Ukraine isn't dead yet!

The Prophetic Ukrainian National Anthem: Shche ne vmerla Ukraina! 

Plast group Nezabudky performing traditional Ukrainian songs in Philadelphia circa 1970

The count is in from Crimea and not surprisingly the vote is 96% in favor of Crimea joining Russia. Of course there were only two choices on the ballot: 1) join Russia 2) have greater independence from Ukraine. And of course, the Ukrainians and Tatars boycotted the vote and the troops stationed there were not allowed to vote. So who voted? The Russians. Of course, they would vote in favor. I wouldn't be surprised if they also got paid for showing up at the polls.



The only problem is that Russia's constitution does not permit them to annex any lands without the agreement of the country's leadership -- that being Ukraine's leadership -- which isn't going to happen. So, what does Putin do when he doesn't like the rules? He changes them.  But in my mind, I am singing the Ukrainian National Anthem, which translates roughly into "Ukraine Has Not Died Yet." 

As a child, you learn your national anthem by rote. At the age of 4 or 5, you hardly know what it is you are singing, it's just fun to sing along and "know" all the words.

For a Ukrainian American it was doubly curious to learn two anthems:  one you heard on television and at every sporting match and state event, and the other heard only in Ukrainian school, at Ukrainian Soccer League matches, and occasionally at home and public gatherings if something patriotic were taking place. The latter existed only in the diaspora. They weren't allowed to sing it in Soviet Ukraine. It would never have been heard on television in that time.

I learned the Ukrainian anthem long before the American one because we spoke only Ukrainian at home. At the age of 6, when I went to school, a Ukrainian American Byzantine Rite Catholic school of course, I remember thinking I will never understand anyone or anything here because they spoke only English there. That's the last I remember of not understanding. One minute I spoke only Ukrainian, the next I spoke English and was singing the American National Anthem as well as saying the pledge of allegiance to the United States of America every weekday. On Saturdays and Sundays we sang the Ukrainian anthem and learned about everything Ukrainian.

At some point, when my level of cognition reached a more mature state, I got to thinking about the different anthems. The Star Spangled Banner has a rather difficult melody. But its lyrics are patriotic and inspirational. "Oh say does that star spangled banner yet wave, o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?" It doesn't matter that it asks a question because everyone knows the answer. Of course it still waves and the land is free.

The Ukrainian anthem is an entirely different thing. It's music is hauntingly beautiful but, as are all Ukrainian songs in minor keys, lamenting. And so it starts out with the claim, "Shche ne vmerla Ukraina", or "Ukraine has not died yet..." Now what kind of rally cry is that, I ask?  From the first time I thought about it, I've been wondering why the hell we're singing "we're not dead yet"?  Shouldn't we, like the Americans, be singing, "We're free, we're free, we're goddamn free?"  Of course, when you understand that Ukraine has rarely been free, it makes perfect sense.  Despite all the incursions, it has never gone away and we are still Ukrainian through and through. They haven't been able to beat, force, or indoctrinate it out of us. Now that's really interesting.

To understand why this anthem resonates so much with Ukrainians you have to look at the 30-second history of Ukraine.  I'm no historian but it goes something like this:

2000 years of struggle

• Early history - Nomadic tribes scyths, goths and others pass through
• Slavic people settle the region in 7th/8th centuries
• Kyiv established by Norsemen in 878 who rule over the Slavic people 
• Christianity introduced in 988 under Volodymyr the Great
• Kyivan Rus grows into the largest state in eastern Europe through to the Middle Ages as a result of being at the crossroads between Byzantium and Asia 
• Rus Invaded by Mongolians in 1240 but the western area remains autonomous
• Rise of Rossia (today's Russia) a Tatar/Muscovy nation to the north and change of the name of the Slavic Kingdom of Rus to Ukraine (hence why Ukrainian language is more Slavic and Russian language is more Asian?)
• 14th c Ukraine conquered and annexed  by Poland/Lithuania who pushed out remaining Mongols/ Tatars who converted to Islam and remained in control of the Crimean peninsula
• 1648 Cossack uprising against Poland, signed Treaty with Russia for autonomy which became obsolete under Peter the Great 
• 1667 Co-occupation of Ukraine by Poland and Russia.
• 1709 Catherine II kept the Eastern part but conquered and ceded the Western part to the Austro-Hungarian Empire
• 1919 Revolution and short lived Independence 
• 1921 Ukraine split again between Russia and Poland in Treaty of Riga
• Stalin's Holodomor in 1932-33 resulted in death of more than 7 million Ukrainians in Eastern region
• Soviet "liberation" of Western region from the Nazis in 1938
• Incorporation of a united Ukraine into the USSR as one of the soviet socialist republics
• 1948-1990 Sovietisation - elimination of church and language and population of east and south with Russian nationals
• 1954 Kruschev "gifts" Crimea to Ukraine
• Collapse of the Soviet Union and freedom for Ukraine in 1990 
• Orange Revolution in 2004 and democratic elections in Ukraine
• President Yushchenko poisoned and Prime Minister Julia Tymoshenko jailed; Russian puppet Yanukovich elected President 2010
• 2013 Alignment of Ukraine with Russia instead of the EU sparks Euromaidan protests in Ukraine
• Defection of Ukraine's President Yanukovich to Russia and Invasion of Crimea by Russian troops in 2014

Here are the lyrics for the Ukrainian Anthem from Wiki Translate (not a perfect translation)

Ukraine's freedom has not yet perished, nor has her glory,
Upon us, fellow Ukrainians, fate shall smile once more.
Our enemies will vanish like dew in the sun,
And we too shall rule, brothers, in a free land of our own.

CHORUS
We'll lay down our souls and bodies to attain our freedom,
And we'll show that we, brothers, are of the Cossack nation.

We'll stand together for freedom, from the Syan to the Don,
We will not allow others to rule in our motherland.
The Black Sea will smile and grandfather Dnipro will rejoice,
For in our own Ukraine fortune shall flourish again.

CHORUS

Our persistence and our sincere toils will be rewarded,
And freedom's song will resound throughout all of Ukraine.
Echoing off the Carpathians, and rumbling across the steppes,
Ukraine's fame and glory will be known among all nations.

CHORUS

The song reflects the tumultuous history of Ukraine so perfectly. Perhaps we shall one day yet be able to sing this to the end and change the words to "Ukraine's fame and glory are known to all nations." But today, while awaiting the consequences of the Crimean KGB-era style referendum which we all know the outcome of already, we will continue to sing, Shche ne vmerla Ukraina. I know it will bring tears to my eyes, just as it did when I first heard it sung and the flag raised publicly at the Olympics. It lives freely in my heart and in my soul.

And on YouTube is a far better rendition from Crimea today:  "We are all Ukrainians now!"