It is probably a huge shock for you to read but according to 2011 estimation and Ukraine statistics, Literacy in Ukraine reach a high level 99.7% while in the meantime in Quebec the HUFFINGTONPOST magazine you can read that Illiteracy in Quebec is a massive problem in The Province. Half of the population is not able to read and write correctly. It gives you quite a different vision than what usual media advertise.
Europe is an old continent with many different nations and language which had to coexist on a small territory compared to America. People have to work together and they are used to learning new language in order to travel or work. It was already mentioned for example that in the Ukrainian Carpathian Mountains, people speak a dialect composed of 4 different languages .
This must be seen in the light of demographic developments. At the beginning of the 1990s there were about 52 million people living in Ukraine. Now the statistics authority says that 42 million Ukrainians live in the country. In 2050, the Institute of Demography of Ukraine expects the population to have dropped to 32 million. This would mean that Ukraine is a dying country, faster than any other country in Europe, and that it will age even faster as a result of the exodus. Everywhere, apart from Kiev, the number of deaths exceeds the number of births. It is pointed out that Ukrainian governments prefer not to carry out censuses since 2001 or to postpone them again and again.
Between 2015 and 2017, most Ukrainians went to Poland to find work, followed by Russia, Italy, the Czech Republic, Belarus and the USA. Since 2015, 7 percent of Ukrainians of working age have left the country, but probably significantly more after the visa requirement was abolished in the EU.
The "revolution of dignity" supported by the West has left behind a highly indebted country that many residents want to leave and whose GDP is falling. The government needs the conflict with Russia and the Donbass to stay in power, but at the same time the permanently smouldering war is preventing large-scale investors from coming. Even the uncontrolled militias and the right-wing nationalists who have become stronger as a result of emigration do not create much trust.
No wonder that the willingness to vote is already low in Ukraine. In a survey conducted in December 2017, almost 40 percent say they are undecided, 17 percent say they will not participate at all. The turnout at the last elections was only just over 60 percent. According to the survey, Tymoshenko's Fatherland Party would win the most votes with just 6.5 percent. The Poroshenko bloc would receive a meager 5 percent, the opposition bloc 4.1 percent. The popular front of the former head of government Yezenjuk, whom the USA preferred, only manages 0.7 percent again. This is a vote of no confidence in the political class.
When you travel to Kiev, Saint-Petersburg, Novosibirsk, it is quite obvious to understand that Eastern European people live in much harsher conditions than what we are used to witnessing in our modern western countries. People have to work hard to survive and make a living in Russia, Ukraine, Moldavia if we exclude a small amount of Oligarchs who took advantages of wild capitalism at the end of communism.
As a result for a Russian or Ukrainian bride who wants to get married with a Canadian man, it’s not unusual to learn a new language like French or English in a few months.
In order to illustrate this article, I propose you to listen to this interview made in December 2014 with Oksana, who works as a translator and assistant in a large company in Kiev.
