Baptism by Ice, Water and Fire

January 19^th has always been a very important day on my calendar. Mostly due to the fact that it’s my half birthday and in the past I had celebrated it with a great relish, which my real day of birth has never enjoyed.

Now the 19^th will also have a few additional items listed in its Wikipedia article. For one, it was the day when Kyiv actually erupted in fire.  A small, isolated bus set on fire, but never the less – fire! The Euro Maidan protests, which had been lulled in to a holiday stupor, came back blazing, when on Friday the government hurriedly, with a quick show of hands, passed severe anti protests laws. Some of the provisions included:

-A ban on the unauthorized installation of tents, stages or amplifiers in public places

-Provision to arrest protesters wearing masks or helmets

-A ban on protests involving more than five vehicles in convoy

-Hefty fines or jail for breaches of law

So on Sunday the streets were filled with masked and helmeted protestors. Some radical fringe groups were battling with the police near the parliament building: the rioters were throwing Molotov cocktails at the police, while they were returning the attacks with rubber bullets. A bus was set on fire. Scores were injured.

In the midst of all this, there were some acts of normalcy being carried out on the banks of the Dnieper River by observers of Epiphany (Julian calendar) as they plunged in to the questionable waters of the Dnieper to commemorate Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River.

I heard about this event just the day before from my co-worker as we were driving from a ridiculous 8am tennis game. I was falling in and out of consciousness in the back seat, along with his three children, when he mentioned that he was planning to partake in this lunacy. I laughed and wobbled back to my apartment along the slippery pavement covered with fresh snow, for two more hours of the sweetest sleep I’ve ever had.

Later that night, at a party, I saw K. She passingly mentioned she would like to participate in this icy & wet nightmare and had been preparing all year by taking cold showers.  Disappointingly she did not have the proper company to go with. I offered to come support and take pictures.  But within a few minutes in to our conversation, as if ruffied by her introspective gaze and pensive tone, I volunteered to participate along side her!

The next morning I woke up and amazingly I hadn’t changed my mind. After a half day of intensive preparation – walking around the apartment clad in only a bathing suit, beating my chest and chanting ‘mind over body’ – I was ready!

Ceremony

fireworks?!

During the half hour of ceremonies performed by the Orthodox priests in -8 degrees Celsius weather, I was a little fearful I was going to abort the mission, but I persevered and we headed towards the river. While K. was trying to figure out the best way to approach the water and change after wards, I was undressed and ready to go. In the most ungraceful way possible – I ran in, took a quick dip up to my neck, and ran out screaming and waving my hands, as if I had just seen a three headed shark. It was bloody cold! Didn’t help that upon exiting the water, on the bank I was greeted with a carpet of ice.

Observing from a safe distance

yes…I kept the hat on

Later as we were warming up at Katyusha’s (Ukrainian food chain restaurant) by covertly pouring Lithuanian liquor in to our teacups, I still wasn’t sure why I had done it. Some sort of half birthday, half mid-life, half-revolution crisis.