REFLECTIONS OF ELECTION OBSERVERS

Ukraine's citizens express optimism, gratitude

by Adrianna Melnyk

On December 22, my first night in Kyiv as an international election observer, my friend Natalya, a Ukrainian-speaking, Georgian-born, ethnic Russian, told me that psychologists and sociologists descended upon Kyiv in those first days of the Orange Revolution to study the behavioral dynamics of the crowd. I could see why. Standing on the maidan that evening, after days of watching events unfold on TV, on the Internet, and in the papers, I felt uplifted, euphoric, as if I had stepped outside myself and into a dream - but one with a cast of thousands. The cameras that scanned the crowd and projected faces up on the huge screens on both sides of the stage served to unite everyone, and had the effect of making the crowd appear even larger than it actually was.

Much has been written about the smiling faces, the joyous crowds, the excitement, the hope and anticipation of a freer and more democratic future. The days leading up to December 26 were indeed about that both for the citizens of Ukraine and for all of those that had come to support them: election observers, foreign journalists, students from countries that had recently undergone their own transformations such as Georgia and Serbia, and those from countries that were waiting in the wings, such as Belarus and Azerbaijan.

But for those who had come from the Ukrainian diaspora, they were also about contributing to a cause that had occupied our every waking moment for weeks.

Arriving in Kyiv, I was immediately struck by the mood on the street. I had never particularly liked Kyiv. Somehow the city, despite its majestic beauty and history, had always felt cold and unwelcoming to me. This time, there was an energy, an electricity that permeated people's faces and that confirmed for me that there was nowhere in the world I would rather be.

On the evening of the 22nd, Yulia Tymoshenko told the crowds that the maidan would always belong to them, that they would always have the right to demonstrate against the government, and that this right included expressing dissatisfaction with the new administration once it came into power. Three men in their 60s standing next to me expressed their surprise. "How can this be?" one asked. Another said that it didn't make sense to come to the maidan once their government of choice was in power. At that moment, I suddenly understood the degree to which the mindset of the older generation would have to change. For them, the fact that they could come to the maidan to fight against a corrupt regime was a miracle in and of itself; taking it one step further and being granted the right to protest an administration that they had freely chosen was simply incomprehensible.

Until we left Kyiv for our respective voting districts, the other observers and I spent time socializing with one another, with diaspora Ukrainians from all over the world and with foreign journalists who were anxious to learn everything they could about us, about Ukrainian history and politics, and about the current situation in Ukraine. They, too, were missing Christmas and had left their families behind, but in the words of one Italian journalist, would have stopped at nothing to be part of what was at that time "the most important story in the world."

In an interview with a Polish journalist, I mentioned Lech Walesa and told her how thankful the Ukrainian people were for his support. She stopped her tape, and said that events in Ukraine had served to unify the Polish people and to remind them of their own hard-won freedom. She told me that she had traveled to Ukraine not only to report on events, but also to be reminded of and to witness the incredible spirit of a nation yearning for democratic change and standing up for its basic human rights. She had tears in her eyes as she recalled and shared with me her own memories of the early days of Poles taking to the streets, of the beginnings of their Solidarity movement, and of the excitement and energy that filled cafes, nightclubs and every home in Poland just a few decades earlier.

* * *

Late one evening before the election, we visited the tent city.

The tent city is lined with signs of all kinds: "The Truth is Yushchenko"; "We are united, Crimea and Karpaty, we are united across space and time, we are united and no one can defeat us, Ukraine unites us"; "Fight and you will win, God is with you - Taras Shevchenko"; "My nation exists, my nation always will - Vasyl Symonenko"; "The truth will be known! Freedom will conquer! - Taras Schevchenko", "Democratic world, don't stay aside"; and this, next to a picture of Yulia Tymoshenko: "Beauty will save the world."

After passing through "security," which consisted of showing our passports and our official observer badges, we spent many hours with the residents of the camp. We sang, some of us played volleyball in the snow (with no visible net), and the tent city residents took us in, served us hot tea and sandwiches, and bombarded us with orange memorabilia.

On one orange banner that was given to me as a souvenir, someone wrote "Virte v peremohu i vy peremozhete" - Believe in victory and you will be victorious. These words of inspiration, words that clearly had kept the occupants of the tent city going through snow, rain, sub-zero temperatures and the possibility of danger, are ones that will stay etched in my memory forever, not because of their meaning, but because of the context in which they were written.

As we were leaving, I asked one of our new friends if they were or had been scared to be there, and he matter-of-factly replied that there is fear only where there is doubt, and that, from the time the tents were set up, the residents of the tent city had not had a moment of doubt about their mission.

* * *

I was assigned to observe in Hadiach, a small city of about 30,000 an hour and a half from Poltava, and a stronghold of Yushchenko support. Viktor Yuschenko's headquarters in Hadiach was based in the living room of an apartment, and was recognizable only by the orange ribbons tied to a tree in front of the Soviet-style apartment building. The night before the election, in the apartment, a group of 20-somethings chaotically worked on computers, talked endlessly on their cellphones and coordinated logistics for the next day.

Hadiach is steeped in history: it is the birthplace of both Lesia Ukrainka and her mother, Olena Pchilka; was once the capital of the left bank of Ukraine; was the site of the 1658 Treaty of Hadiach, which if it had been successfully implemented, would have created a loose confederation of Poles, Lithuanians and Ruthenians. Our hosts were eager to share with us all of their knowledge of the history of their home town.

As we visited polling districts in small villages, we were told over and over again by villagers that they had heard that many observers were coming to Ukraine, but didn't think that any would actually come to their remote part of the country. I don't think I have ever heard so many words of gratitude in my life. As everywhere else throughout Ukraine, the villages are poor, but the people are hospitable beyond belief. The older generation all expressed the same sentiment: this vote and their support for the opposition were not for them, but for their children and grandchildren. Despite years under Russian rule, the residents of this part of Poltavschyna exhibited such a pride in their language (the most beautiful Ukrainian I have ever heard spoken), their land, and their history and traditions that all reports of an east-west divide in Ukraine seemed incongruous.

We returned to Kyiv early in the morning of the 27th. People were once again gathering, and the mood on the streets was different than it had been before we left. People were a bit more on edge, but their spirit was still characterized by an underlying optimism and hope. Later in the day and on the next day, once it became clear that this time the elections had been fair and that Mr. Yushchenko had won the vote, the celebration began for real. Too-close-for-comfort fireworks and monkeys with orange ribbons around their necks are two images that I have had trouble shaking since I returned home.

* * *

Before I left, my friend Natalya told me how her mother, who had died on November 21 and had been a huge supporter of Yushchenko and a survivor of the Holodomor (the Famine-Genocide), said on her deathbed that if the Kuchma regime were to continue, there was a real possibility of another Holodomor, either literal or figurative. She didn't live to see Mr. Yuschenko's victory, but I believe that the real credit for the revolution should go not only to those on the streets, but also to their parents and grandparents, and to those, like Natalya's mother, who had held onto hope through one of the most brutal regimes in history.

And the real work is still ahead. Natalya told me that her husband, who had never visited the countryside before last week, came back to Kyiv depressed, despite the jubilation in the city. She had packed him kovbasa for his three-day trip, which he put on the table of his hosts and which disappeared within moments. He could not believe the drinking water, the poverty and the abysmal conditions only a few hours outside Kyiv.

Development in Kyiv itself is uneven: I had dinner one evening on Andriyivskyi Uzviz, called by guidebooks "the most charming street in Kyiv." The street is named for the Baroque cathedral that stands atop the hill, whose site was chosen because it was there that the Apostle Andrew raised a cross and predicted that a great city, full of churches, would one day rise from that spot. The street is steep and winding and made of cobblestones - and totally unlit and deserted at night. In any other European city, this would be a street lined with cafes, restaurants, bars. In Kyiv, it remains a prime development opportunity.

This was a revolution, as some have said, that was won by music, laughter, song and dance. Once the euphoria wears off, the work must begin. The Pora students who were helped by Serbian Otpor and by Georgian Kmara must, in turn, pass their knowledge and experiences to the Belarussian Zubr opposition movement, to the Azerbaijanis and to the Kazaks. The pride and excitement that brought people out of their homes and onto the streets must not wane if the policies of the new government do not bring immediate changes and results.

The diaspora that so readily and admirably gave up its Christmas holidays that donated time and money during the elections must stand ready to share its educational resources and professional experiences. As I was leaving, I was asked by a friend in Kyiv to encourage everyone - but especially the youth in the diaspora - to consider spending more time in Ukraine in the coming months and years. "We need you," he said.

The sheer number of young observers of Ukrainian descent from all over the world who were willing to travel to Ukraine for the elections, at their own cost, was a testament to the love that our parents and grandparents instilled in us for our country and for our people.

May 2005 usher in a new period of cooperation between Ukraine and the Ukrainian diaspora. May it go down in history as the year when a new Ukraine was born, one in which Ukrainian citizens can live comfortably and freely. May Ukraine become a country which our children and grandchildren visit not to take part in democracy-building missions, but to rent summer vacation homes in the countryside, to be educated, to conduct business in a fair and transparent environment, and to eat dinner on a well-lit and bustling Andriyivskyi Uzviz.

Adrianna Melnyk was in Ukraine on December 22-31 and in Hadiach on December 25-27. She is a manager of interactive strategy at American Express in New York.

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, January 23, 2005, No. 4, Vol. LXXIII

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