Last May I went to Kiev with my friend for May holidays.
On 9th of May we went to Maidan to see the celebration of the
victory in Second World War: there was a beautiful parade and several concerts.
There were a lot of flowers and smiles, hugs and tears. All veterans held huge
bunches of flowers and air balloons. And people were bringing them more and
more. Especially popular were lilies-of-the-valley that are known as May and
spring flower. Me and my friend stood close to the stage enjoying beautiful
Ukrainian and Russian songs when suddenly a very old veteran with a lot of
medals on his chest called me and gave me and my friend all the
lilies-of-the-valley that he had in his hands. He smiled and said: “Flowers are
for women. We were glad to do it for you. Happy Victory Day!” I didn’t know
what to do and what to say because it was THEIR day and they were supposed to
be given presents. Me and my friend took flowers, thanked him and hugged him. A
little later I noticed that he and his friend, another old veteran with a lot
of medals, were giving all the flowers (that people kept giving them to
congratulate) to women and girls. It looked so gentlemen-like, so like a real
man. This old veteran was most probably Ukrainian, though he spoke perfect
Russian. It didn’t matter. For me he was like MY grandfather. All people there,
at Maidan felt the same, they were proud of OUR grandfathers and grandmothers
who saved OUR country for us. There were no Ukrainians or Russians, there were
PEOPLE who had the same roots and the same culture. And it was Kiev.
One might skeptically say that I am not Ukrainian and
I never lived in Ukraine, so my Ukrainian last name doesn’t really matter. It’s
true, I never lived there and last name doesn’t mean anything for me. But I
must say that I grew up partially with Ukrainian culture in my house and I
never thought that Ukrainians are different from me. Now I want to say that I
don’t want to sound “Russian-imperial”-like or not admitting Ukrainian sovereignty.
I am talking exclusively about my personal background and my self-identity. Also
I never met Western Ukrainians and I suppose that I might have had a different
perception if I would have talked to one. But I want to say that yes, Ukraine
is a part of Russia to me! And I love it as much as I love Russia.
My father comes from Don Region, in the south of
Russia, where people pretty often use mixed Russian-Ukrainian dialect. I grew
up in the North but every summer I was spending at my grandma’s village near
Rostov-on-Don. I loved telling everyone that I have Cossack blood in my veins
and turned my nose up every time when someone called me “Little Cossack girl” (only
later I learnt that Cossack were just one of the groups of the population). My
dad sang me Ukrainians song when I was a kid and I remember thinking how
beautiful and soft sounded Ukrainian language for me, how these melodies
touched my heart as strong as Russian folk songs. That was a sound of my
Ukraine.
In Karelia (on the north of Russia) where I grew up,
Ukrainian community is on the third place in number after Belarusians and Karelians.
We often went to community celebrations and concerts with my dad and those
events stayed in my memory with warm-hearted people, bright clothes, sunny
smiles, and loud, endless and sincere love. Love to everyone and everything:
people, world, sun, life… For me, that was a real image of what we call
“Russian soul”, of south, of summer, of happiness. I was a part of it and these
people were one big family for me. We sang together, we danced together, we
yelled and laughed together. And I have never seen my dad so happy, so “at home”.
It was the same feeling as the one that I had in the south of Russia. It was
the same heart-openness and unlimited love mixed with a true taste of life
(whatever the conditions of life are) that I saw when all my “south” relatives
gathered together. That was a feeling of my Ukraine.
When at 12-13 I read Gogol’s (who was Ukrainian, by
the way) Taras Bulba (about Ukrainians
fighting for their sovereignty and their religion against the Poles, who ruled
all Ukraine west of the Dnieper River) all the Ukrainian characters were “us”
for me and all the Poles were “them”. It wasn’t because Ukrainian characters were
good guys and the Poles were bad. It was because they had the same feelings and
principles as me and people around me. It was because they had the same soul
and the same heart, and I easily imagined myself being one of them, fighting for
MY land. That was a pride of my Ukraine.
I never was much into politics but following events in
Ukraine for last ten years I was always impressed by people not being afraid of
saying aloud their opinion (something that I wished Russian would do). I knew
some information about all the three leaders (Jushenko, Janukovich and
Timoshenko) and none of them didn’t really deserve much respect in my eyes. What
is happening in Ukraine now actually hurts me as if it would have happened in
Russia. I’m not defending any of the sides. I just find unfair and hypocritical
that those people who protested on Maidan to say their opinion and fought for
their rights a month ago now try to kill and to shut up their own brothers (and
our brothers) who try to do exactly the same. And I despise utterly the world
community who called the first ones “liberators” and the second ones “terrorists”
instead of helping both sides to find a compromise. People of Donbas,
Slavyansk, Kramatorsk and other cities who protest again new government don’t
want to live in Russia, they want to live in their own country and speak their
own language. They want to have a normal life and have the opportunity to
choose the way to live themselves. And they are punished for THAT? It’s
ridiculous and scary when you hear how people at the barricades in the Eastern
Ukraine saying that they don’t have a way back any more: their options are
either die here or die in the prison for being accused in “terrorism”. They say
they prefer to die while defending their land and their rights…That is a pain of
my Ukraine.
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