The Voices of Ukrainians

  Anya has been the mother at Safe Haven for 18 years.   She worked as a helper in the home for a few years before that.   In that time, she and Bogdon have had about 80 young people live under their roof.   Most of those young people came to them in their teenage years, after living in the orphanage.   They have chosen a hard life, and most of these young people have a really hard time showing gratitude to Anya and Bogdon for all that they have tried to give them.  Because of that, there are times when Anya, naturally, feels like she is working and working and giving and giving, and has nothing to show for it.   This past week, Anya has been really sick, while being disconnected from her husband and half of her family.  She is not living in the country that she wants to be in.  And there is a war.  This week she learned of one more friend that has died since the war started.  And we are in the middle of a dreary, grey Eastern European winter.    It shouldn’t be any surpr

War.   It has upended our lives and brought missile attacks, loss of jobs, split families, living in darkness, family members and friends out of contact behind Russian lines, the death of friends, uprooting to another continent, constant air raids, listening the the lies churned out by the Russian propaganda machine, listening to those same lies being repeated by people you meet on the street.   There are days when all of this can feel like too much to handle.   As I have talked to people in Ukraine, I have found it very interesting to see how different people cope with what is happening in their country right now.  I know a few guys in Ukraine who started smoking (in their 40s) to calm their nerves.  Some of my friends spend hours and hours following gossip feeds that analyze every movement by Putin, always coming to the conclusion that he is deathly ill and the war will be over as soon as he dies.  There is even a significant number who are convinced that he is already dead, and

     When the war started and our group fled to Western Ukraine, they stopped in a small town for about 10 days to figure out their plan … and just to see what would happen.   Would Ukraine fall, or would it stand?    That small town in Western Ukraine started preparing to be invaded as well.   The young people in our group joined in the work, making camouflage nets, digging defensive trench locations, filling sandbags to protect buildings and windows, as well as for building checkpoints.   Later when the group showed up in the Czech Republic, the two teen guys in our group talked about that time with longing.   They worked hard, and all of the work was physically exhausting, but they were helping prepare Ukraine to fight back.   They were a part of something bigger than themselves.   This kind of thing was happening all over the country.  Most towns formed their own civilian battalions and did what they could in case the Russian forces were just a few days away.   The same th

We have seen on the news that the fighting on the front lines in and around Bakhmut is reminiscent of the trench warfare during WWI.   At this point, it seems like everyone we know knows someone who has been sent to that front line.   While it is pretty much universally being described as a meat grinder, neither side is reporting how many of their own soldiers are being lost in this area. Viktor was sent to the front near Bakhmut about a month ago.  He had been stationed in a completely different region leading up to that point.  When he was sent to the front, his unit included men who had little to no military experience.  Some of them were men who volunteered for the army after Russia’s full scale invasion, but they expected that they would be able to serve in support roles, not actually be put in positions where they would be likely to kill or be killed.   A month ago, Viktor’s unit consisted of 100 men.  By the time their unit was pulled off the front, there were down to 12

“Hello Daniel, my name is Dima.   I’m a friend of Anya and Bogdon’s.  I heard that you are going into Ukraine soon.  Is there a chance that you would have an empty seat for me?”     I got this call on Thursday, two days before I left for Ukraine. My first thoughts had to do with how many boxes I wouldn’t be able to take into the country, and how many podcasts I wouldn’t be able to listen to on the road.  I don’t love last minute changes and my initial reactions are almost always negative.  But I’d also taken the bus most of the way to Kyiv, and wouldn’t make someone else do that if I could take them with me.  So, that’s how I got a passenger for this trip into Ukraine.   I was really hoping that it wouldn’t turn out to be an awkward trip.  Thankfully, it wasn’t.  Dima is a warm and engaging person with a fun, if quirky, sense of humor.  I’m a bit quirky, too, so it was right up my ally.        Dima and his wife have three school age kids, and because of that he is allowed to leave

  When I was in Ukraine last month, Bogdon noticed that one of my light were out.   He took my car down the road to a friend of his who had a shop, they replaced the light and looked over the car and noticed another problem. They didn’t end up doing a lot of work to the car, but when I asked how much I owed for the work, Bogdon said that his friend did the work for free and we just needed to pay for parts.   “All his work is free right now, he just wants to help volunteers.”   I protested, especially after this.   I have the ability to pay and this guy is exactly the kind of person that I want to be supporting with my money.   He politely, but firmly refused.   This is how it is in Ukriane now.  Everyone at Safe Haven helps out in lots of little ways.  But it’s not just the people we know, it is most of the country.  Bogdon’s friends at the front will come to the house to resupply on some of the many things that we’ve been able to stock them up on (high protein snacks, sock

  Recently, when Bogdon was in the Czech Republic visiting his family and collecting aid, a German man saw his Ukrainian license plates at the gas station and approached him.   Working through their language barrier, the man asked Bogdon if the way German media was portraying the war was accurate.   (I’ve had people in the states ask similar questions, and this is really hard.  What is the media you are watching showing?  There are people in all countries who get at least some of their news reporting directly from Russia. )   This guy seemed genuine, and as they talked, Bogdon learned that German media was showing that Russia was carrying out a war and that they were heavily bombing the country … BUT … German media seemed to make the claim that most of the bombs were hitting military targets.   This was where Bogdon had to set the record straight.   According to Ukrainian military announcements, Russian forces have fired over 4,500 missiles at Ukraine.  They have also fired mil