the photo was taken with Canon 350d + 50-mm.

What you see here, is a part of a traditional celebration, named 'Shrovetide', or A Pancake Week, or Masleniza. It is still celebrated in Russia and other countries. In russian it is named Maslenniza (Масленница).

Today, people celebrating it with making loads of tasty pancakes (and eat them!), and mostly that is all. But theres more to it, actually!

The fun includes burning a special doll, also called Shrovetide.

Shrovetide is an ancient Slavic holiday that came from pagan culture and survived after the adoption of Christianity. Shrovetide falls on the week preceding Lent. Where did the name come from? One version says that this week, according to the Orthodox tradition, meat was already excluded from food, and dairy products could still be consumed, hence the "Shrovetide".

Shrovetide is the most fun and satisfying folk festival lasting a whole week. An integral part of the festival was horse riding, on which the best harness was worn. The guys who were going to marry, especially for this ride bought a sled. All young couples certainly participated in skating. Equally widespread, as well as holiday riding on horses, were riding young people from the icy mountains, jumping over a fire and taking a snowy town.

All this is in the peasant past ... But our company (parents with children) celebrate this holiday every year. We burn the real big Maslenitsa, take round dances around the campfire for a long time, jump over it, and write notes (we list all the bad things that we want to leave in the past year), put the doll in our purse, and burn it. Someday I will make a real photo post about this.

ps. the person on the right is my friend, a big russian artist, who creates annually the actual doll we burn.