Belarus
Belarus, which means “White Russia,” is the blue-eyed country caught in the middle. East and West. Orthodox and Catholic. Belarus suffered the most loss of any country during World War II, with hundreds of towns destroyed and a quarter of its population gone. The Chernobyl disaster of 1986, just over the southern border, took at great toll on Belarus. Heavy, black rain fell in Gomel. 70% of the radiation fallout landed on Belarus.
A transit point in ancient times, the people attribute their flexible, pliable nature to their ability to get along with all of the different peoples who came through. Or maybe it’s because Belarus consumes the most alcohol of any other country per capita.
There is everywhere rich Orthodox choral singing, even in their folk rock music, even spontaneously during a protest in Minsk. With land that is mostly flat, its highest point is a hill, potatoes are prominent in Belarusian cuisine, and 40% of the country is forested, which led to the old nickname “the lungs of Europe.” Along the border with Poland, there is a primeval forest where huge European bison roam.
The first president of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, has held the office since independence from Russia in 1994. The election in August 2020 remains contested. An avid hockey player, Lukashenko continues to seek ways to make a bridge with the people of Belarus, including giving a speech in Belarusian rather than the common Russian.
As part of an effort to preserve the natural culture, authoritanian Lukashenko mandated that 50% in 2002 and 75% in 2005 of radio broadcast music be Belarusian in origin.
Music is a big part of Belarusian culture. In medieval times, skomorokhs were harlequin actors who could also sing, dance, and play musical instruments. A unision, neumatic chant called znamenny, meaning “sign,” was used in 16thcentury Orthodox church music. Part singing was introduced in the 17th century.
Select the title to hear Belarus Folk Music and Dancing performed by the Dudariki ensemble in May 2006.
And here’s More Belarus Folk Music and Dancing performed in Norway.
To hear more music, select Belarus Patriotic Songs.
I enjoyed hearing the Belarus popular group Pesniary from the 1970s. Rich harmonies, diverse use of instruments, and with the sound and rhythm of 70s folk rock. It’s like the Beatles meets Orthodox choir!
To listen, select Pesniary: Oy rana na Ivana and Pesniary: Kalina.
Master of color, artist Marc Chagall was born Moishe Shagal in Vitebsk, Russian Empire (now Belarus) in 1887. His nationality was Russian and French.
The national poet of Belarus, Yanka Kupala (Я́нка Купа́ла), was born in Viazynka, just northwest of Minsk, in 1882. Preserving the Belarusian language and culture was very important during the eras of Nazi invasion and Soviet control and Kupala was a symbol for Belarus. There are three versions of how he died falling down a stairwell in 1942: an accident, a suicide, a murder.
Adam Mickiewicz, the Slavic Bard, born in what is today Zaosie near the old town of Navahrudak, Belarus, was a Polish language poet. He published his first poem in 1818. His language is alive with action.
Awarded the 2015 Nobel Prize in Literature for her investigative journalism and essays, writings that were credited as a monument to suffering and courage in our time, Svetlana Alexievich was the first writer from Belarus to receive the prize. Select the link to read an interview with Svetlana Alexievich at How the Writer Listens – Svetlana Alexievich. To read some of her words, select Excerpt from Voice from Chernobyl.
Belarusian cuisine is heavy on potatoes and stews. Following are some common dishes beginning with the national food Draniki. To read more, select Belarusian Cuisine.
Draniki: potato pancakes – grated potatoes, onions, sometimes meat, mushrooms, cheese, sour cream
Kletski: boiled flour balls filled with meat. Similar to Polish pierogi and Russian pelmeni, kletskis are bigger and crescent-shaped.
Galušky (Halušky) potato dumplings made of grated raw potatoes and flour
Lazanki: pasta made with wheat, rye or buckwheat flour made into squares or triangles and boiled and topped with various things such as onions, meat, cabbage, sour cream, and during Lent, mashed berries or ground poppy seeds.
Tsibriki: a popular snack that pairs with beer – potato with cheese filling fried in a pan
Sashni: fried potato cutlets stuffed with cottage cheese that melt in your mouth
Zhurek: soup made of oat, wheat or rye flour with a distinctive sour taste
Machanka: stew with sausage, bouillon, sour cream, flour, beef. It is served for the holiday Maslenitsa. Typically, people roll up pancakes and dip them in the stew
Borscht: beetroot, meat, potatoes, cabbage, carrots, and onions
Belarusian borscht has lots of vegetables and is not fatty and spicy.
Khaladnik: cold beet soup – boiled beets mixed with kefir, cucumbers, spring onions, dill served with sour cream and dill and sometimes a hard-boiled egg on top
Shkvarki: port fat snack
Kasha: grain boiled in water or milk
Spring salad: tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, bell peppers, dill, sour cream/olive oil
Pyachysta: stewed meet served with potatoes
Vereshchaka: stew with pork, bacon, onion, flour, beer, and spices with buckwheat pancakes on the side
It was invented by a royal chef named Vereshchaka.
Krambambula: Belarusian cocktail made with red wine and different types of liquor (rum, vodka or gin)
Kvass: made from buckwheat meal, wheat, rye, rye bread, barley with a low alchohol content
Top 10 Most Popular Belarusian Foods
What to Eat in Belarus
BELARUS FROM WEST TO EAST
Belovezhskaya Pushcha National Park
The Biełaviežskaja pušča (in Belarusian) and Białowieża (in Polish) Forest straddles the border between Poland and Belarus. It is considered the oldest woodland in Europe with hundreds of European bison. Białowieża means “White Tower” in Polish named for the white hunting manor of the King of Poland from 1386 to 1434. In 1541, the forest was designated a hunting reserve in order to protect the bison. Some of the ancient oak trees in the forest have names: Great Mamamuszi (height 112 feet, circumference 270 inches), the King of Nieznanowo (height 125 feet, circumference 240 inches), Emperor of the South (height 130 feet, circumference 240 inches), Emperor of the North (height 121 feet, circumference 238 inches), Southern Cross (height 118 feet, circumference 250 inches), the Guardian of Zwierzyniec(height 121 feet, circumference 259 inches), Dominator Oak (height 118 feet, circumference 270 inches) estimated to be 450 years old, and the Patriarch Oak (height 102 feet) is believed to be over 550 years old and is about half a mile from the home of the East Slavic Father Christmas or Grandfather Frost, Ded Moroz. The most famous of the Biełaviežskaja pušča trees is the Jagiełło Oak which toppled over in 1974. It had a height of 128 feet and circumference of 220 inches. There are legends that King Władysław II Jagiełło of Poland rested beneath it prior to the Battle of Grunwald in 1410.
Brest is the hero city in the southwest corner near Poland. Brest Fortress was built in 1842 and was seiged by Nazi troops during WWII. The fortress fell and there is a monument in honor of the soldiers and citizens who fought and lost their lives.
Brest Railway Museum includes fifty-six trains.
Berestyle Archaeological Museum near the city of Brest is a site of a wooden town from the 13th century.
The Tower of Kamyenets is the only remaining of several red-brick towers across Belarus in the 13th century.
Grodno (Hrodna) on the Neman River is 232 kilometers north of Brest. 20 kilometers from the Polish border and 40 from Lithuania, it was a central city to the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
Kaložskaya (Kalozha) Church of St. Boris and Gleb from the 12th century, considered to be the oldest church in Belarus, may be the only surviving example of the ancient Black Ruthenian style of architecture.
The Old Grodno Castle was built in the 11th century as a residence for the Black Ruthenian rulers.
Farny Cathedral on the Savieckaja Square is a Jesuit cathedral from the 17th century with high Baroque altars.
Melovyye Kar’yery is a lake with turquoise water and white, chalky shores about 70 kilometers southeast of Grodno.
Ružany (Ruzhany) Palace, about 130 kilometers northeast of Brest and 116 kilometers southwest of Navahrudak, belonged to the Sapieha Dynasty. There is a Ruzhanskaya Brama festival each year and a castle hotel.
Kosava (Kossovo) Castle, 25 kilometers southeast of Ružany Palace, was built in 1838 and has twelve towers and an underground tunnel to the Sapieha residence.
Lida Castle, 160 kilometers east of Grodno, was built in 1323 and hosts knight festivals in the summer.
Liubča (Lubcha) Castle to the east of Lida on the Neman River was built in the 16th century.
The ancient city of Navahrudak is just southeast of Lida. It was once the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and there are old ruins.
Mir Castle, southeast of Navahrudak about 100 kilometers southeast of Lida and about the same distance southwest from Minsk, is from the 16th century and is considered by many to be the most beautiful castle in the country. Red and white brick. The Radziwills, from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, lived there from 1568 to 1840. There is a hotel on site.
Niasviž (Nesvizh) Castle, a 17th century fortress with Baroque and Renaissance architecture on a charming lake, it is a former home of the Radziwills. There is a hotel on site.
Kreva Castle, 82 kilometers east of Vilnius the capital of Lithuania, was where the treaty uniting the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with Poland was signed and is now the site of red brick ruins in northwestern Belarus. There are legends about a beautiful imprisoned girl and a secret tunnel to Vilnius. The Grand Duke of Lithuania Kestutis was killed in the dungeons of Kreva Castle by his nephew Jogaila in 1382.
Narač (Narach) Lake, about 100 kilometers north of Kreva Castle, is in the Narachanski National Park full of pine forests with the resort village Narač and the red brick church of Saint Andrew Babola.
The Braslav Lakes area in the northwestern corner near the border of Latvia is called the blue necklace of Belarus with over thirty lakes.
Minsk, the capital city at the heart of the country, has a number of beaches on its reservoir lakes.
Built in 2006, the National Library of Belarus building has a rhombicuboctahedron shape, which means it’s a polyhedron with octahedral symmetry with eight triangular and eighteen square faces.The library contains the largest collection of Belarusian printed material. There is a light show at night and you can look out over Minsk from an observation deck on the 23rd floor.
The Zaslawskaye Reservoir (Minsk Sea) with beaches, water parks, and clubs.
The Drozdy Reservoir has a forest park and the Lebyazhy Water Park.
Dudutki Ethnological Museum Complex is a living museum south of Minsk with hands on activities including a creamery, pottery workshop, forging horshoes and armor.
Pripyatsky National Park (the Lungs of Europe) to the south along the border with Ukraine has swamps and forests, fish and boat tours. It’s possible to stay in forest lodging.
Polatsk in northern Belarus on the Dvina (Daugava) River is considered to be the oldest city in Belarus, founded in 862. The Cathedral of Saint Sophia built in 1101, the Museum of Traditional Weaving, the Museum of Belarusian Printing with works from the 16th century are found in Polatsk. Some say the geographic center of Europe is in Polatsk and there is a monument marking the spot.
Vitebsk (Viciebsk) in northeastern Belarus, Vitebsk is considered the cultural capital of Belarus on the Dvina River hosts an international music festival called Slavianskiy Bazar and is the birth place of Marc Chagall and there is a museum in his honor in a former home.
Batsvinava (Botvinovo) has a Museum of Bread that’s interactive, so you can bake some yourself in a traditional wood stove. It’s in the southeastern part of the country not far from the border with Russia.
Gomel (Homyel) in southeastern Belarus, founded in 1142, was significantly impacted by the Chernoybl disaster of 1986, suffering radioactive contamination. There are a number of historic buildings within the city.
For more about Belarus, select the titles below:
Belarus protests: Embattled leader Alexander Lukashenko hints he may quit
Here’s why protestors in Belarus are flying a white and red flag
Europe Between East and West
Western Belarus: What To See and Do
15 Best Places to Visit in Belarus
Top 10 Best Places to Visit in Belarus
