Bojarka (Ukraine)

At the turn of April and May 2000 delegations from Puławy and the Puławy poviat visited Bojarka, where the letter of intent was signed concerning the cooperation. Then on April 27th 2001 in Bojarka the Puławy Mayor Janusz Grobel and  the Mayor of Bojarka Anatolij Biluk signed an agreement concerning partner Town cooperation.

Bojarka was given Town rights on December 30th 1956 in result of 4 towns merging: Bojarka, Budajiwka, Nowa Tarasiwka and Gozowikiw. Bojarka then had almost 10 thousand inhabitants.

Many people from the cultural sphere were connected with Bojarka, the most famous of which was Szolem Alejchem (literary name: Szolema Rabinowicza) – his famous Jewish writer visited Bojarka very often in the years 1884-1905. Bojarka was described by him as Bojberyk in his known work „Tewja the Milkman’s Story”. Its staging is known in the entire world from the musical of J. Bocek „Fiddler on the Roof”. The prototype of the main character was Tewja, the owner of an inn situated in the neighbouring village Zaborze.

Bojarka – is a town  inhabited by over  35 thousand people. It occupies the area of 1122 ha, including house estates – 600 ha.

During the last 25 years the town developed considerably. During this time period over 600 thousand square meters of flats were built together with a school for 1600 pupils, a gymnasium, centre for children and teenagers, municipal library, kindergartens, ceremony building, out-patient clinics, hospital for children, sports hall, telephone station, banks, pharmacies etc.

These investments show the perspective of the town’s development. Over 15 thousand people occupy with economic activity. Services companies and the industry sector are most important with respectively 4000 and 3000 people working in them.

However Bojarka is not known for its industry. The town is well situated geographically among huge forest areas. The therapeutic climate of the town is well-known. This was the decisive factor in the location of medical centres and health resorts.

Each year the town is visisted by around 100 thousand people. The town could become attractive for the inhabitsnts of Kiev due to beautiful forests, clean ponds and lakes. Tourist development is definitely the direction of the town’s development in the nearest future.
In the years 2000-2003 delegations of Puławy and Bojarka visited both town (the sojourns included: visiting schools, culture centres, institutions, offices, experience Exchange concerning communal economy, social care, non-governmental organizations functioning etc.).

Thanks to the personal engagement of Mrs Tatiana Matwiejczuk from Bojarka the cooperation in the education domain is still continued. Puławy has been visited by over 300 children and teenagers from Bojarka so far. School European Clubs from the Gymnasium nr 1 in Puławy and the Classical Gymnasium in Bojarka established cooperation. The direct result of this cooperation was the organization of summer camps with the participation of students from Stendal.

In 2005 the students from Puławy spent a week in Bojarka. The details of their visit and information concerning the cooperation were published in the Ukrainian press.

In the cultural cooperation the group ‘Retmany’ visited Bojarka and Kiev in 2002 while in 2005 the children vocal group „Allegro” presented a concert in „Dom Chemika”.

It is worth to underline that thanks to partnership cooperation Polish language lessons were introduced in the classical gymnasium and more and more students decide to learn Polish.

prepared by: Anna Matej