On Love and Leaving My Country by Halyna Pastushuk
LETTERS FROM ATTACKED UKRAINE (LeFrAtUk)
15th day of Russian invasion in Ukraine
Thursday, March 10, 2022
Many of you have been asking me where I currently am and how I traveled to get here. Well, this requires a separate travelogue because our travel was an adventure. But still, a few words. We were supposed to leave on Tuesday morning, but my husband’s friend could not make it for Tuesday as he had been tired after a sleepless night bringing refugees across the border. We postponed the trip for one day. Then we did not set off on Wednesday morning either because there popped up some issues with the car. Eventually, we left our home on Wednesday after 6 pm. We joined the long queue at the Krakovets / Kordova border crossing point around 9 pm and spent there the whole night. On the one hand, it might sound incredibly long, on the other hand, knowing that some of my friends spent at other crossing points 2 days living in their cars with children, I think we escaped with relatively short time, having only circa 300 cars in front of us.
Both Polish and Ukrainian volunteers working at the border express their solidarity with every person queuing at the crossing point. Even though the line is much longer than in normal times, the friendliness and generosity of passport and customs control staff compensate for the stress and make the whole thing an unforgettable experience. Maybe the perception is such because I trained my brain to be open and accept things the way they evolve. While sitting in the car we were twice offered hot meals. There is almost no way you can refuse: the ladies insist that you must eat something hot and treat you to the food, claiming that they “have to distribute the meals anyway.” My girls’ traveling passports expire in a week, but nobody cares. They might as well not have passports at all, even birth certificates can do under the circumstances.
When we passed all the controls on both sides and were about to catch the early train from Jarosaw to Wroclaw, a certain officer noticed Cleo on my lap. He highly recommended to chip the dog. This is something which is requested according to the EU regulations. Luckily, there was no line for this procedure. Two friendly veterinary ladies served us very fast, and Cleo became a true EU citizen. As the ladies were filling out the papers, one of them staggered over the name of our street:
- Warsaw street? Do you have such a street in Lviv?
- Yes, we do. Why?
- In the long run, their city – says the other lady, was Polish for around 300 years. It’s not surprising that there is such a street.
- Moreover, I say, it’s one of the few streets in my city that never underwent renaming, even under the USSR.
- So, it would have been better for you if it stayed a Polish city, and not Putin’s, right?
Appalled by such an unexpected turn in our conversation, I decided to go diplomatically silent.
In Jaroslaw, we had a brief breakfast and coffee at my other friend’s place. From there we headed for the first train westward. All the tickets for Ukrainian refugees are free: these days you can travel across Poland wherever you want and it’s all free. This is true for all public transport. My eldest daughter got off in Krakow where she has a bunch of Polish friends, as well as a couple of UCU students who are currently staying there. And we continued the trip to Opole. All the carriages were filled up with Ukrainians and Russian-speaking Ukrainians, mostly from Kharkiv. The destination of the train was Berlin Hauptbahnhof. Most Ukrainians were heading there. The most unbelievable thing for me was to hear announcements of the train driver in Ukrainian with an almost unnoticeable Polish accent (in the past it was always only English and Polish). I almost grabbed for the phone to record this but then decided to leave it up to the memory. Just incredible solidarity with Ukrainians. Thank you.
The train was delayed for 1 hour. Our friends were already waiting for us. We are currently staying in Kadlub Turawski, a town nearby Opole. It’s quiet and beautiful here. I am flipping my brain and tongue to Polish. We are treated here like queens. From Monday we shall all go working and schooling online. So far, we are just having rest from the trip and getting settled. I have no idea how long we shall be staying here but I sincerely hope that by Easter time we shall be back.
This trip has proved to me again and again that the biggest treasures in this world are friends and genuine human love.
Halyna Pastushuk: Philologist, radio journalist, publicist, translator, PhD in Medieval Literature. Graduate of the Ivan Franko National University of Lviv (majoring in English Language and Literature), Oxford University (majoring in English Literature). 1994-1999 - worked as a live broadcaster on the local FM radio "Lviv Wave", 1998-2011 - taught literature at the Ivan Franko National University of Lviv. Since 1996 she has been working as a freelance correspondent for the English service of Polish radio (Warsaw) within the framework of the analytical weekly radio magazine "Europe-East". Freelancing experience in consecutive and simultaneous interpretation since 2001. Author of more than 20 literary studies (mostly on English literature), journalistic articles on current topics, a member of the Ukrainian Shakespeare Center (Zaporizhzhia). Married. Mother of three daughters: Halshka (20), Martha (14), Agatha (8).