Meet Anastasia - Turning Tragedy into Hope

Ukranian Refugee of the Last 8 Years Shares Her Story

Born in Donetsk, part of Eastern Ukraine, Anastasia has been a refugee since 2014.  “For me the war started 8 years ago.”

Anastasia was born in a Russian speaking family.  “More than 30 years ago, most people in the eastern part were Russian speaking.  That was the main myth that Russian propaganda is made with.  That there are Russian speaking people in Ukraine.  Second part of myth is that Ukrainian speaking people are Nazis.  Russia then used that myth to explain why Russian speaking Ukrainians needed protection.  Though I was born in a Russian speaking family, I’ve never considered myself to be Russian.  I have always been Ukrainian.  I love Ukraine.  My homeland is Ukraine.”

When Anastasia was 16, she met a boy from Western Ukraine, Ukrainian speaking.   “We fell in love, started dating for 7 years and got married.  We would visit each other’s families and there was no aggression or disrespect connected with this ‘language’ issue.  We got married, after 4 years, my daughter was born in Donetsk.  It was a big, nice European city.  There were more opportunities for us there.  When my daughter was 10 months old, the War came to my home.  The country was quite weak after the revolution.  The Russian ‘brothers’ used this weakness.”

“I felt I needed to show my position so I went outside with Ukrainian flags to rallies.  We wanted to send a message to Russia, ‘It’s okay.  We don’t need your protection Russia.’”

“But it was never about protection from Russia.  Our opponents started getting more aggressive day after day.”

“At one of the rallies, when we finished, the aggressors were attacking us, that’s how it started.  They got more and more aggressive, killing people at the rallies.  On March 28, they killed a man.  There was no one to protect us because the police didn’t do anything.  Russians had already made agreements with local authorities and police for them to do nothing.” 

“Locals started stopping cars and checking documents.  I was scared for my husband who was from the other side of Ukraine.  So we ended up leaving.  We went to Western Ukraine where he was from.”

**

Anastasia and her daughter moved to Lviv. 

On Feb 24, 2022, at 5:00am, Anastasia’s sister called their mom, crying, saying she could hear the explosions.  She was renting an apartment close to where the first aims were. 

“My mom didn’t want to wake me up… I checked the news first thing.  We knew it was coming.  I felt, ‘I would love to live one more day of normal life.’  We will just go to the park and have a pizza.  We brought my daughter’s friend.  They didn’t want to go home.  We felt these are the last days of normal life.” 

“We felt, we saw American services showed a lot of reports of what the Russians were planning.   I checked the news and started crying.” 

“We lived with my boyfriend.  He said, we were going to have to move.  He had to go to the military office.  On the 24th, we left.  My mom decided to stay, that was heartbreaking.  We said goodbye.  I was hugging her.  For some people who have experienced this before, they are optimistic and hopeful.  But I know what can happen.”

“In 2014, me and my friends said we will meet soon.  It’s been 8 years.”

“Every time I say goodbye to someone, I know it can be forever.  It’s really difficult to say goodbye.  I am very close with my mother.  The closest friend and person.  That was her decision to stay.  The next day, after we got to town.  My friend called with inside info that the airport would be attacked so she went to a line in Romania and then would figure out what to do next, ‘let’s just cross the border.’  I packed my things again, that wasn’t the plan, I had 15 minutes to pack everything.  My boyfriend took us to the car.” 

“From 10p to 8am, we moved 3 kilometers in a line to get to Romania.  My friend decided to go back home.” 

Anastasia waited, had a cup of coffee and pondered what decision she would make.

“Okay, I can go back home anytime, I’ll go (to Romania) and see what happens next.”

“We walked 5 hours, there were crowds of women and children.  My friend’s friend in Suceava contacted a volunteer at the border and he helped her to a hotel… she asked him to meet me.  It was Petru from Fight For Freedom.  He met us.  I still remember the feeling when you don’t speak the local language, you don’t know anyone in the country, you don’t have a plan, a place to stay, you feel absolutely lost, it’s very stressful.  I remember that feeling really well.  It helped me when I started volunteering because I understand that feel.  I know how to calm others down.  It helped me to help them.”

Anastasia and her daughter were on their way to Suceava with no place to stay.  “I didn’t know what to do.  While I was thinking, Petru said, you can come to my home if you need a place to stay.  It was just very human. He has 7 children, his wife and us.  We were offered our own bedroom.” 

The 26th of Feb, Anastasia lay down, exhausted.  “Oh my God, thanks God, I am here.”

“The next day, my mom called me, and told me my uncle was shot.  He was a civilian.  It was terrible to find out.  He lived in a small town that has now been ruined.  They were hiding in the basement in their village.  And Russians entered the village and started shooting houses.  He decided to go outside and talk to them.  ‘We are all civilians, there are no soldiers, no military, why are you shooting our houses?’  And they shot him.”

Anastasia paused.  I gave her space.  Emotions told the rest of the story.

“After that, anytime anyone calls, the first thing in my mind is that someone could be killed.  That’s an awful thing to think every time someone calls you.” 

“I was really stressed.  I spent 2 days in the bedroom.   I went to sleep and thought, what should I do not to go crazy?!  I need to do something.” 

Anastasia went to Petru’s wife, “Can I do something?  I need to do something!”

“Petru came to me and said, ‘You speak English and Ukrainian and Russian, we have crowds and women who are scared… they don’t understand us, we want to help them, would you be willing to help us?  Would you like to go?’  I was like, ‘YES, I would love to do something.’”

Anastasia rested in some thankfulness for the opportunity. 

“On one hand, I felt guilty.  I left my home.  On the other hand, I was busy all the time helping people.  There was no time for me to be stressed.  When you are busy, no place for bad thoughts.  Just solving problems.  Gathering information.  Sharing information.  It’s not just about sharing info, it’s about psychological help.  I felt I was needed there.  Most of the people in tears at the border were men.  The Ukrainian women were scared.  Several men coming to you, speaking and you don’t understand each other can be really stressful.”

Anastasia would talk to the men, “I know you want to help, just let them cross, have a cup of tea.”

“I asked the girls and women, ‘Would you like a hug?’  They would say, ‘Yeah, yeah, sure.’  The feeling was, ‘I need this hug too.’”

“And now, there aren’t many people crossing the border.  We are now crossing back into Ukraine.  I am still always looking for the job where I can be most useful.  This job of packing and wrapping could be done by a lot of people. I go to the village, to Suceava and talk to people there from Ukraine and they need help.  I translate for them.  They trust me.” 

“Translating gives me feeling, ‘That’s where I need to be.  When you lose all the connections from your past life, you need this feeling to know you’re at the right place.  When I do this job, I have this feeling, I’m at the right place.  Not many people could do this exact job.’  That’s why I refuse all the offers for people to help me to get to Germany or other places to work and live.”

“I value the feeling I’m at the right place right now.” 

**

There are more victims.  I try to see some advantages comparing to what happened in 2014. 

At that time… I didn’t feel like anyone cared.  The world didn’t care. 

Now I understand, maybe it’s a terrible thing to say, it’s good that I feel like everyone is aware of what is going on. 

We are great optimists. 

**

This past weekend, Anastasia and her daughter were back in Chernivtsi. 

“On Sunday, Alarms went off, ‘My daughter woke up, I hugged her, it’s okay.’  Maybe there is a bomb going above us but we can shoot it in the air, maybe it will fly over us.  I was trying to comfort her somehow.  We are just going to get dressed and go to the basement.” 

Anastasia’s daughter replied, “Will we take our cats with us?!!” 

Anastasia replied, “I think we are going to hurry on down to the basement.”

“My boyfriend’s parents were in the same building.  They said, there is a place for you.  Some kind of bed covered with a carpet.  They gave us a blanket.” 

“They cannot share the information with us what happened… so we just know when something is happening and when we can come out again.  We don’t get info of what it was and where.” 

“We know the bomb fell somewhere, but they don’t discuss where.  We know Russians follow every social network. Ukrainians started joking and inventing streets that don’t exists.  Or they will talk about subway stations in cities where there are no underground systems.   I love our Ukrainian sense of humor.” 

**

Anastasia started calling her friends, ‘Meet me at the border, bring your kids, I’ll help you.’  I have my own refugee camps now at my apartments, I have people coming from Kyiv and eastern Ukraine. 

Anastasia has 2 bedrooms and 10 people, 6 people in her bedroom.

**

Q: What do you hope life is like on the other side of this?

The most difficult thing is to not think about your normal life 3 months ago, ah, the place I went for coffee, ah my favorite park.  That’s what most Ukrainians want… we want to come back to our former life, the life before (war).  Making plans is difficult.  The moment you start making plans, it means, you agree, it’s not over, you’re not getting back to your normal life.  It’s a little betrayal. 

The way out for me is to think short-term.  Say not even one month, maybe 2 weeks, 1 week, tomorrow… in general, my home was taken away from me in 2014, since then I haven’t had a place to call home.  I lived somewhere.  I was comfortable.  But I don’t feel I have Home somewhere. I want to find a place called Home.

**

Lots of Russians really feel like they are helping someone here but they have never visited Ukraine.  If they had the experience to go, meet people, know people in person, maybe that would take much more to make them believe that there are Nazis there. 

When you talk to real people, real people and real communication means more than the news or TV telling you something. 

I met locals that were absolutely sure Nazis were coming to get us.  I asked why and they said… ‘We watched TV.’ 

I would love us to have one of the main tasks after victory, to take children from Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine and make them to be friends, there is no difference.  Russian speaking, Ukrainian speaking so no one can ever convince them there are enemies on the other side.  Because of course, if you don’t know anyone on the other side, it’s easy to believe that they are against you.

**

Q: What would you say to Americans who are at home and want to help?

First, guys you’re great.  I understand… it’s not about your country, it’s somewhere so far away.  You have your normal life, your family, your friends, your job, your plans, you don’t have to think about it.  There are wars in the world.  It’s been like this for years here.  It’s awful but it’s still so far away.  To get involved into that, you need to have a place in your heart for that.  Your hearts are so big, that’s true.  You really care. 

The most hurtful thing for people in trouble is to feel they are alone.  If you lost your home or lost someone, no one can get the people back to you.  But when you see that someone cares, it helps you to believe that something good is still there for you because you’re not alone in this.