Валентина Нікіруй Valentyna Nikiruy

This was such an event that it seems to me to be the most important event in the history of Ukraine. Because people and the state itself had been waiting for this independence for many years. I remember Chornovil and all our dissidents, the Sixties, how excited people were. And then I remember how they carried a big flag to the Verkhovna Rada, how they brought it in. Then there were people standing on the roads from town to town – there was a human chain. And you know what else I remember – at that time I was listening to the radio, and one old lady said this thing, she was probably many years old. She said: “I can now die in peace, because I have finally heard the anthem of Ukraine, a free state.” That's how I remember it. And we also have a song, as I said before, ‘Oi u luzi chervona kalyna' (Oh, there is a red viburnum in the meadow). We hardly ever heard it, we didn't sing it much. But in our group we had it, we sang it and were very proud of it. And since then, we were no longer afraid to perform it, you know? And when it started to sound during the war, I said: “Mikhas, our song has spread all over the world now. I don't mean in the specific sense that it's our song, but that we are hearing it now. Before, we didn't hear it very much. And now we hear it everywhere. In all corners of the world.

I'm finishing my third year, we applied, and he brought me to his house for the bride show. And our parents, since I had already applied to the registry office, were already preparing for the wedding. And they wrote to us that the wedding will be held on such and such a date in August. We had already made our dresses in Ternopil, and we wanted to go back. But the cholera broke out. We couldn't get through, we couldn't pass. We got to Chișinău – we were travelling by bus – and came back. And we saw such a horror: the whole station was covered with people, there were trains at the station, people were not allowed anywhere, only nurses were running around in their gowns, it was horrible. So we arrived in the afternoon, somewhere in the evening, spent the night there, and in the morning we went back, as long as there was a road, as long as it was not closed. We wrote to my mother or called, I don't remember what happened, we were negotiating that we couldn't leave, they wouldn't let us out, and they didn't believe us. They said: “We've already prepared everything, we've brewed vodka, and this, that, and the other thing.” Mum screams: “I'm going to dress up as a bride, my dad as a groom, and we're going to have the wedding instead of you!” Oh, well, it was like that. We decide to leave again. Oh, I can't tell you what it was like. I don't think anyone has ever had a wedding like that. We got on the train and left. I don't know where we were going. In any case, we are moving, and moving, and moving. We get to Razdelna, and that's it – the train doesn't go any further. Mikhail Ivanovych runs out, talks to someone, and comes back and says: “Valia, come out quickly, we'll go somewhere...”. I think we walked about a kilometre or a kilometre and a half, and there was a train going through Moldova to Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi. And we were travelling all night again. We didn't know where we were going... And in the morning we arrived and looked at our station, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi – thank God, we arrived! Mikhail Ivanovych lived in a flat, I lived in a dormitory, and now I came to see him. We had wedding outfits. He said: “Well, Valia?”. And we had an appointment at the registry office for 27 August. We got dressed, went to get married, and our classmates came, as well as our teachers. We registered the marriage and ordered a car, and went to the wedding. And we arrived: I in a wedding dress, and Mikhail Ivanovych in a suit. And my mother greets me like this – with her fist! Can you imagine that? Me – the young bride on her way to my wedding, and she greets us with her fist! Oh, my God! And I was so afraid of them, and I don't know how to behave, because I already have a husband. Oh, my God! Well, that's all right, then we celebrated the wedding, did it the way it was – on Saturday I was braided there, because we braid brides, and they watched my dowry. For the wedding, my father hired musicians from Krynychne, two accordionists, and the music was very good. There was no one on Mikhail Ivanovych's side. And on my side were only my relatives. I couldn't invite any friends or students. Damn it, I couldn't! You can't leave, you know? And so we had our wedding in these conditions. And we got married much later, because there was no church then, we got married later. After the wedding, on Monday we ordered a car again, the same driver – he knew Mikhail Ivanovych. He came and picked us up, and on the first of September I started my fourth year. We walked in, the teachers greeted us, and everyone congratulated us on being a couple. And in my fourth year, I was already Nikiruy.

If you look at our village, like all villages, they... <...> Thanks to the fact that they are hard-working, that they do everything with their own hands, they had chickens, geese, pigs, they worked hard, let's say. But at that time, everyone was worried. Imagine, we had empty stores, there was nothing to buy. I go, for example, to the market, see that there is a queue and ask: "What do they give"? Now we are going to the market with a list, and this was not the case before — what you see, you take. They give bowls, they give cans — that is, they sell dishes. And you get in line without even knowing what's on sale there. Those queues were exhausting. We had a shop number 20 on the corner, a grocery store. In the morning, grandma Zina lived here where you come in. “ Aunt Zina, I took the queue, please watch out.” And we were so busy waiting in line, and I was running to work. And at five o'clock they will give butter, cottage cheese, milk. That's what we had. And these coupons, too! We've been through it all, you know? And so I'm running home from work, letting Grandma Zina go, and she's sitting there, talking to the old women and laughing, but she keeps the line, otherwise, if you lose the queue, nothing will happen. That's how we lived. For example, it was impossible to buy fine clothes for children. We sewed. It so happened that my husband went to France in [19]90 to live with his uncle. He arrived, and I asked: “Mihas, do they have sugar?”. We had everything on coupons. And he said: “ You know, I won't tell you anything, well, keep in mind that I challenged you. My uncle and I went to the embassy there, and we called you. You'll go next year and see for yourself how people live.” He says, “ I can't tell you, you have to see it.” And when I went to France for the second year, I looked at it and asked my uncle: “Uncle, do those shops ever run out of these goods?” The fact that everything is there, and on such a large scale, was incomprehensible to me, you know? For example, we went to the Ternopil region, and there is a town called Borshchiv. When we went into the store, can you believe it – an empty store, nothing there. And the shop assistant was standing there. And I was horrified... Here, at least we have something, you can buy it at the market. In the shops here, it's the same – you come and want to buy something beautiful from the kitchenware, and there's nothing. I had no pots and pans. And I loved all this cookware so much. It used to be very difficult to get all that stuff. Everything was a special favour. They say at work: “Today, girls, they brought goods – they will give us shoes, Czech shoes.” Czech shoes used to be very expensive. God, standing in those queues... And how I used to get furniture! I signed up for furniture, and for a whole month we kept this queue. And I signed up for a sofa: I needed a sofa because my children were growing up, I had to buy a sofa. I stood in line for a month, and the day came when the furniture was delivered. They brought it once a month. I took the sofa, and my colleague said to me: “Valia, they also have wardrobes.” So not only did I take the sofa, I also took a wardrobe... I don't remember. Or a desk. I got it right away, it was my turn, and they had more, so I took it. So we stood there... It was just, you know, people were mocked. And you stand there like a slave, like a humiliated person, you don't feel like yourself. No dignity at all.

We were recommended as a musical group. We, of course, responded to this. But I want to tell you that this trip was not easy. Our school director was summoned to Moscow several times. Then, we didn't go alone; we were given a person to observe us from the services that monitor the team. God forbid we did anything wrong. The observer made sure that we did not take anything from the store. That's what we were taught. They gathered us beforehand and gave us “valuable instructions” on how we should behave, so that we would not take a step to the right or a step to the left. If you go into a shop, you will see that they will ask you something, give you something – a bag or something else. And so they really set us up to be obedient. We performed and immediately went back. I want to tell you that they used to organise evenings for us there after our performances, all the bands would gather. People would come up to us and talk. And I tried to not pretend to be pleased when the Germans came up to us, to be honest. They gave me, for example... They didn't have anything, they didn't know, but they gave me a handkerchief. I was even afraid to take it, you know! Serhii Borysovych made it clear that it was possible. One person was being filmed when we were travelling on the train, apparently because they had figured out that he was travelling somewhere. They filmed a person right there at some stop.