What's This Stunt All About Anyway?

In addition to major public holidays, like New Year, International Women's Day, and Victory Day, Russia honors almost 200 different professions, speicalities, branches of the military,  and government service throughout the calendar year.   I first wrote about this in a column for Russia Beyond the Headlines, focusing on how, in Russia, holidays are marked on the actual day, rather than "the first Monday in September," as is done in the English-speaking world.   Recently, I turned my attention to the professional holidays.   Some, like "Day of the Internet" are relatively new, whereas others, like "Day of the Firefighters" are hundreds of years old.   These have always made me smile, but when I researched further, I found myself wondering, "what do Russian cartographers actually do?"

Every blogger benefits from the stimulus of stunt journalism, so this is mine: I will spend a calendar year marking each holiday.   Starting with "Day of the Kosmonauts" on April 12th (when this insane idea started to occur to me).  Each holiday will get its own post, with a little something about the profession in question, and then off with my own thoughts.  Move over, Julie Powell, we're coming to get you!

You will find The Stunt in the central column list, or click "Professional and Public Holidays in Russia," or "The Stunt" category in the category cloud.

Enjoy!