Alexei Navalny: New Year’s Greeting
Text version
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New Year. I don’t know whether one can say for certain
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that it is everyone’s favorite holiday,
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but I do know for sure that it is the most
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unifying one. Because no matter who we are,
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no matter how different our views may be
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on the various issues of life,
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or politics, we all celebrate New Year. And
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on this night, we all want one thing: to be
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surrounded by our family and loved ones and
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to sit together with them and talk about how we
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have lived through another year of our lives and
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wish each other wonderful things for the
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year ahead. Of course, after the Kremlin clock chimes (the traditional New Year’s midnight bells in Russia)
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we will all rush to our
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mobile phones and start sending
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text messages and calling relatives. And
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without fail, at those moments mobile
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service works poorly. And we know that
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the messages will only arrive by morning, but we
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keep sending them simply because
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we love the people we are
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congratulating. And it seems to me that it is precisely
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in these very simple and so
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human moments that we most fully
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become one family, one
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country, and one people. And that is simply
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wonderful. Friends, I want to wish you all
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a Happy New Year. I want
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to wish that in 2017 each and every one of
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you experiences something wonderful,
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so that 12 months from now, as you sit around
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the table, you can say to one another: "Well,
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it was a good year, wasn’t it? Please stay
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healthy. May your
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loved ones never be away from you for long. And
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let us believe in our own strength. We will
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surely succeed. Happy New Year!