BOSTON – On Saturday evening, February 1, almost 300 people from the greater Boston area and as far away as Rhode Island, Connecticut and upstate New York gathered at the Venezia Waterfront Banquet Facility and Restaurant to celebrate a Ukrainian Winter Ball/Malanka 2020 with a “Welcome to the Roaring ‘20s/Great Gatsby” theme.
The venue’s ballroom, which was filled to capacity, has windows overlooking Dorchester Bay and Boston Harbor, with the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library directly across the bay and the major buildings of the downtown towering in the distance behind it.
The Ukrainian American Educational Center of Boston (UAEC) and the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America – Boston Branch (UCCA–Boston) provided the overall organizational back-up and support for this year’s Malanka committee, consisting of Oleg Sadovy, who served as the committee chairman, Darya Bohushynska, Vsevolod Petriv, Maria Fedynyshyn Saxe, Ihor Pryadko and Olya Selko.
Co-sponsors included the Ukrainian American Youth Association – Boston Branch (UAYA – Boston), the Ukrainian Federal Credit Union (headquartered in Rochester, N.Y.), MEEST-America Inc., Orest and Lila Hrabowych, and a major anonymous donor.
A view of the ballroom at the Boston Malanka.
Ms. Selko handled the flower arrangements for the foyer and all of the tables, Myron Kravchuk (Ukrainian) and Yevheniia Dubrova (English) served as the joint masters of ceremony for the evening. (Ms. Dubrova is a senior at St. Mark’s Academy who will be going to Dartmouth College in September thanks to the Ukraine Global Scholars program.) Nadiya Kravchuk was the official photographer, Ivan Kril was the DJ during the cocktail hour, Igor Barakaiev (a senior who is currently studying at Andover Academy and will begin courses at Stanford University in the fall also thanks to the Ukraine Global Scholars program) played a number of solo guitar selections during the formal opening program, and Brattia z Prykarpattia provided the live music during dinner and afterwards for dancing. Finally, Taras Sadovy and Boris S. Shpilevoy provided back-up whenever and wherever needed.
Although Malanka 2020 was officially scheduled to begin at 7 p.m., the forecast of heavy rain brought many party-goers out early and the cocktail hour was already in full swing by 6:30 p.m. with some people even checking out their tables in the main ball room and admiring the view of the harbor. At 7:45 p.m. the doors to the ball room were officially opened and everyone was invited to come in and find their assigned table and take their seat.
The official program began promptly at 8 p.m. with the co-MCs welcoming everyone and then explaining that one of the main beneficiaries of the evening was the charitable organization Ukraine Global Scholars, which is based in Cambridge, Mass., and has as its mission the identification and education of the best of the next generation of Ukraine’s leadership – politicians, educators, business leaders, philosophers, religious leaders, communicators and military leaders, in short, the major decision makers of and for Ukraine in the future.
Ukraine Global Scholars conducts a national competition in Ukraine to identify the best secondary-level students in the country and then works with some of the most prestigious private secondary-level academies and boarding schools in the United States to provide the winners with full scholarships, as well as room and board. The students are then fully immersed in the American educational system and are especially prepared for the college entrance exams. As a result, they attract the interest of some of the best universities in the country and earn offers of full scholarships to them. To date, 62 Ukrainian students have earned more than $18 million in full scholarships through this program.
After Mr. Barakaiev entertained the audience with a number of classical and contemporary selections on his guitar, the MCs called up the members of the Organizing Committee, along with Mikhail and Julia Lemesh, the co-founders of Ukraine Global Scholars, and, finally, Patrick Forde, chief of staff to Massachusetts State Sen. Nicholas Collins, whose district encompasses the eastern half of the city of Boston, including the Venezia. Mr. Forde presented the group with a senatorial proclamation commending the organizers and the supporting organizations for their support of the Ukraine Global Scholars organization and its mission, and also commended Ukraine Global Scholars for the tremendous work that it is doing in advancing the cause of Westernizing Ukraine and more specifically Ukrainian higher education. It was then announced that $5,000 would be going to Ukraine Global Scholars from the proceeds of the evening.
Following the presentation, it was time for dinner, and Brattia z Prykarpattia started to play. Within a short time, people began to make their way to the dance floor, which then remained the main venue for the rest of the evening. Periodically, students from the MIT Ukrainian Student Folk Ensemble would take part in some of the dancing. As the evening wound down, they began a Kolomyika that drew not only everyone’s attention but the participation of a good number of those gathered on the dance floor; the dance went on for almost half an hour, gathering in intensity as it went along.
Finally, the dessert and beverage stations were cleared away around midnight and the evening slowly drew to a close.