Immortal regiment

Traditionally on May 9 we celebrate Victory Day, it's a day when in 1945 the ww2 was finished for Soviet Union.

There are many different events related to this date: military parade, sport competitions, gigs, fireworks and many others. 

I want to show you only one part of it.

Because of many years passed since 1945, we almost don't have veterans alive. Only few of them still able to visit such events, and they have special places on the tribune at parade. 

We appreciate what those people did for us,  we remember that.

And that's why we carry their photos on this parade.

It mean: they died, but they are still with us. 

It's a good educational event too. I took my boys with me, and we walked with photos of my grandparents, and, of course, I had to answer to thousand questions about all related things. 

Officials said that more than 5000 people participated in that, but I think they count only registered participants.

We call that event "Immortal regiment", and I'm not sure in translation here.

The idea is: those people are immortal because we will remember about them.

International Workers' Day, also known as Labour Day

1 May is Labour Day, it's a holiday with the long history.

But I can't remember anyone who celebrate it like a "Workers' Day".

As usual people are smarter than their government and everyone whom I know consider this holiday like - the winter is over, the summer is close.

Traditionally we have a few things about this holiday

1. Subbotnik, my dictionary doesn't know how to translate it, let it be a Russian word like babushka.

It's a day when all the volunteers help to clear everything in our towns/forests etc.

There is a lot of rubbish after the snow had gone, and without our help municipality will struggle with it for a long time.

In soviet era this event wasn't really for "volunteers", it was kind of mandatory and many people had days off from their work to participate in that.

Nowadays it's up to you.

But I still like the idea, and often participate in such events.

In my opinion it's good educational event for everyone, because once you see how many trash people leave you will treat environment better.

This pile of trash on the photo was grabbed from the small area near to our lake.

Because we really often walk here with my boys and dogs, I feel like I'm in charge here ;)

The local municipality will  take this pile and transport it somewhere.


All you need is to call special number and tell them about where such pile is.

We are far away from a good use of our environment by things are definitely changing.





2. The second thing about this holiday is a Shashliching. ;)

Shashlik is a barbecue (noun) and -ing makes it to be a gerund. I don't know how to translate it either.

So, it's just a day when we are starting the season of our summer houses, with mandatory bbq cooking.

It should not necessary  take place at your summer house, but we (our family) like to do it simultaneously (clear our summer house and make the a bbq)



It was nice to meet our "summer" neighbors after the long winter.

Almost everyone in my place have two homes.

One is usually an apartment in the town for winter season, the another one is a summer/country house somewhere in a village.

Summer houses have less commodities, but they are close to nature, and we like to spend our short summer outside the town.

Unfortunately my work wired (pun intended) to the internet really hard, so I should return to the town often, but other people live at their country houses the whole summer.

This year this holiday will four day long, so we have time to visit friends in their country houses too, I like bbq in general, but after this holiday I usually need a rest from it.