In this oral history of the first two weeks of the Russian invasion, 30 young Ukrainians confront life during wartime
‘I Bought Four Bottles of Wine in Case We Need to Prepare Molotov Cocktails’ February 23 Russian forces surround Ukraine on three sides. The U.S. warns that an invasion is imminent. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy declares a state of emergency.Aleksey, 26, a printing manager in Kyiv I was standing with my friend on the Yurkovytsia Mountain, which overlooks the whole city, and we joked, “Just imagine — bombs are going to fall on Kyiv.
Nasta: It had such a profound effect on me that I did not sleep for the next two hours, although Leonid fell back asleep almost instantly. But on the 23rd, we both thought we’d have at least two or three more days to prepare.Daria Holovatenko, 18, a university student in Avdiivka That day, I was hanging out with a friend at my parents’ café, talking about going to America as part of a work program for students.
Finally, I told Yulya that the war had started. She didn’t quite understand at first because, really, the war had been going on for eight years in the east — but now there’s a full-scale invasion. And it feels like total annihilation because they’re shooting at civilians.Anastasia Kovalchuk, 19, a university student in Kyiv When we heard the first siren, we went with our things to a bomb shelter. It was very cold.
Leonid: I saw a warplane for the first time in my life on the way to the supermarket. The shelves were quite bare, but I bought four bottles of wine in case we need to prepare Molotov cocktails. But with every hour, sounds of attacks were closer and closer, so I insisted that we try to get on the first train with my stepson. We packed what we could take. I was crying the whole time because I am someone who buys only the stuff I really like — I couldn’t choose what I should and shouldn’t take. I packed some jewelry from my mother and grandmother and clothes that will be warm because it’s minus-two degrees Celsius and snowing in Lviv.
We have a bunker in the basement of our apartment building if we need one. We gathered with our neighbors to clean it because it didn’t look like a place where people could live; it was absolutely dirty and dusty, and there was no furniture. But I haven’t been in the basement since all this started. I’m a little bit careless about that.Daria Holovatenko After we got to Novomoskovsk, to the west, Mom made me pancakes with apricot jam, which cheered me up.
Because of the lack of sleep, it seems like it’s one long day, but the diary helps keep the days separate. When we arrived early in the morning, I hugged my aunt and cried. We hadn’t slept in 24 hours. She gave us some food because the whole night we hadn’t eaten. My niece woke up; she hadn’t seen us for a while and asked, “Who are these people?” We introduced ourselves and said we were going to stay for a while. My aunt asked if I wanted to sleep in a separate bedroom or with my brother and his fiancée. I said I would stay with them. It feels safer in a way, at least for my brain.
The sirens go off every day, constantly. People really get angry. You get the notification to hide — it might last for hours — and then you get the notification that everything is okay and you can come out and then, ten minutes later, you hear again this terrible sound. Our mayor wrote us a message: Please, people, don’t be angry because of that. Every time you hear a siren and hide but there is no sound of an explosion — this is the work of our army that protected us.
They took me back to the apartment where I was staying with my “friend.” It was sort of funny — me casually going to the train station and coming back in the company of three armed men. My friend and his girlfriend did not talk to me afterward.Roman Vydro, 27, an engineer and entrepreneur in Kharkiv I co-founded a community workshop where people can fabricate projects with machines. I used to think our windowless basement was a disadvantage. Now I realize how lucky we were.
My friends and I made an agreement that we won’t talk about the war, only fantasize about what we would do when it is over: One friend plans to visit Portugal, another Japan.Markiian Matsiiovskyi At first, we were delivering by taxi, but soon we got more volunteers and some had cars. We have 50 volunteers in Kyiv now. In the beginning, the majority were young people, but now older people also realize that they shouldn’t sit and wait it out, that they should do something to be helpful.
I don’t wash my hair. I don’t brush my teeth. You feel like you don’t need that — there is important stuff to do. I have COVID right now. I am fully vaccinated, but still it got me. It’s a distraction. Despite everything, our spirit is pretty high because we are winning. Monday was just a tranquil, worry-free day, maybe for the first time since I left Kyiv. Lviv is now just a Disneyland for refugees, free from both Russian aggression and Ukrainian paranoia. It’s almost too comfortable.Anastasiia Viekua I went to the store in Lviv, and there was no porridge or canned food or sausage. I’ve been eating simple food, but if I can find the products, I’d like to cook chili con carne for my family.
The churches are cool. On one side, next to these tiny memorials to people who have died over the past eight years, people are praying, and on the other side, there are huge piles of boxes with donations.Julia Berdiyarova I got a Google Calendar notification about a work meeting with my colleagues from Kyiv.
We woke up at 5 a.m. and could hear sirens and screaming outside. My mother and brother were in shock. The dog was just happy to hang out. We got to the railway station and men weren’t allowed on the train. I could hear these soul-rending screams of women who had to leave their men in a city that was being bombed.
One of us was in the middle of speaking when something exploded nearby. We held our breath and listened as hard as we could. We left by car the next day. There were huge traffic jams, five or six hours long. When we stopped in Vinnytsia, we found out Russians had just bombed the airport eight times. I’ve been thinking about having a child. Maybe I feel like my parents felt during the collapse of the Soviet Union in Ukraine, when people were not paid a salary. They didn’t have money, but they had a child. I think about them having me. I absolutely understand them now.Julia Berdiyarova I’m surprised by some of my friends who are going to fight.
My relatives are desperate. They are thinking that the war might be happening for months. And our town has run out of food, and more troops are coming from Russia.Victoria Vlasenko As usual, I was hearing noises outside. In the beginning of the war, I was thinking they were all bombs that were falling on my city. But I’ve learned that some of the noises were not us being attacked but rather our own army’s bombs. It’s good to know that not all the noises mean danger.
There’s no need to overestimate the power comedy has. It’s not a weapon; I don’t think I can heal any wounds. But it might help us to stay sane. We heard from our president that we could expect shelling in Odesa. We all know that Odesa may be next. But I feel safe here, and I believe in our army. I’ve never had this feeling before: I’m not a person of war, and in peaceful times, you don’t think about the army. But when you are in a war, when you are in danger, you have a very close relationship with this institution, and you do everything to help them.
Sometimes we are feeling upset, really depressed. But then we’ll start to feel hope and start smiling. It’s like a circle from emotionally inspired to depressed. My friend who is now in Kherson called me, crying hysterically, begging me to take his girlfriend to a safe place. He was screaming about genocide in Kherson: “They’re killing people on the street!” I was in shock. You can’t do anything. You want to teleport yourself to him to save him.Masha Varnas We got the longest alarm today.
March 9 Russia bombs a maternity hospital in Mariupol, where officials say more than 1,000 civilians have been killed.Danyil Zadorozhyni I had my first night shift at the Lviv train station. We worked for 14 or 15 hours. There’s a tent city there now — bonfires in canisters, huge tents where volunteers pass out food, tons of people with weapons. There’s a vast number of women and children sleeping on the ground, using who-knows-what for blankets, on cardboard, with dogs. People in wheelchairs.
Each night, after midnight, off-duty Ukrainian soldiers post voice chats on social media. They explain to us what “official reports” mean. They are honest and tell us that some cities are devastated, that it’s extremely bad. They ask us to eat carrots, do physical exercises, and keep working. They are telling us, You don’t have to feel guilty.
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