Hava Nagila - Jewish song with Ukrainian roots

This week's Ukrainian Jewish Heritage topic is Hava Nagila, the song, the story and the movie.

While looking into the Ukrainian connection to this ubiquitous Jewish standard, I came across a documentary film about the song, called Hava Nagila (The Movie).

I contacted the production company in Los Angeles, and they kindly allowed me to screen it for review.

In this week's Ukrainian Jewish Heritage episode, I described my search and reviewed the movie.  You can read and listen to it here.

I also went one step past where the movie ends the story—YouTube. It seemed to me that in terms of  storytelling technique, ending the story of Hava Nagila at YouTube was leaving the story unfinished. A hanging thread.

In the course of producing this series and presenting some of the episodes, I discovered that much work is being done to restore what is left of Ukraine's Jewish communities destroyed by the Nazis and Soviets in the last century.

So I thought I would check to see how popular Hava Nagila is today in its ancestral birthplace.

Very popular, it seems!

Do a google search for Hava Nagila Ukraine and you'll be amazed at what pops up!

I can save you a bit of time by starting you out with a few that I found. Enjoy!

Dnipro 2017;



Kyiv 2010

Vinnytsia-Ukraine December 2013

Students in Kharkiv



In Czernowitz



Poltava 2017



ManSound in Israel 2012



Ukrainian musicians in Paris subway 


Dnieper cruiseship lounge 2012

Ukrainian language lesson: It's Fun!

It's Fun To Be Ukrainian 

by Shoom





This is a great way for beginners to learn how to speak Ukrainian (or more accurately, Ukrainian-Canadian). Just sing along with the song! Watch and repeat, and in no time, you will have these basic words as part of your vocabulary!

Glossary: 

(To help you understand the Ukrainian words and sing along. The rest of the words are in English.) 

English spelling	Translation	Ukrainian spelling
Yak sha mayesh?	How are ya?	Як ся маєш?
Duzhe dobre!	Very good!	Дуже добре!
Pyrohy	Perogies	Пироги
Holubtsi	Cabbage Rolls	Голубці
Kubasa	Smoked Garlic Sausage	Ковбаса
Kishka	Blood Sausage	Кішка
Chasnyk	Garlic	Часник
Zabava do rahnya!	Party till dawn!	Забава до раня!

It's Fun to be Ukrainian can be heard (often) on Nash Holos Ukrainian Roots Radio... along with lots of other ones!

Get show times and/or subscribe to the podcast here.

Enjoy your lesson. Repeat often until memorized! 

Blast from the past - Taras Bulba

A great movie that was ahead of its time. Too bad there weren't more like it produced.

Maybe if there were, the West would not be so ignorant about Ukrainian history that most, especially the media, have no clue what is going on now, much less understand the dire consequences of throwing Ukraine under the bus.

Anyway, enjoy the movie clips and the background tune, Розпрягайте хлопці коні (Unharness the Horses, boys) by the group Ekspress.