CELEBRATIONS AND COMMEMORATIONS
OF UKRAINE'S INDEPENDENCE
Images of Independence: Ukraine
begins its seventh year
Western Ukraine has doggedly and persistently fought for Ukraine's independence
from various foreign regimes. The sixth anniversary dawned bright and sunny,
as those in western Ukraine solemnly and joyfully marked their holiday of
independence.
- In Lviv's center, at the memorial dedicated to poet Taras Shevchenko,
people came forward all day to place flowers at the base of the bard's
statue (upper left).
- The Ukrainian flag of gold and blue flew throughout the city in various
sizes - from the tiny ribbons pinned to the dresses and shirts of children,
to flowing banners three times the size of the bearers (above).
- Komu Vnyz (upper right) has become one of the favorite rock bands of
young Ukrainians. On a balmy summer evening they performed to an enthusiastic
concert audience of 15,000 at Lviv's Ukraina Stadium.
- At the starting line-up, the first several dozen runners all jointly
held the edges of a huge Ukrainian flag above their heads. But after the
starting gun, it was a matter of each runner for himself (and an occaisonal
herself) as the 400 participants of the annual "Halychyna" independence
day marathon (center right) took off from the center of the city for a
run through outlying villages, to return back to the city center to the
cheers of friends and family.
- Ukrainian artisans displayed and sold their wares at the Shevchenkivskyi
Hai open-air museum (lower right), a favorite gathering place for families
on the outskirts of Lviv, as grandparents and parents and children wandered
through the several hundred acres of meadows that are dotted with cottages
representing Ukrainian village life in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries.
Photos by Khristina Lew
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, August
31, 1997, No. 35, Vol. LXV
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