Also it's curious to know that what ultimately became a distinctly US aesthetic was so popular in Europe back then. I don't miss these alternative architectural scenarios at all, but it is still so interesting!

I know nothing about them, I just periodically feed fancy academic religion and sectarian keywords to the search, hoping to catch niche interest accounts :) But fingers crossed, fingers crossed!!

Wow that sounds super-invasive! As you are probably registered at the apartment, surely you can raise stink and make them stop doing that? In fact, if anything, you could oblige them to put all names on the bell!!

(except that they may try to punish you and print it at 2pt font)

gosh. our santa is at least unconditional! :) I love the elder gods concept (gods competing for believers, with those without believers losing power and hunting for at least a single worhipper to leave a shadowy existence), but it feels a bit weird ethically to put santa in this category haha!

Yeah, I think so. It's like molting in birds, it doesn't quite fall apart in one piece, they seem to live in a state of half-disassebled confusion, and somehow never demand an answer from me, as of course I wouldn't have lied to them. They just do a don't ask don't tell thing, which is so weird :)

You're not careful with your kissing, next a stork. Is there someone you forgot to ask? (a stork)

We never - ever - taught them anything about Santa! Especially as travellers, you can SEE it getting absorbed from the surrounding culture. In the US, now-older ones would leave the disgustig sprinkle-porrige for the beast to feed. Here in Germany, younger ones leave boots for St. Martin. Like how??

I hate the tooth fairy for her attempts to pay minors for wilfull self-dismembering! What next, kidney fairy?? But nah, despite almost intentional inconsistencies (like, disappeared teeth re-surfacing in a lil box in mom's drawer), the faith is strong. And who am I to fight the in-group folklore...

I'm not sure how to react, as we definitely don't promote Santa-worship, but it also feels cruel to just acknowledge it drily like "Yeah you got it finally, we lied to you for X years, but now you got it, congrats, welcome to adulthood. Next step get some income!" So I was like Uhmm hmm interesting

So flappy spanie-like ears are unlikely, but feathery ears - why not?..

But birds that rely on ears actuall do have external ears, it's just they are made of feathers, and not cartilage. Owls, for example. And I don't mean those tufts that look like ears to us (left), bot those layers of feathers inside the "face" that project sound to the inner ear (right)

Or Amaras Monastery: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaras_...

Both an Armenian heritage site:
artsakhmonuments.org/en/monuments...
monumentwatch.org/en/monument/...

And an evidence of "Armenian Crime", apparently...
armeniancrimes.com/amaras-monas...

You can read about it in a database of Artsakh heritage:
artsakhmonuments.org/en/monuments...

But also on a site with a teling name "Armenian Crimes":
armeniancrimes.com/aghoghlan-te...
where it is called "Aghoghlan Temple" through the process of "Albanization":

But had we been an UA/RU mixed family, and expecially if we had access to communities in both languages, I'm pretty sure I would have shaped it as "UA at home as the first language, RU as a cheap and useful extension in adulthood", not the other way around.

For some ppl there's no dilemma actually as that's their native tongue, and there is no alternative to learning it. In our family, it's one of the core languages we use (along with English, while surrounded by German), there's no choice for us here.

I think the question of learning a tongue as a foreign language is much easier: of course you should! Rich history, deep literature, you need to understand your enemy, but also support people (including writers / poets) stuggling under the dictatorship.

And on the other extreme, for some ppl... /