Share |

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Maidan: 4 Years After

November 22 also marked the 4th Anniversary of the Orange Revolution.

On my way to the Holodomor remembrance service, I dropped by Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square), the heart of the Orange Revolution.












On Sunday, I revisited Maidan.


The Presidential Secretariat, a key Orange Revolution battleground









I miss you, Maidan!

4 comments:

Nika said...

Thank you, Taras, for these pictures... For some reason, the first word that pops up in my head is 'creepy'... The empty Maidan looks creepy, that is... It's sad, too. And I remember the first anniversary, in 2005 - the weather was horrible, too, no one seemed to have too many illusions about the politicians anymore, but the spirit was still there and it felt awesome to spend a few hours as part of that crowd again... (I was very pregnant then, too...) Anyway, thank you!

Taras said...

Creepy and empty and a shadow of its former self:(

I remember the first anniversary, too. It snowed just the way it did during the Orange Revolution.

Yushchenko drew catcalls and Tymoshenko got hand-carried all the way to the stage, with the entire Maidan screaming “Yu-lya! Yu-lya! Yu-lya!”

The spirit was there, and so was the split. They screwed it all up, and we kind of let them.

On a forward-looking note, here’s a song for your daughter:)

Anonymous said...

Wow, how sad! I was there during the Orange Revolution and remember a pact made by those camped near the administration to meet up at that spot every year.... so much potential energy just wasted... the politicians who were on the stage will never even comprehend the power they let slip right through their hands...

Taras said...

Thank you for recalling that idea, OrangeDoc!

More than that, we talked about the need to have regular Maidans to keep the Orange Revolution on the right track. I even remember Tymoshenko encouraging this interactive mode.

It never happened.

By the time the Orange leaders went astray, we the disenchanted people had lost interest. We crawled back into our shells when we should have kept the bastards in check.

Today, we’re worlds apart. They don’t care about us and we don’t care if they care or not.