The Voices of Ukrainians

 One thing that didn't make it into this video:  I asked Pasha if he was scared when the air raid sirens went off.  He said that at first, it was scary, but you get used to it.  Every time he heard the sirens, there was this thought of, "This could be the time I am hit by a missile."  But you know that the statistics are really small and the country is really big.  So you move on with your day.   I completely relate to this from my time in Ukraine.  

    We moved to Ukraine in 2011 before Ukraine grabbed the world's attention.   Before the Maidan Revolution.   Before former president, Viktor Yanukovich fled the country to Russia.   Before Russian forces moved in annexed Crimea.   Before Russians started paying people to come into the Donbas and carryout what they falsely labeled as a civil war in Ukraine.   And long before the full scale invasion of 2022, when Ukraine surprised the world by holding off the world’s second most powerful army.   I recently met a lady in the Czech Republic who was amazed at the resilience that Ukraine has shown as they are standing up to a much larger army.  She noted that the Czech people have had professional armies to defend them … but those armies have never done a thing.  She was referring mostly WWII and the Czech Revolution in 1958 that was put down with little resistance by the Soviets.  Her perspective piqued my curiosity and we ended ...

Written April 2022 Just a few weeks after our group fled to the Czech Republic, I went to visit Anya’s apartment.  I found a bag sitting in the hallway in front of their door.  It had a globe and some drinking glasses in it.  I assumed that some one had just left a small a gift for the family, so I took it in.   The next day, Anya had me look more closely at the globe.  Most of Europe was smudged out and a smiley face was drawn there.  There were little arrows drawn to different parts of the world.   My first thought was that a kid had made marks to places that he had heard about or wanted to travel to.         Anya saw a more sinister message.  A message to the refugees that they should go home.  Europe was a happy place where they were not welcome.         I’ve been around enough marginalized people to understand that while every perceived discrimination may not be real, only fools do...

At the end of 2022, Lena and I tried to cross the border from Ukraine on our way back to the Czech Republic and Lena was rejected at the Polish border in spite of having done everything right.   When our group fled to the Czech Republic, they were granted refugee status immediately.  This originally came with some restrictions: namely, they wouldn’t be allowed to return to Ukraine without forfeiting their refugee visas and getting themselves restricted from returning to the Czech Republic.  Since none of us had ever been refugees before, we had no idea that this is standard procedure in most countries for people who are fleeing violence in their home countries.  When, two days after fleeing Ukraine, our group went and registered, none of us had a full appreciation of these restrictions. We were just grateful that for the moment, we didn’t have to worry about whether we would be able to stay or not until we figured out what to do next.   Our group had fle...

  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 Easte...

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...