Visiting the Hutsuls: the estate of Ukrainian mountaineers

There are not many, oh, not many places left in Ukraine where the appearance of a stranger is a big event for local residents, and people, without fear or doubt, let strangers in who knock on their gates. Yes, they don’t just let them in, but show all the best, feed them to the fullest and invite you to come again! One of these paradises is located in the Putilsky district of the Chernivtsi region - a mountainous region inhabited by Ukrainian highlanders, Hutsuls.

(Total 27 photos)

1. This is not Bukovel and Dragobrat, where the Hutsuls are “spoiled” by mass tourism and extort money for everything. Local residents living in remote farms scattered over the hills rarely see outsiders. There is nowhere for strangers to come from here - the region is sandwiched between the mountains and the Romanian border, outsiders do not go here.

2. Unless rare tourists come to the eco-hotel "Khutor Quiet" and go for a walk around the neighborhood, photographing unprecedented beauty.

So we went in search of a church located on one of the peaks, very remote from our habitat, and on the way back we decided to visit the local population, whose hospitality we heard from the hotel staff, mostly natives of these places.

3. - Hello! Can you tell me how to get to the road? - We asked, approaching the estate, located on our way. We purposely made a detour to it in order to get in touch with the locals.

4. - Yes, go straight through our yard, and there is a road. - The hostess answers and lets her through the gate.

What a beautiful house you have! - I say, looking at a wooden frame of clearly great age. - Can I take a picture? - What is there to see? Hat is 100 years old! - The Hutsulka shrugged her shoulders incomprehensibly.

5. Hearing other people's voices, the owner of the house came running.

He introduced himself as Semyon, immediately pulled me inside the house and began to show his simple belongings.

6. - This is what my wife embroidered herself. Semyon shows ornamented pillows. - He loves them very much.

“And you know what I have?” - He continues and immediately answers: - I'll get dressed now! You'll see! Semyon leads me and Seryozha and Dima, who came up a little later, to the next room, and he runs away: - Wait here! I'll be there in a minute!

7. Simple life in the living room. When it gets into a warm house from frost, the lens fogs up, so the pictures are with effects.

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11. Family photo archive.

12. He comes in full dress - a men's ethnic costume that combines an embroidered shirt, vest, hat, belt and white pants.

“Here, far away from the Carpathians, there, de fine beeches, Mustache Hutsuls walk in white trousers,” I recall the song of the Chernivtsi group “Hutsul Calypso”, in which it is sung just about these lands.

13. Showing off in front of us in full dress, Semyon leaves to change clothes, and throws before that:

"Now let's feed you!"

14. Just a couple of minutes later, he returns and begins to melt the stove.

15. We do not have time to recover, and we are already being dragged into the yard to show the living creatures. The economy here is large - a lot of wooden buildings. Here you have a residential building, and a summer kitchen, and a barn, and a barn, and what other incomprehensible structures.

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17. - Fifteen hectares of land. A little! Simon says.

18. His wife leads us in turn through different doors, where we see either lambs, or calves, or chickens.

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20. A pig too, where without a pig?

21. The dog, judging by the stories of the mistress, likes to playfully bite the pig for a nickel, but for some reason she does not tolerate this and is very nervous when the dog approaches.

22. - Take a picture of me with the lambs! - The hostess asks.

23. - And why only you? I want too! Her husband intervenes.

— Come in the summer! We have so many mushrooms here! From one clearing you can collect two large bags. - Tells Semyon, laying the table for us. - Be sure to come, it's so beautiful here in the summer! “At first I thought you were some kind of bandits. Just don't be offended, I only tell the truth to people. - The hostess suddenly declares (unfortunately, they didn’t ask for the name right away, and then it was already inconvenient to find out). - I read that in Chernivtsi robbers killed a woman and took her pension. And I see some people coming, I thought they would kill. — How are things in Kyiv? What Yanukovych has brought our patient people to! Until the uprising! Can't get drunk! - The owner says. - And you're filming it all. Will they show us on TV? We have a TV over there, it would be nice to see yourself there. - This is his wife. I only go to the store for cigarettes and coffee. Everything else is yours! - Simon boasts.

24. At this time, a mountain of food is growing on the table, intended for us.

“My mother always told me, when a guest comes, give him the last piece of bread. Everything will come back. - Says the hostess, while we are eating beans with meat, pickled mushrooms, palyanitsa, guslyanka and scrambled eggs prepared for us by hospitable Hutsuls.

— I myself am boyko (another mountainous sub-ethnos of the Ukrainian people) from Berehomet. But I've been living here for thirty years, so I'm a Hutsul.

25. Events unfold rapidly. We ate, chatted a little in a mixture of Ukrainian and barely understandable Hutsul, and now we are led to sheep grazing not far from the house. Happy with the arrival of unexpected guests, the hosts show everything they are proud of. Our job is to record what we see and tell others.

26. Finally, I write down the address of this estate and promise the owners to send photos.

- Be sure to come in the summer for mushrooms! - Semyon shouts after us.

27. Way home

From Wikipedia:

Hutsuls are the highlanders of the Carpathians, an ethnic group of Ukrainians.

They live in the Ivano-Frankivsk, Chernivtsi and Transcarpathian regions of Ukraine (Verkhovynsky, Yaremche, southern parts of the Kosovsky and Nadvirnyansky regions of the Ivano-Frankivsk region, Rakhiv region of the Transcarpathian region). The territory of the Hutsul region in Ukraine is 6.5 thousand km², it also extends to the border regions of Romania, where the Maramarosh Hutsuls live. Along with the Boykos and Lemkos, they are considered the autochthonous population of the Carpathians.

According to the data of the first All-Ukrainian population census in 2001, 21,400 inhabitants of Ukraine determined their belonging to the ethnographic group of the Hutsuls.