Celebrating Ukraine’s Day of Unity in New York

Ukraine celebrates 22nd January as a Day of Unity to mark the birth of modern Ukraine, which came about with the unification of Eastern and Western Ukraine on January 22, 1919. In New York, acknowledging and celebrating all things Ukraine has become the status quo as a sign of solidarity since its invasion by Russia a year ago, and New York marked this Day of Unity with a display of 355 sunflowers, one for each day of the invasion by Russia, at Flatiron Plaza over the weekend.

I got to experience the sunflowers at night, and they were shining bright despite the pouring rain.

I learned that the Sunflower is Ukraine’s national symbol of peace, happiness and hope.

Earlier the same day, I crossed a gathering of people supporting Ukraine in Times Square in the shadow of the Lunar Year celebrations as you can see in the billboards below.

In fact, it is not unexpected to cross people and signs of support for Ukraine in New York. For instance, a number of the landmarks have been lit up in support of Ukraine –

At the Museum Mile festival over the summer, the Met had organized an event that had a poster project in support of Ukraine, and there were two very thoughtful posters being given out to raise awareness about Ukraine.

The Pulaski Day Parade in New York in October 2022 had a number of people waving Ukranian flags along with Polish flags all along Fifth Avenue.

In March 2022, St Patrick’s Cathedral had the Cross of Gratitude, which originated in Lviv in Ukraine in 2003 and was on a journey to all the capitals of the world to prepare for the 2000 year anniversary of the crucification of Jesus Christ. All my thoughts were with Ukraine when I stumbled across this Cross of Gratitude entirely by chance at St Patrick’s Cathedral.

To paraphrase a sign at the Day of Unity exhibit, lets make this a year for reflection, resistance, and hope for a free tomorrow.