Victory Day

It's been awhile since I've written, although I do have some things to upload.

I feel like I should start with May 9th. Obviously, this was over a month ago... but what are you going to do?

May 9th was Victory Day for the Russians in World War II, and is a day that is celebrated throughout the former Soviet Union. I guess it's kind of a controversial day though, for quite a few reasons.



First of all, the war wasn't really over - at least not in the way Americans have been taught to look at it. Japan, after all, had not surrendered. We were still in the Pacific, and to call the war over at that point is a little bit of an insult to the people who were still fighting.

(Although, as I've been reminded many times, it's also easy for us Americans to remember that about five times as many Russians died in WWII than Americans did, and our insistence that we were this big savior in that war still grates on Russian nerves).

For Moldovans, the end of the war in Europe meant the re-occupation of their country by the Soviets, and the beginning of the process of isolation from what many considered their natural brethren - Romania, and the initiation of the... the what, the sovietication process? When Russia began to call the language spoken in this country - (Romanian) Moldoveneasca, and switched the entire country from the Latin alphabet to the Cyrhillic... imposed a new government, made the official language russian, barred outside communication ...

So, it's kind of a controversial day, although still, obviously, quite celebrated. What's interesting is that there's more than one VDay celebration here, because the folks that aren't exactly thrilled with the Russians chose to have a different celebration.



What was doubly interesting for me, as an outsider, was to watch how things are in Chisinau, the capitol. Obviously, the memorial that you see in these pictures are in Chisinau, and the big parade and celebrations are in Chisinau.

This country, if you recall, has a democratically elected Communist government, and thus, the federal government at least is very much into the celebration of Victory Day.

Chisinau, however, had a serious upset in its last Mayoral election - this city, with basically a quarter of the population of the entire country, put in a 34-year old social democrat.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but this was a big damn deal. As Chisinau goes, some says, so goes the rest of the country. And in Chisinau, they did indeed have a big celebration for Victory Day.

But at the same time, they also had a big weekend celebration for European Unification. There were European Union flags everywhere, even flower beds made up to look like EU flags.

That's kind of a slap in the face to Russia, who is still pretty intent on keeping Moldova firmly in the fold.

The next federal election is in February. And from all accounts, it's going to be a very, very, close election.

I do so love a good election.

This picture below, by the way, is the emblem of Chisinau....