New 7 Wonders of the World

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

From left to right, top to bottom: Chichen Itza, Christ the Redeemer, Great Wall of China, Machu Picchu, Petra, Taj Mahal, and Colosseum.

 

New 7 Wonders of the World (2000–2007) was a campaign started in 2000 to choose Wonders of the World from a selection of 200 existing monuments. The popularity poll was led by Canadian-Swiss Bernard Weber and organized by the New7Wonders Foundation based in Zurich, Switzerland, with winners announced on 7 July 2007 in Lisbon.

The New7Wonders Foundation claimed that more than 100 million votes were cast through the Internet or by telephone. Voting via the Internet was limited to one vote for seven monuments per person/identity, but multiple voting was possible through telephone. Hence the poll was considered unscientific. According to John Zogby, founder and current President/CEO of the Utica, New York-based polling organization Zogby International, New7Wonders Foundation drove "the largest poll on record".

The program drew a wide range of official reactions. Some countries touted their finalist and tried to get more votes cast for it, while others downplayed or criticized the contest. After supporting the New7Wonders Foundation at the beginning of the campaign by providing advice on nominee selection, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), by its bylaws having to record all and give equal status to world heritage sites, distanced itself from the undertaking in 2001 and again in 2007.

The New7Wonders Foundation, established in 2001, relied on private donations and the sale of broadcast rights and received no public funding or taxpayers' money. After the final announcement, New7Wonders said it didn't earn anything from the exercise and barely recovered its investment.

Although N7W describes itself as a not-for-profit organization, the company behind it—the New Open World Corporation (NOWC)—is a commercial business. All licensing and sponsorship money is paid to NOWC.

The foundation ran two subsequent programs: New 7 Wonders of Nature, the subject of voting until 2011, and New 7 Wonders Cities, which ended in 2014.

Winners

Location of the New7Wonders winners

The Great Pyramid of Giza, largest and oldest of the three pyramids at the Giza Necropolis in Egypt and the only surviving (and oldest) of the original Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, was granted honorary status.

Wonder	Location	Image	Year
Great Pyramid of Giza (honorary status)	Giza Necropolis, Egypt		2560 BCE
Great Wall of China	China		700 BCE
Petra	Jordan		312 BCE
The Colosseum	Rome, Italy		80 CE
Chichen Itza	Yucatán, Mexico		600 CE
Machu Picchu	Cuzco Region, Peru		1450 CE
Taj Mahal	Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India		1643 CE
Christ the Redeemer	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil		1931 CE

Reactions

United Nations

In 2007 the New7Wonders Foundation contracted a partnership with the United Nations in recognition of the efforts to promote the UN's Millennium Development Goals". The UN posted on its website:

The New7Wonders campaigns aim to contribute to the process of uplifting the well being and mutual respect of citizens around the world, through encouraging interaction, expression opinion and direct participation by voting and polling on popular global issues which are understandable to everyone.

— United Nations Office of Partnerships

However, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in a press release on June 20, 2007, reaffirmed that it has no link with the "private initiative". The press release concluded:^[7]

There is no comparison between Mr. Weber's mediatised campaign and the scientific and educational work resulting from the inscription of sites on UNESCO's World Heritage List. The list of the 8 New Wonders of the World will be the result of a private undertaking, reflecting only the opinions of those with access to the Internet and not the entire world. This initiative cannot, in any significant and sustainable manner, contribute to the preservation of sites elected by this public.

— UNESCO

Brazil

In Brazil there was a campaign Vote no Cristo (Vote for the Christ) which had the support of private companies, namely telecommunications operators that stopped charging voters to make telephone calls and SMS messages to vote. Additionally, leading corporate sponsors including Banco Bradesco and Rede Globo spent millions of reals in the effort to have the statue voted into the top seven. Newsweek reports the campaign was so pervasive that:

One morning in June, Rio de Janeiro residents awoke to a beeping text message on their cell phones: "Press 4916 and vote for Christ. It's free!" The same pitch had been popping up all over the city since late January—flashing across an electronic screen every time city-dwellers swiped their transit cards on city buses and echoing on TV infomercials that featured a reality-show celebrity posing next to the city's trademark Christ the Redeemer statue.

— Elizabeth Dwoskin, Newsweek

According to an article in Newsweek, around 10 million Brazilians had voted in the contest by early July. This number is estimated as the New7Wonders Foundation never released such details about the campaign. An airplane message, with a huge inscription "4916 VOTE FOR CHRIST" flew in Rio de Janeiro for a month.

Peru

An intensive campaign led by the Peruvian Ministry of Commerce and Tourism in Peru had a great impact in the media and consequently Peruvian people voted massively for its national wonder. The announcement of the new World Wonders generated great expectation and the election of Machu Picchu was celebrated nationwide.

Chile

The Chilean representative for Easter Island's Moais, Alberto Hotus, said Weber gave him a letter saying that the Moais had finished eighth and were morally one of the New Seven Wonders. Hotus said he was the only participant to receive such an apology.

India

A campaign to publicize the Taj Mahal in India gathered speed and it reached a climax in July 2007 with news channels, radio stations, and many celebrities asking people to vote for the Taj Mahal.

Jordan

Queen Rania Al-Abdullah of Jordan joined the campaign to back Petra, Jordan's national treasure.

Mexico

There was a campaign on the news programs to encourage people to vote for Chichen Itzá.

Other finalists

The other 13 finalists, listed alphabetically, were:

Wonder	Location	Image	Year
Acropolis of Athens	Athens, Greece		447 BCE
Alhambra	Granada, Spain		1333
Angkor Wat	Angkor, Cambodia		1113
Eiffel Tower	Paris, France		1887
Hagia Sophia	İstanbul, Turkey		537
Kiyomizu-dera	Kyoto, Japan		1633
Moai	Easter Island, Chile		1250
Neuschwanstein	Füssen, Germany		1869
Red Square	Moscow, Russia		1561
Statue of Liberty	New York City, United States		1886
Stonehenge	Amesbury, United Kingdom		2400 BCE
Sydney Opera House	Sydney, Australia		1959
Timbuktu	Timbuktu, Mali		1327

Wonders of the World

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World (from left to right, top to bottom): Great Pyramid of Giza, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus (also known as the Mausoleum of Mausolus), Colossus of Rhodes, and the Lighthouse of Alexandria as depicted by 16th-century Dutch artist Maarten van Heemskerck.

Various lists of the Wonders of the World have been compiled from antiquity to the present day, to catalogue the world's most spectacular natural wonders and manmade structures.

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World is the first known list of the most remarkable creations of classical antiquity; it was based on guidebooks popular among Hellenic sightseers and only includes works located around the Mediterranean rim and in Mesopotamia. The number seven was chosen because the Greeks believed it represented perfection and plenty, and because it was the number of the five planets known anciently, plus the sun and moon. Many similar lists have been made.

Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

The Great Pyramid of Giza, the only wonder of the ancient world still in existence

 

The Colosseum in Rome

 

The Great Wall of China

 

Hagia Sophia

 

Stonehenge

 

Machu Picchu

 

Taj Mahal

 

Empire State Building

 

Golden Gate Bridge

 

The Victoria Falls contain the largest sheet of falling water in the world in terms of area

 

The Great Barrier Reef

 

CN Tower

 

Chichen Itza

 

Old City of Jerusalem

 

The Aurora Borealis or Northern Lights

 

Grand Canyon

 

The London sewerage system's original Abbey Mills pumping station

 

The Sydney Opera House

The historian Herodotus (484 – ca. 425 BC) and the scholar Callimachus of Cyrene (ca. 305–240 BC), at the Museum of Alexandria, made early lists of seven wonders. Their writings have not survived, except as references.

The classic seven wonders were:

• Colossus of Rhodes
• Great Pyramid of Giza
• Hanging Gardens of Babylon
• Lighthouse of Alexandria
• Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
• Statue of Zeus at Olympia
• Temple of Artemis at Ephesus

The only ancient world wonder that still exists is the Great Pyramid of Giza.

Lists from other eras

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, some writers wrote their own lists with names such as Wonders of the Middle Ages, Seven Wonders of the Middle Ages, Seven Wonders of the Medieval Mind, and Architectural Wonders of the Middle Ages. However, it is unlikely that these lists originated in the Middle Ages, because the word "medieval" was not invented until the Enlightenment-era, and the concept of a Middle Age did not become popular until the 16th century. Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable refers to them as "later list[s]", suggesting the lists were created after the Middle Ages.

Many of the structures on these lists were built much earlier than the Medieval Ages but were well known.

Typically representative are:

• Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa
• Colosseum
• Great Wall of China
• Hagia Sophia
• Leaning Tower of Pisa
• Porcelain Tower of Nanjing
• Stonehenge

Other sites sometimes included on such lists:

• Cairo Citadel
• Cluny Abbey
• Ely Cathedral
• Taj Mahal

Recent lists

Following in the tradition of the classical list, modern people and organisations have made their own lists of wonderful things ancient and modern. Some of the most notable lists are presented below.

American Society of Civil Engineers

In 1994, the American Society of Civil Engineers compiled a list of Seven Wonders of the Modern World, paying tribute to the "greatest civil engineering achievements of the 20th century".

Wonder	Date started	Date finished	Location	Significance
Channel Tunnel	December 1, 1987	May 6, 1994	Strait of Dover, between the United Kingdom and France	The longest undersea portion of any tunnel in the world.
CN Tower	February 6, 1973	June 26, 1976	Toronto, Ontario, Canada	Tallest freestanding structure in the world 1976–2007.
Empire State Building	March 17, 1930	April 11, 1931	New York City, New York, U.S.	Tallest structure in the world 1931–1954, Tallest freestanding structure in the world 1931–1967, Tallest Building in the world 1931–1970. First building with 100+ stories.
Golden Gate Bridge	January 5, 1933	May 27, 1937	Golden Gate Strait, north of San Francisco, California, U.S.	The longest suspension bridge main span in the world from 1937 to 1964.
Itaipu Dam	January 1970	May 5, 1984	Paraná River, between Brazil and Paraguay	The largest operating hydroelectric facility in the world in terms of annual energy generation.
Delta and Zuiderzee Works	1920	May 10, 1997	Zeeland, South Holland, North Holland, Friesland and Flevoland, Netherlands	The largest hydraulic engineering project undertaken by the Netherlands during the twentieth century.
Panama Canal	January 1, 1880	January 7, 1914	Isthmus of Panama	One of the largest and most difficult engineering projects ever undertaken.

USA Today's New Seven Wonders

In November 2006 the American national newspaper USA Today and the American television show Good Morning America revealed a new list of New Seven Wonders as chosen by six judges. An eighth wonder was chosen on November 24, 2006 from viewer feedback.

Number	Wonder	Location
1	Potala Palace	Lhasa, Tibet, China
2	Old City of Jerusalem	Jerusalem
3	Polar ice caps	Polar regions
4	Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument	Hawaii, United States
5	Internet	Earth
6	Mayan ruins	Yucatán Peninsula, México
7	Great Migration of Serengeti and Masai Mara	Tanzania and Kenya
8	Grand Canyon (viewer-chosen eighth wonder)	Arizona, United States

Seven Natural Wonders of the World

Similar to the other lists of wonders, there is no consensus on a list of seven natural wonders of the world, and there has been debate over how large the list should be. One of the many existing lists was compiled by CNN:

• Aurora
• Grand Canyon
• Great Barrier Reef
• Harbor of Rio de Janeiro
• Mount Everest
• Parícutin volcano
• Victoria Falls

New 7 Wonders of the World

In 2001 an initiative was started by the Swiss corporation New7Wonders Foundation to choose the New 7 Wonders of the World from a selection of 200 existing monuments. Twenty-one finalists were announced January 1, 2006. Egyptians were not happy that the only surviving original wonder, the Great Pyramid of Giza, would have to compete with the likes of the Statue of Liberty, the Sydney Opera House, and other landmarks, calling the project absurd. In response, Giza was named an honorary Candidate. The results were announced on July 7, 2007, in Lisbon, Portugal:

Wonder	Date of construction	Location
Great Wall of China	Since 7th century BC	China
Petra	c. 100 BC	Jordan
Christ the Redeemer	Opened October 12, 1931	Brazil
Machu Picchu	c. AD 1450	Peru
Chichen Itza	c. AD 600	Mexico
Colosseum	Completed AD 80	Italy
Taj Mahal	Completed c. AD 1648	India
Great Pyramid of Giza (honorary candidate)	Completed c. 2560 BC	Egypt

New 7 Wonders of Nature

New 7 Wonders of Nature (2007–11), a contemporary effort to create a list of seven natural wonders chosen through a global poll, was organized by the same group as the New 7 Wonders of the World campaign.

• Iguazu Falls
• Hạ Long Bay
• Jeju Island
• Puerto Princesa Underground River
• Table Mountain
• Komodo
• Amazon rainforest

New 7 Wonders Cities

New 7 Wonders Cities is the third global vote organized by New7Wonders.

• Durban, South Africa
• Vigan, The Philippines
• Havana, Cuba
• Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
• Beirut, Lebanon
• Doha, Qatar
• La Paz, Bolivia

Seven Wonders of the Underwater World

The Seven Underwater Wonders of the World was a list drawn up by CEDAM International, an American-based non-profit group for divers, dedicated to ocean preservation and research.

In 1989 CEDAM brought together a panel of marine scientists, including Dr. Eugenie Clark, to pick underwater areas which they considered to be worthy of protection. The results were announced at The National Aquarium in Washington DC by actor Lloyd Bridges, star of TV's Sea Hunt:

• Palau
• Belize Barrier Reef
• Great Barrier Reef
• Deep-Sea Vents
• Galápagos Islands
• Lake Baikal
• Northern Red Sea

Seven Wonders of the Industrial World

British author Deborah Cadbury wrote Seven Wonders of the Industrial World, a book telling the stories of seven great feats of engineering of the 19th and early 20th centuries. In 2003, the BBC aired a seven-part docudrama exploring the same feats, with Cadbury as a producer. Each episode dramatised the construction of one of the following industrial wonders:

1. SS Great Eastern
2. Bell Rock Lighthouse
3. Brooklyn Bridge
4. London sewerage system
5. First Transcontinental Railroad
6. Panama Canal
7. Hoover Dam

Seven Wonders of the World film

Seven Wonders of the World is a 1956 film in which Lowell Thomas searches the world for natural and man made wonders and invites the audience to try to update the ancient Greek Wonders of the World list.

Seven Wonders of the Solar System

In a 1999 article, Astronomy magazine listed the "Seven Wonders of the Solar System". This article was later made into a video.

• Enceladus, a moon of Saturn
• The Great red spot of Jupiter
• The Asteroid belt
• The surface of the Sun
• The Oceans of Earth
• The Rings of Saturn
• Olympus Mons on Mars

Other lists of wonders of the world

Numerous other authors and organisations have composed lists of the wonders of the world. For example:

• British biographer, science writer, and novelist Ronald W. Clark published a book of man-made and natural wonders titled Wonders of the World, which lists 52 wonders, one for each week of the year.

• Travel writer Howard Hillman published two books on the subject, one with 10 man-made wonders, and one with 10 natural wonders.

Ukrainian culture

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ukrainian culture and customs of Ukraine and ethnic Ukrainians. Ukraine has a shared culture and history with neighboring nations, dating back to the 9th century and the Land of Rus. Mutual customs are shared among the cultures of Ukraine, Belarus, Ukrainian Cossacks and Russians. Ukrainian customs are heavily influenced by the Eastern Orthodox Church and traditions from Slavic mythology. The Soviet era unified the cultures of many unrelated nations with a common language.

Customs

Holidays and celebrations

Christmas icon, Adoration of the Shepherds, from the Ivan Honchar Museum collection. Artist unknown, c. 1670.

Social gatherings like Vechornytsi have a long history in Ukrainian culture, and so do traditional holidays like Ivan Kupala Day, Maslenitsa, Koledovanie, and Malanka, where people gather in large groups. "Razom nas bahato, nas ne podolaty" is a popular cultural and political statement of both traditional and modern Ukrainians. It translates as "Together we are many! We cannot be defeated!"

Weddings

Traditional Ukrainian wedding celebrations have many rituals that involve music and dancing, drinking and eating, and crowds of people. The wedding consists of three separate parts that can last for days or even weeks. First there's a betrothal, then a ceremony, followed by a big celebration. The betrothal involves the groom going to the bride's parents to bargain for ransom he will pay for the bride and to seek the blessing of her parents. There are many stories in Ukrainian folklore of a bride being stolen without the groom paying ransom. Often, the stolen bride is a willing participant and the couple elopes without her parents permission. Alternatively, the bride can refuse an offer of marriage, in which case, it is customary for the parents to meet the groom at the door with a pumpkin to convey the message. After they reach an agreement, the official wedding takes place in a church, often in a group ceremony with other couples. A celebration follows at home with the entire community participating.

Education

Chernivtsi University.

Religion

Religion is practiced throughout the country. Eastern Orthodox Christianity and Eastern Catholicism and Roman Catholic are the three most widely practiced religions. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church is the largest in the country. Faithful of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, the second largest, practice Byzantine rites, but are united with the Roman Catholic Church.

Cuisine

Ukrainian borscht with smetana

Main article: Ukrainian cuisine

See also: Ukrainian wine

Food is an important part to the Ukrainian culture. Special foods are used at Easter, as well as Christmas. During Christmas, for example, people prepare kutia, which is a mixture of cooked wheat groats, poppy seeds, honey, and special sweet breads.

An average Ukrainian diet consists of fish, cheese, and a variety of sausages. Head cheese is also quite popular in Ukraine, as well as Kolbasa (Ukrainian: Ковбаса́, Kovbasa), a type of sausage. Typically bread is a core part of every meal, and must be included for the meal to be "complete." During Christmas, for example, it is the tradition to have a twelve-course meal. Included at Easter are the famous pysanky, which are colored and patterned eggs. Making these eggs is a long process, and they are used for display at the center of the table rather than consumed.

Ukrainians often toast to good health, linger over their meal, and engage in lively conversation with family and friends. Often they will drink tea (chai), wine, or coffee afterwards with a simple dessert, such as a fruit pastry. Popular foods include salo, borscht, chicken kiev, pierogi,and pilaf.

Art

Architecture

Golden-Domed Baroque architecture. St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery.

Ukrainian architecture reflects distinct features of that particular location and time period. Design and architecture are influenced by the existing political and economic climate.

Vernacular architecture

Different regions in Ukraine have their own distinctive style of vernacular architecture, based on local traditions and the knowledge handed down through generations. The Museum of Folk Architecture and Way of Life of Central Naddnipryanshchyna is located in Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi. The open-air museum contains 13 theme museums, 122 examples of national architecture, and over 30,000 historical cultural objects. The Museum of Decorative Finishes is one of the featured museums that preserves the handiwork of decorative architectural applications in Ukrainian architecture. Decorative finishes use ancient traditional design patterns.

Ornamental and visual art

Christmas card by Jacques Hnizdovsky

On special occasions, every aspect of ordinary life is transformed into ornamental art form of artistic expression. Ornamentation and design motifs are steeped in symbolism, religious ritual and meaning. From the illuminated manuscripts of the Peresopnytsia Gospel to the famous pysanky and vytynanky, intricate details have ancient meaning. Much of the oral history was lost during the past 300 years of Russification of Ukraine when Ukrainian culture and language were forbidden. Organizations like the Ivan Honchar Museum, Pysanka Museum and the Ukrainian Museum are dedicated to historic preservation. Different regions of Ukraine have their own traditional ornamentation with their own variation of style and meaning. Examples can be seen in Petrykivsky Painting, ornamental architecture, Ukrainian embroidery, and textile motifs from various Ukrainian historical regions.

Jewelry

Ukrainians in national dress

Traditional costume

The iconic embroidered shirt or blouse, the vyshyvanka, is the most recognizable part of Ukrainian national costume, and even has its own public celebration in May. For men, traditional dress also includes kozhukh, kontusz, żupan and sharovary. For women, traditional dress includes kozhushanka, ochipok for married women, and Ukrainian wreath for unmarried girls. Garments are made using elaborate structural design, complicated weaving techniques, extensive embroidery, and cutwork needlework.

Weaving and embroidery

Artisan textile arts play an important role in Ukrainian culture, especially in Ukrainian wedding traditions. Ukrainian embroidery, weaving, and lace-making are used in traditional folk dress and in traditional celebrations. Ukrainian embroidery varies depending on the region of origin, and the designs have a long history of motifs, compositions, choice of colors, and types of stitches. Use of color is very important and has roots in Ukrainian folklore. Embroidery motifs found in different parts of Ukraine are preserved in the Rushnyk Museum in Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi.

National dress is woven and highly decorated. Weaving with handmade looms is still practiced in the village of Krupove, situated in Rivne Oblast. The village is the birthplace of two famous personalities in the scene of national crafts fabrication. Nina Myhailivna and Uliana Petrivna with international recognition. In order to preserve this traditional knowledge, the village is planning to open a local weaving center, museum, and weaving school.

Performance art

Dance

The Hopak is often popularly referred to as the "National Dance of Ukraine".

Traditional dances are popular within Ukraine, many of which derive from rural Cossack villages. One Ukrainian style of dancing is called the kalyna. Both men and women participate in this type of dancing.

• The women wear colourful costumes, sometimes featuring a solid-coloured (usually blue, green, red, or black) tunic and matching apron, and under that an open skirt, and below that a white skirt with an embroidered hem that should reach an inch or so below the knee. If they wear a tunic, then under that they wear a long-sleeved richly embroidered white shirt. Traditionally, women wear a type of red leather boots to dance in. They also wear a flower head piece (vinok), that is a headband covered with flowers and has long flowing ribbons down the back that flow when they dance, and plain red coral necklaces.
• The men wear baggy trousers (usually blue, white, black or red) and a shirt (usually white, but sometimes black) embroidered at the neck and down the stomach. Over the shirt they sometimes will wear a richly embroidered vest. Around their waist they wear a thick sash with fringed ends. Like the women, they wear boots, but these can be black or white in addition to red.
• Kalyna dancing involves partner dancing. One dance, called the pryvitannia, is a greeting dance. It is slow and respectful, the women bow to the audience and present bread with salt on a cloth and flowers. Another, called the hopak is much more lively, and involves many fast-paced movements. Hence hopak as a dance is derived from hopak martial art of Cossacks.

Theatre

National Art Museum of Ukraine. Established in 1898.

Museums and libraries

There are nearly 5,000 different museums in Ukraine, including National Art Museum of Ukraine, National Historical Museum of Ukraine, Museum of Western and Oriental Art, Ukrainian National Chernobyl Museum in Kyiv, Lviv National Art Gallery, Poltava Art Museum, Simferopol Art Museum, and many others of art, history, traditions or dedicated to different issues.

There are 14 libraries of state significance (Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine, National Parliamentary Library of Ukraine, National historical library of Ukraine in Kyiv, Korolenko State Scientific Library in Kharkiv, and others), and 45,000 public libraries all over Ukraine. All these institutions own 700 millions of books.

Literature

Ukrainian literature had a difficult development because, due to constant foreign domination over Ukrainian territories, there was often a significant difference between the spoken and written language. At times the use of the Ukrainian language was even partly prohibited to be printed. However, foreign rule by Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Turkey, left behind new words thereby enriching Ukrainian. Despite tsarist and soviet repression, Ukrainian authors were able to produce a rich literary heritage.

Many Ukrainians also contributed to the closely related literature in Russian language.

Popular culture

Sports

Match of Ukraine national football team in UEFA Euro 2012.

Main article: Sport in Ukraine

Ukraine greatly benefitted from the Soviet emphasis on physical education, which left Ukraine with hundreds of stadiums, swimming pools, gymnasiums, and many other athletic facilities.

Football is the most popular sport in Ukraine. The top professional league is the Vyscha Liha, also known as the Ukrainian Premier League. The two most successful teams in the Vyscha Liha are rivals FC Dynamo Kyiv and FC Shakhtar Donetsk. Although Shakhtar is the reigning champion of the Vyscha Liha, Dynamo Kyiv has been much more successful historically, winning the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup two times, the UEFA Super Cup once, the USSR Championship a record 13 times, and the Ukrainian Championship a record 12 times; while Shakhtar only won four Ukrainian Championships and one and last UEFA Cup.

Many Ukrainians also played for the USSR national football team, most notably Igor Belanov and Oleg Blokhin, winners of the prestigious Golden Ball Award for the best footballers of the year. This award was only presented to one Ukrainian after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Andriy Shevchenko, the former captain of the Ukraine national football team. The national team made its debut in the 2006 FIFA World Cup, and reached the quarter-finals before losing to eventual champions, Italy.

Ukrainian brothers Vitaliy Klychko and Volodymyr Klychko have held world heavyweight champion titles in boxing.

Ukraine made its debut at the 1994 Winter Olympics. So far, Ukraine has been much more successful in the Summer Olympics (96 medals in four appearances) than in the Winter Olympics (Five medals in four appearances). Ukraine is currently ranked 35th by the number of gold medals won in the All-time Olympic Games medal count, with every country above it, except for Russia, having more appearances.

Other popular sports in Ukraine include handball, tennis, rugby union, basketball, gymnastics, and ice hockey.

Tourism

Ukraine attracts more than 20 million visitors a year from around the world. Seven Natural Wonders of Ukraine and Seven Wonders of Ukraine are popular destinations as well as modern urban cities, festivals, ecotourism, and medical tourism.