You're reading: Hearts that won’t be lonely on Valentine’s

Today’s Independence Square is not just about fighting, protesting and singing Ukraine’s national anthem. It’s a place for love, too, especially on Valentine’s Day. Here are some real romantic stories:

Wedding boom ahead?

Four days before her wedding, Khrystyna Kryvdyk, 21, still hasn’t tried on her wedding gown, but everything else is ready – the pizza house near EuroMaidan headquarters is booked for a party while the wedding ceremony will take place in a Kyiv cathedral.

Danylo Keh, 23, proposed to Kryvdyk in October. They were friends since childhood, but started dating 18 months ago. Both are from Lviv, but have stayed at Kyiv since the first EuroMaidan Sunday rally on Nov. 24. Both help coordinating self-defense units.

A EuroMaidan wedding is cheaper than most. “Everyone helps! Just everyone!” Keh says. “Somebody is like, ‘My sister is a florist and she can make bouquets,’ others say they can get some discounts, AutoMaidan offered to escort us.”

The official registration, however, will take place after the revolution. “It takes too long,” they agree.

A young Lviv couple, EuroMaidan protesters Khrystyna Kryvdyk, 21, and Danylo Keh, 23, sit in their office in the demonstrator-occupied Trade Union building as their Feb. 15 wedding date approaches.

Bulletproof gown

Journalist and EuroMaidan protester Galyna Yeremitsa, 36, sits on her future husband’s lap in a dark tent on Independence Square. Oleksandr Cheban, 45, proposed almost three weeks ago. She accepted this week from the EuroMaidan stage. Why did she finally agree? “I love him now and we just may not live long enough to get married after all this is over,” she adds.

The wedding ceremony is scheduled for St. Valentine’s Day. She plans to wear a bulletproof vest over her wedding gown. “After all, this is a revolutionary wedding,” she laughs. The couple says there is no guest list and everyone is welcome to join their celebration on the square.

Both came from Chernivtsi Oblast and met at EuroMaidan. “I came into her tent and it was love at first sight,” Cheban says.

Donetsk unites hearts

Donetsk EuroMaidan rallies connected architect Anna Zuyeva, 30, and economist Maksym Huz, 29, on Nov. 24.

“His face seemed familiar to me,” Zuyeva says. “I came up to him to find out if we knew each other.”

They ended up talking all day. But it was police who gave real impulse to their relationship. On Nov. 30, when officers brutally dispersed the peaceful anti-government protest on Kyiv’s Maidan Nezalezhnosti, they consoled each other.

Zuyeva was shocked. “The moment he promised to protect me against everything I understood he was my betrothed,” she recalls.

In early December, Huz proposed to Zuyeva. The couple got married in January. The haste doesn’t bother her. “My parents got married two weeks after they met. And they have been living in a happy marriage for 30 years already,” she says.

Waiting to propose

EuroMaidan guard Oleksandr Martynenko is anxious. He plans to propose to his sweetheart, but she is unaware of his plans.

Their love story began two months ago. Martynenko, 30, first met Viktoriya in the protester-occupied Trade Unions building, where she was a volunteer.

“It was love at first sight. I asked to see her passport, because that was the first thing that came to my mind. And she did. She must have understood that I wanted to see if she was married,” he says.

“I do hope she will not say ‘no’,” he says of his coming proposal to a woman whose age and last name he does not know. “I don’t care about her origin and family, I would want to marry her even if she had three children,” Martynenko says.

When he came to Kyiv from Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast on Dec. 1, protest was the only thing he had in mind. Love came as a bonus.

“I am shocked. I do not even believe my happiness,” he says shyly.

Kyiv Post staff writer Daryna Shevchenko can be reached at [email protected] and on Twitter at @iskrynka. Kyiv Post staff writer Nataliya Trach can be reached at [email protected].