I recently moved into the Ukraine to help run a safe haven for our refugees. There’s two of us staying in a decent three star hotel connected to a 24/7 casino, but there is still a 9pm curfew here and air raid sirens cut through the cold dry air to remind everyone to get home and off the streets, so the gamblers either stay put overnight or slink away. We are in a safe area in a nice old city and there hasn’t been any actual air raids, but the sirens are a reminder that we are still in a country with a war going on.
I mentioned the casino previously and one thing I noticed about Romania before leaving was that literally every 5th shop front in Bucharest was either a casino, a bank, money changer or a pharmacy. That says something. I’m not sure exactly what, but it’s probable that Romania functions as some sort of laundry for men in leather coats with ulcers. Ukraine is different. Good different.
My colleague, who is a former member of a three letter agency and I, were doing runs to and from the border collecting families (although that traffic has slowed) and if they didn’t want to leave the country, bringing them to safer places. We are now mainly coordinating the receiving and shipping on, of supplies to those still in the besieged cities.
Our adopted town has a number of aid agencies who have moved in and set up field kitchens and tented (free) supermarkets, all for the displaced people and even the locals who can no longer afford necessities because of the war. As you can imagine, the fighting and subsequent disruptions to supply lines has not only indirectly, but has also directly screwed peoples lives up. To illustrate that, we passed a funeral in a small village yesterday that was obviously for a soldier, as the coffin was draped in the Ukrainian flag and his unit colours. His comrades had formed a guard of honour as he was carried into the small church for them all to say goodbye. I couldn’t help thinking of my eldest, who had come through his five plus years in the Army unscathed and how lucky we all were.
When we had arrived in this town, the locals had been very suspicious at first, especially when they had seen us moving boxes of supplies into the hotel rooms. After a day or two, the refugees had arrived and they then understood the reason why we had been moving in cots, baby baths and cases of pampers and the suspicious and slightly hard faced hotel staff soon defrosted and have become very friendly ever since. we have tried to become part of the fabric of the place and we now know the staff on the desk, the launderette ladies and the people who work in the coffee shops. Obviously we stand out as foreigners, but there are so many ‘out of towners’ around that people have stopped staring.
As with all countries in wartime, patriotism is always on display, whether it’s the ladies in their national dress, the graffiti on the walls, the flags flying everywhere or the distinctly martial music being played live in the squares or piped in to the hotels.
We saw a street performance earlier in the week outside the National Theatre that was essentially a patriotic piece from the theatre company dressed as citizen soldiers in uniform and their wives and girlfriends, all in national dress. Some had bundles of rags that were being held like babies, one had a hurried wedding before her new husband was bundled away by his cheering mates and as young men on their way to battle the first time tend to be, they were full of bravado and song. The culmination of the show had the actors holding Russian tunics aloft on pikes. I found it very powerful and by the end, I had tears rolling down my cheeks. I wasn’t alone either.
The Police are now going hotel to hotel, looking for military aged males and registering them for potential call up. That means that some families are continually on the move, not wanting to lose their sons or husbands to the war and once the Police have left after documenting them, they usually disappear as well, in order to move to another city. A press gang came to our hotel last week and they would have stopped us if the (now friendly) lady on the front desk hadn’t shouted “Amerikanets” and they waved us on. Neither of us are American, but it did the trick.
I have held onto this post for a few days for personal and operational security reasons so by the time you read it, it’ll be a little out of date. There is a lot of talk about the ‘peace talks’ and how the invaders have reached a standstill, but the facts are that although the Russians have moved back from the front lines in many areas, most sources believe that they are regrouping and that they intend to attack further in the East of the country. I hope not.