Belarus in Associations

Card no 320 - Elena

This is a map card with a difference.  It shows the shape of Belarus and fills in the shape with words associated with the country. Elena was kind enough to explain some of the words that were not in English.  For example -  pushena or belovezhskaya pushena is the most famous national park in Belarus and a UNESCO WHS.  It’s a good job that Elena explained because putting  belovezhskaya pushena gave the language detected as Malay and the translation as ‘belovezhskaya pushena’.  I love Google translate but occasionally it can go a bit berserk!

Draniki, Elena told me, is a traditional dish of potato pancakes served with sour cream.  And Pesniary is ‘a nice musical band singing songs in the traditional Belarusian language that is so little used these days’.

Among the words I recognised were Azarenka - Victoria Azarenka is a Belarusian professional tennis player and the current World No. 1 – and zhaleyka - a single-reed hornpipe, considered by many to be the most popular Russian folk wind instrument.

The Pahonia was the official state symbol of the Belarusian National Republic in 1918 and the official coat of arms of Belarus from 1991 to 1995 when it was controversially scrapped.

Right in the middle of the country can be seen the word ‘postcrossing’ and judging by the number of cards I have recievd fromn there and sent there I must agree it is worth mentioning.   It is ranked eighth in thenumber iof cards sent ion the Postcrossing site.