Celebrating Independence
Under the Soviet occupation, Soviet police employed special volunteer police units, whose job on a usual day was to offer assistance the law enforcement agencies. Around Nov. 18, on the Latvian independence day, they were on standby with a simple task - to prevent a display of a white-striped burgundy Latvian flag in Latvian SSR.
On Nov. 18, when my father was just 12 years old. One of his friends’ grandfather gave them the Latvian flag and the three kids climbed on top of the Riga’s First Hospital, took down the flag of Latvian SSR and replaced it with the Latvian banner. My father said, no one had noticed a change in the flag for most of the day.
Since regaining independence, Nov. 18 has grown into a real holiday.
I watched a military parade celebrating Latvia’s 89th birthday on television, but decided to drop into town for the Sunday night fireworks over the river Daugava. Crowds moved in and out of the Old Town ahead of the president’s speech at the Freedom Monument a few minutes before the celebratory visual extravaganza.
It was unseasonably for this time of year: no rain or snow, temperatures hovering above zero.
Fathers carried their children on their shoulders to the 11. Novembra Krastmala. Mothers showed their kids the red, green lights appearing in the sky. Crowds that didn’t make to the krastmala before the show stopped on the street and looked up to the sky.
The mood was festive throughout the day. Store fronts decorated in national colors, people carrying around small burgundy-white flags, sometimes incorporating the colors into the whole dress ensemble, free concerts shown throughout the town.
I took a trolleybus, filled with Russian-speaking teens, speaking loudly, laughing, drinking Coke with some kind of alcoholic beverage. They were on their way to see the fireworks. Probably, not out of the patriotic sentiments. However, it seems that shiny lights in the sky under the crowd’s ooohs and aaahs, free public transportation for a day, and an extra day-off actually can unite people.
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