Another Hair-Cutting Ceremony
Do you see Lightning McQueen there? Or, as he's known in Russia "Molnya Makween?" Bobbie baked this cake for some close friends of ours whose son was turning three.
As we've mentioned on the blog before, the people here don't cut boys' hair until they turn three. If a boy has his hair cut, then it will be known to the spirits that he is a boy and they can cause him some problems, so everyone waits. This leads to a lot of confusion for Bobbie and I guessing the gender of toddlers, but then on the boy's third birthday, there is a special ceremony for him.
I don't know if you'll recall, but Matthew had one when he turned three (though we obviously changed some of the details), and this was similar. I'll apologize in advance for the quality of the pictures; our camera recently broke so I was using Bobbie's phone.
First, of course, as with any party here, you have to have a "rich table." This time was not so elaborate as some, but still had quite a few goodies on offer.
Then all the relatives and close friends get up to pronounce a blessing on the young boy (who generally is disinterested or upset - fortunately this guy was the former). You "wish" for good things for him, peace, long life, and the like, and then cut a small piece of his hair.
I've been to several of these, and even offered a toast a couple of times, but this was the first time I've been in the "hair-cutting" party.
Bobbie was also on the list of honored guests, so she waved the scissors around and cut hair too.
Of course, at the end it was all about the cake. Little "Glory" (that's what his name translates to in English) had been waiting for that all along!
Sorry for the short post; not many pictures due to lack of camera these past few weeks. We're making progress on getting our organization registered, and also keeping on with our culture and language study. In fact, in a few hours we're going out to a yurt/ranch nearby to stay with a T family. We love the summer for the chances it brings to get out into the culture a bit more!
Be thinking of us, we'll be herding sheep and cows and all the rest of it, and staying in the family's yurt (it was standing empty as they've all moved into a little cabin). We're not sure how long we'll be there, but the goal is to stay there two weeks if things work out. Thanks again for stopping by, and we'll be sure to post how that goes when we get back to the city!
Oh, we do have one more awesome piece of news that I almost forgot, it's been so long since we updated this: we got our permanent residency! That means that we can be here for the next 5 years, so thanks to those of you who were thinking about that.
