Victory Day // День перемоги
- madisonunderwood93
- May 9, 2017
- 2 min read
Victory Day is a holiday that celebrates the victory of the Soviet Union over Nazi Germany in World War II (or as was called in the USSR the Great Patriotic War.) The Soviet government announced victory early on May 9th 1945 after the signing of the German Instrument of Surrender early the night before. In countries further west and in Baltic countries it is celebrated on May 8th, but in Post-Soviet states it is celebrated on May 9th because the document was signed after midnight Moscow Time.
In 2015 a decommunization process was started in Ukraine. Ukrainian parliament replaced Victory Day with the new holiday titled "Victory Day over Nazism in World War II." At that time the term "Great Patriotic War" was also removed from Ukrainian legislation and now the term "World War II" is used in Ukraine. Since then over 51,490 streets and 980 cities and villages were renamed and 1,320 Lenin monuments and 1,070 monuments to other communist figures have been removed.
(This is where a Lenin statue was in Romny)
Today it is celebrated by greeting and thanking war veterans, speeches, and evening firework displays. There is also a moment of silence to honor war victims and many people lay flowers on the tomb of unknown soldiers in Kyiv.
In Romny this morning we had a small assembly with our school near pictures of war heroes. These war heroes were all from Romny and surrounding villages and were awarded the Gold Star Medal of Hero of the Soviet Union during WWII. This is the highest honor you could have received in the soviet army. Flowers were laid by their pictures, songs were sung, and speeches were given.
Then we went to another location in Romny where there were three graves of soldiers who fell during WWII and the entire town gathered. The national anthem was played, the mayor spoke, and flowers were laid on their graves. There is also a flame that is lit during Victory Day in remembrance. Many people wear red poppy flowers pinned to their shirt, a British wartime symbol that commemorates the fallen soldiers from WWI. This also came with changes made during decommunization process as some previous symbols were associated with the Russian Liberation Army that fought alongside the Nazis during WWII.
It was a really interesting day to see how people commemorate their soldiers in a different culture and I'm glad I got to experience it in my community in Romny.
