Of all the Russian holidays and traditional days, and there are many, New Year or Novy God is perhaps the most important. Also, a holiday of at least two days: it starts on 12/31, with Christmas, the Fourth of July, and Thanksgiving, All Rolled Into One (The New York Times, 2018).

Of course, there’s a Russian version of the cat scratching curls off the stairs. And the Russian language wouldn’t be itself if it didn’t have an entire collection of such phrases. Plus, record attempts to say them correctly as fast as possible.

A Russian may not see it as a holiday, but September 1st is certainly a special date. On this День Знаний (Day of Knowledge, since 1984), knowledge is honored and celebrated—but of course, knowledge is not gained easily. So, September 1st is also the day when Russian children return to school (or go for the first time). Accompanied by festivities, but once the первый звонок (first bell) rings, freedom and vacation are truly over.

There are many reasons to (want to, start, or continue) learning Russian. It’s the language of the world’s largest country, the biggest language in Europe, and it’s useful in many countries outside of Russia too. And perhaps the best reason to learn Russian: simply the most beautiful language of all.

For beginners, there are plenty of sentences to see, listen to, and repeat so that you can quickly make your own beautiful sentences. Useful for this purpose is the video below from RussianPod101, featuring words like потом (then), но (but), тем временем (meanwhile), and seven more.

In Russian, you can say a lot with few words. The language is compact, and many sentences are simple. “He is an engineer” is already short, but Russians cut it in half: “He engineer” – that’s all you need to say. The language requires few words but the right ones.

A short poem (called ‘Woordenschat’ – Vocabulary) by Jaap van Lakerveld goes like this:
A man whose small vocabulary
I estimate to be six words
says to the woman who loves him
when she asks how he feels about her
‘I don’t have the words, my dear’