If you pass by an increasing number of young and not so young mothers in the street, if you notice more cars racing past with just married signs, also if you notice fresh flowers laid at the foot of the statute to Taras Shevchenko [traditionally visited by newly married couples to pay homage and leave bouquets], it is a sure sign that life in Ukraine is changing for the better; people are taking the risk of marriage.
The statistics are eloquent as well. The Ukrainian Justice Ministry’s Public Registry Department points to a total of 395,524 births and 754,915 deaths in Ukraine in 2003. This asymmetry notwithstanding, experts insist that the population increment statistics are promising. The birth rate, while showing a 3% decline over the past several years, registered a 3% increment in 2002 (an extra 14,153 deliveries recorded at the Ukrainian maternity hospitals). Thus, an increase in the number of those willing to bear the nuptial bond. Statistics further show that there are 183,546 divorces compared to 317,224 marriages. Lasting marriages appear in Zakarpattia, Ternopil, and Volyn oblasts. Here marriages surpass divorces by 70%. Not so in Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kirovohrad, Sumy, and Cherkasy oblasts (30% less divorces than marriages). In 2002, 19,000 couples decided to marry, compared to 18,158 in 2001.
The Kyiv State Statistics Department reports 12,381 marriages and 6,764 divorces officially recorded in January-August 2003. The same period last year showed 11,630 marriages and 7,237 legal separations.
There are several reasons suggested for this year’s marriage boom. Olena Prudka, deputy head of the Demography and Statistics Division, says that this year young people born in 1983 (marking a birth rate peak) have reached marriageable age. It is further believed that a marriage stands a twofold risk of breaking apart if consummated in a leap year — e.g., 2004 — and the next one will be that of the Widow. God forbid a wedding then! The fact that the marriage boom took place this fall is explained by people returning to tradition. Since time immemorial, Christian rites in Ukraine have dictated that weddings be celebrated in the fall, after people are through with their summer chores.
There is no telling which of the alleged reasons are true, but the fact remains that all of Kyiv civilian registrar’s offices are packed with marriage applications, and that weekends see the greatest influx (a marriage ceremony scheduled every ten minutes). Although such applications are legally required to be submitted a month prior to the intended date, the current situation is such that the couples have to wait at least three months.
Violetta Levina, chief expert and consulting psychologist with the Central Marriage Registration Department, predicts that next year will see a great many wedding parties.
On the one hand, this is because of the enactment of the new Family Code, reading that a marriage can be registered anywhere, regardless of the applicant’s official place of residence. In other words, couples can register their marriage at the place of residence, so it stands to logic that the number of marriage will increase in Kyiv. Moreover, the trained psychologists notes a characteristic pluralism of ideas, specifically the popularity of common law marriage, but that this trend in no way affects the number of officially registered nuptial bonds.
Also, marrying officially is a costly affair these days (UAH 20 being charged for a place). Of course, this is little compared to what one has to spend for the wedding party. First, one is charged UAH 90-150 for the official marriage ceremony, complete with Mendelssohn’s Wedding March (the price varies depend on whether or not you plan a stand-up buffet). Then one will have to part with even larger sums: footing the hair stylist’s bill averaging UAH 150; add here the wedding dress (some $500 if made to order, or UAH 200-2,000 if borrowed), complete with the white gloves and jewelry that will cost one only 100 hryvnias. And, of course, the wedding cortege, bouquets thrown, live music, and emcee. One will be offered a wedding tour of the capital, using a Volga or a Daewoo Lanos model (UAH 40 per hour), but one can also order a Lincoln limo at UAH 500 [per hour] and live flowers (UAH 150-250) or artificial ones (UAH 30-150) to boot. Then there is the wedding party. If one wants it to be a memorable event, one has to pay for an orchestra (UAH 80-200 per hour), although a discotheque will cost half that plus an emcee (UAH 50-150). Yet all this is a traditional wedding arrangement now. One could upgrade it by adding fireworks (UAH 540-850) and opening a cage of pigeons. Let them fly as a sign of good luck.
Perhaps the only really needed service provided such couples free of charge is a consultation with a psychologist. A couple can have this consultation after filing a marriage application, or after the registration of marriage, by dialing a number and arranging for an appointment.
Violetta Levina says that everything depends on the couple’s inner motivation. More often than not, such consultations are requested by individuals aged under 20, those that have had psychologists take care of them while at school, college, and/or university. On the other hand, people getting married the second time want to make doubly sure that their marriage will be a lasting one. Ms. Levina notes, “I have my own clientele, people that tend to come again after the first introductory interview.” She adds that most often such consultations are caused by problems at work or at home. Sometimes couples visit to learn about how best to raise their offspring, even if only planning to have children; they want to know how best to raise a boy or a girl, who is to do what and how in the family. Girls come sometimes, asking for advice, planning to marry foreigners.
In a word, officially marrying in Ukraine is still relevant, evidenced, among other things, by poll turnouts courtesy of the Ukrainian Institute of Social Research: only 18% of the respondents believe that joining in marriage, observing all the formalities, has become obsolete; 77% think otherwise. Experts explain this by a persisting return to the patriarchal tradition within an economically unstable society.
