Russia’s forces have destroyed in Ukraine apartment buildings, schools, hospitals, critical infrastructure, civilian vehicles, shopping centers, and ambulances, leaving thousands of innocent civilians killed or wounded, forcing people to flee their homes seeking safety, protection and assistance.
From very beginning of the war in Ukraine I have strongly decided to stay in my hometown, contribute our army as I could and help people who really needed it. Ukrainians were linked and united as never before, and I was really inspired by that feeling of comprehensive support. My 42 days in Kyiv were quite stressful, each day started from bad and scary news, but my family has managed to help one beautiful creature: we have taken a puppy from Irpin and started to give him all our love. We did not get used to our new life conditions when the opportunity of exchange studying was given by Kyiv Mohyla Academy for their students.
I have decided to try and fill the application for studying. In a few weeks I was accepted in Germany university in Giessen. But still, it was a very hard decision for me to venture for that trip and leave my family and my country for four months. I was crying all week and tried to choose the best way for me. And only my family and friends have managed to help me with this hard decision and convinced to go and gain this experience, they gave me the most important thing – confidence.
On Friday 8th I was in the train to Poland. My trip was quiet and calm till we get to Ukrainian-Poland border into the buffer zone. Our train stopped without any connection with Polish side. We were said we would not be allowed in Poland till the time a European delegation with Ursula von der Leyen would cross the boundary. At that time we were in the train for about 14 hours, people were exhausted. During our stop, a pregnant woman felt bad and no one known what to do.
We did not have drinking water till the time the Ukrainian border guard gave it. There was lack of fresh air in the train, and we started to help her as it was possible. Doing that, people got to know each other and I found out many impressive and disgusting stories about Russian war against Ukraine and awful things they made. A woman from Kherson told us how she tried to leave the city under the bullets over head.
They all cried after leaving the city, but her parents stayed there. Murderers proposed them to take russian money, but they refused. Another woman did not eat some days because she was trying to get to the safety place, and we collected her some food. Other people cried looking for animals because they left their pets in Ukraine. I was also surprised when conductor said they evacuated people from Kharkiv and people were grateful even for hot water. I heard Boris Johnson said: “Ukrainian conductors are iron people now, because they save lives”.
Arriving in Poland, we were met by volunteers. They were everywhere and helped us as they could. We were given by food, water and sim-cards. On each step, there were about three volunteers who helped to bring baggage. Here I should stay and highlight that we should be very grateful to Polish people and government. They did even more than we really needed, volunteers did their best and helped us on each point, we felt the support and were really impressed in a good way by Polish help. There were also a help points for Ukrainian people on each bus station in Poland, where we could get everything we required.
So the conclusion is: sitting in the safety places, we do not really feel and understand the reality of war and people’s tragedy. After all these stories, I have understood more about war.
The second is that we should be really grateful to Poland support and appreciate it more than we do it now. It is priceless.
