Prior to our first adoption, Pa and I knew next to nothing about Ukraine and we found that to be pretty common among our friends and family. It’s a country that, until recently, received little attention–even when it gained independence from Russia in 1991. The one exception was the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, though I recall the media’s attention was turned more toward Belarus, just north of the accident, where the winds carried the majority of radioactive fallout.

Ukraine has had a rough history, indeed, and here’s a little bit of background:

Interesting Facts About Ukraine

Ukraine is just slightly smaller than the state of Texas.

The official flag of Ukraine is Gold and Blue (Azure) horizontal bands. Gold represents grain fields under the (Blue) sky.

The official language of Ukraine is Ukrainian. VERY different from Russian, although Russian is spoken and most Ukrainians speak Russian.

The capital of Ukraine is Kiev.

It is improper and in poor taste to say “the” Ukraine because it is not a region but rather an independent country.

Ukraine’s borders are the Carpathian Mountains in the midwest; Moldova to the southwest; Poland in the northwest; the Black Sea/Sea of Azov to the south; Belarus to the North and Russia to the Northeast. It also has a peninsula jutting out the south end, called the Crimea.

The northwestern region of Ukraine was once part of Poland, from 1919-1939.

The Great Famine of 1932-1933 (called Holodomor–meaning hunger plague) wiped out an estimated 5.5 million people in Ukraine. Holodomor is referred as the Ukrainian Holocaust because it is believed that the famine was a directive by Joseph Stalin to completely obliterate Ukrainians.

1.5 million Jews living in Ukraine during 1941 were shot and killed by Nazis. One mass slaughter occurred at Babi Yar — a place just outside of Kiev.

Yalta–a city in the southern part of the Crimea–was the site of the February 1945 Allied conference between Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin.

On April 26, 1986, Reactor #4 of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded, releasing large amounts of radioactive particles into the atmosphere. It is the worst nuclear reactor accident in history.

Today, 22 years after the accident at Chernobyl, Prypiat–the closest town to the nuclear plant–is still abandoned. If you want to look at some pretty intense pictures taken recently, go here.

The current president of Ukraine is Viktor Andriyovych Yushchenko. He has been president since 2005, but during his “Our Ukraine” campaign in 2004, he was mysteriously poisoned with dioxin which nearly killed him and left his face disfigured. During the election in November 2004, Yuschchenko’s opponent Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, was declared the winner after a very tight race. This sparked a massive protest in Kiev and in other parts of the country where citizens claimed the race was fraudulent with voter intimidation and torching ballot boxes. The protests, called the Orange Revolution for Yushchenko’s campaign color, lasted for six days until the government backed down and called for a re-vote, which resulted in Yuschenko winning the election with 52 percent of the votes.

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