by locals and tourists , which houses a reconstruction of a Ruthenian village . Looking at the interior of the simple old houses brought from the surrounding villages , I wonder what is really left of Ruthenia .
For Julia , a medical student and street musician I met in the central square in Bardejov , it ’ s not really important to know her mother tongue .
“ My grandmother speaks Ruthenian and I can understand it just a bit , but nothing more ,” Julia explains . “ I ' m a bit sorry because it ' s my family dialect , but in Bratislava we speak Slovak , and people in the world speak English ”.
A closed page of history , then ? Majo thinks differently . I met him in front of a tank , while he was riding his second-hand Transalp . During the long chat we had , he told me that “ being Ruthenian is fantastic . The language allows me to be understood in Poland and Ukraine , and a little in
Russia too .
“ I can travel around a big chunk of the world without having any major communication problem . For us Ruthenians , these borders do not exist ”.
That ’ s like saying that your own specificity is an open door to the world , not a cage in which you lock yourself up .
It ' s time to head west . I realise that I ' ve really come out of Ruthenia when , after yet another Catholic
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