Posted by brian on October 15, 1999 at 11:51:46:
In Reply to: Re: seeking.rusyn.info posted by oksana on October 15, 1999 at 09:22:08:
hello oksana. thank you for replying so quickly to my message. i am so insane about my e-mail and message boards. it is hard for me to walk past a computer without checking them.
you have a very good question that i am often confronted with by my ukrainian friends. i think that by insisting on being referred to as rusyn, i may be insulting them. like, "the ukraine is not cool enough" or something. believe me, that is far from true. i like the ukraine very much and i especially like ukrainian dances. (i was looking for more uke-dance sites when i stumbled on BRAMA.) this is a great site!
anyhow i like the ukraine but i am just not ukrainian. i feel that if i called myself anything other than rusyn, i would be turning my back on my heritage and family. do you know what i am saying? i might as well spit on their graves. maybe this would help, when people ask what my nationality is, i reply, "well, my father's family lived in slovakia and my mother's family lived in the ukraine. so my nationality is half slovak and half ukrainian. however if you are asking me about my ethinic background, i am rusyn. this is due to the lack of our own country." usually after an answer like that i need to give a brief history of rusyns. I must answer in that way everytime or i would be neglecting a people.
-well oksana thanks again for replying so fast. it is greatly appreciated. forgive me if i rambled for awhile. i did not intend this answer to be so long. i hope that my answer helped though. alright, talk to later. -Brian