It’s difficult to think of a good comparison from the thousands of public holidays, festivals, galas and pageants around the world by which to describe Victory Day celebrations in Russia. Remembrance Day is too sombre, Bastille Day too jolly.
The day on which Russians remembers the nasally voice of Joseph Stalin coming over the wireless to announce the end of the war is a curious mix of solemnity and jubilation. In St. Petersburg one year, I remember thinking how swiftly the funereal marches of the morning turned to night-time revelry, with sailors who had earlier been firing off three-volley salutes now tanked up and cavorting across the town in high spirits.
Then there’s the bravado that goes with it too. International Women’s Day is widely and actively observed in Russia, and though there is an official male equivalent in November, Victory Day is far closer to any actual celebration of masculinity. In the same year that I was wandering the streets of Petersburg trying to steer clear of drunken sailors, a friend of mine was invited to a dacha in the countryside by some of his male colleagues.
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