – bang, bang and boom is the mood…
So according to what you believe on this Monday, January 14th 2013 is the real New Year according to the Julian calendar…
It dawned on me that the Western Christmas is so materialistic and when I saw that the New Years is Russia was the same, I was a little upset that the Russians had such views also. Even though Russians do not claim that there is any religion involved in their Christmas time, as they do claim in the Western countries. Then I was pleasantly surprised to find a Christmas and a New Year in Russia that did not have roots in capitalism and greed. The Orthodox Christmas and New Year fits that bill very nicely, thank you…
Have a Happy New Year! (No matter which New Year you celebrate…)
Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…