Ukraine: What are the Rumeika stickers that drove social network users crazy?

Maybe it’s a world first….Stickers in the Romanian dialect with Joe Biden on Telegram sending the message “Good!”. The current president of America is pictured holding a paper package of traditional fried Greek dumplings filled with minced meat, the favorite of Ukrainian Greeks “chir-chiria” or “tseburek” and giving the OK sign with his thumb, thus showing that he likes these delicacies. A Ukrainian of Greek descent, Uliana Kartseliuba has created 85 stickers in the “Rumeic language” and 18 in the Urum, (Turkish-speaking Greek) language of Azov.

“I made stickers with Biden, when on February 20 the US president went to Kiev,” the 20-year-old self-taught painter tells APE-MPE. Uliana Kartselioupa has been living in Thessaloniki for more than a year. “My mother and I left the bombed Mariupol at the end of March 2022. It was difficult and we forcibly left the place of residence. In Greece, luckily for me, I found the inspiration to continue my life creatively, painting stickers in our own mother tongue – the Greeks of Azov”, he says and continues: “However, the idea was collective, having the advice of ethnologist researcher of the language and traditions of the Greeks of Ukraine, Alexander Rybalko, who is also now on Telegram in the collection of stickers with the signature: “Long live our language!”

Ulyana’s tasteful stickers with genuine subtle humor were very loved by the users of the Telegram social network, and more so by the youth. “We took advantage of the possibility of free access to Telegram with our own stickers to attract our young people, to spread Rumeika on the internet,” says Uliana. The subjects of her stickers concern the history and culture, but also the daily life, tradition, manners and customs of the Greeks of Azov, while the texts that accompany the icons are in two dialects: Roumeiki and Orum.

“I have also made stickers for holidays: Easter, Christmas. All this is also published on the website of the Federation of Greek Associations of Ukraine. In addition, I have created postcards for online use but they can also be printed. They are with toponyms of Greek villages, with embroidery motifs from our traditional costumes with well-known personalities of the Greek diaspora of Ukraine. Every year on such days in Ukraine the traditional embroidery of all Ukrainians and nationalities of Ukraine is celebrated. On the national holiday (17/5) called Visivanka (s.s. from the word “visivanka” – embroidery) everyone wears clothes decorated with traditional embroidery”.

Many of Uliana’s stickers bring smiles and joy to Telegram users and have become “exciting to use. She speaks proudly of the result of her work: “With our Rumeika stickers, we cry, we “argue”, we laugh… we hold each other even online. The approximately 100 stickers in total respond to the whole spectrum of our emotions today, in the midst of war and refugees”, he says and also tells us about another form of online communication that he posts, Memes (Memes) again in Rumeika.

“And memes help promote and save our language and culture. They help preserve our national consciousness, our mother tongue, and our history…” says Uliana who firmly believes that with her work she has a mission.

Uliana Kartseliuba also illustrated a book with a Greek fairy tale in Rumeika: “Three oranges”. She speaks modern Greek comfortably, and, as she explains, Greek language lessons at the Greek Sunday school in Mariupol helped her.

“Although I am not one hundred percent of Greek origin, I love the Romanian language very much and I adore Modern Greek. In Roumeika I talk to my grandmother, who stayed behind and is in my village, which is currently occupied,” says Uliana. She herself dreams of returning to Mariupoli. “I really love our city, the beautiful Mariupoli! I don’t want to stay anywhere else! I’m waiting for the win to come back. Let all the refugees return to our suffering country, Ukraine!”