WEBVTT - Made with VTT Creator 00:05.469 --> 00:14.918 position:50% align:middle On the 24th, I got a call from my mum in the morning. She was at work and I was at home with my daughter. And she said: “Son, are you asleep? 00:14.918 --> 00:26.107 position:50% align:middle There’s a war on!” and I said: “What are you saying, mum? What war?” I opened the window and heard Skhidnyi being bombed. 00:26.107 --> 00:38.405 position:50% align:middle We are far away, in the 17th [microdistrict], but we could hear it. I took my wife from Skhidnyi. They stayed with us for a short time, then they left. 00:38.405 --> 00:51.141 position:50% align:middle While the shops were working, it was fine, we had time to buy, to stock up normally. Then, when they started bombing the 23rd [microdistrict], 00:51.141 --> 01:07.764 position:50% align:middle they closed all the shops. I went to Metro to get some juice and water. I came to Metro and got there... I got a whole square pallet of juice and water, 01:07.764 --> 01:21.008 position:50% align:middle I went out to the backyard, and at that moment three missiles flew into PortCit for the first time. I’m standing, and next to me, people are falling dead. 01:21.008 --> 01:39.350 position:50% align:middle I barely got some water out of there. I was walking down the street, and mostly young girls were lying dead. It wasn’t scary. I was angry. I came home. 01:39.350 --> 01:52.046 position:50% align:middle And as long as it didn’t concern me, as long as I didn’t see such things, it was calm. I wasn’t afraid for myself, I was afraid for my children, for my mother, 01:52.046 --> 02:05.640 position:50% align:middle for my wife. Then the water, light and gas were switched off, and we started cooking outside. We didn’t cook quietly for long. I remember we got together 02:05.640 --> 02:13.985 position:50% align:middle and it felt like a picnic: the whole house was out, everything was good and everyone was having fun. And the next day, where we cooked... 02:13.985 --> 02:21.846 position:50% align:middle We didn’t have time to go out. To be more precise, we cooked in the morning, and in the afternoon people from other houses started to gather there. 02:21.846 --> 02:32.326 position:50% align:middle And then three mines landed where everyone was gathering. Killed a little boy, maybe 10 years old. And a girl. Well, how do you say, a girl? 02:32.326 --> 02:45.328 position:50% align:middle She had a little baby left. They told the child that mum went to get bread and hasn’t come back yet. Then we decided to go to the basement. 02:45.328 --> 02:54.599 position:50% align:middle She had a little baby left. They told the child that mum went to get bread and hasn’t come back yet. Then we decided to go to the basement. 02:54.599 --> 03:09.012 position:50% align:middle like, +8, it was warmer there for the kids. We took the sofas down there. We cooked right on the way out of the basement. When we ran out of food, 03:09.012 --> 03:23.802 position:50% align:middle we started to go further, to the checkpoints, to the Old Crimea, where the bases were. We collected everything we could. We traded something, 03:23.802 --> 03:32.803 position:50% align:middle someone brought something. People were walking... Old people couldn’t go anywhere... And you see a person walking along, 03:32.803 --> 03:42.166 position:50% align:middle and he or she tells you that they have two children, their parents are gone, and they have nothing to feed them. So we helped in any way we could. Some potatoes... 03:42.166 --> 03:54.028 position:50% align:middle There were a lot of sweets and biscuits, but there was nothing more serious to eat, like tinned food. There was nothing like that. There was no meat. 03:54.028 --> 04:07.433 position:50% align:middle We ate fish from the warehouses, from “Shchyryi Kum”. Someone brought it out and we ate it. We stayed in the basement for probably 8 or 9 days. 04:07.433 --> 04:16.364 position:50% align:middle That basement was very good, you couldn’t hear the waves, only the bombing. We couldn’t sleep at night. I slept normally, but my wife jumped 04:16.364 --> 04:24.110 position:50% align:middle at every explosion, grabbed the baby and tried to run away somewhere. Then the russian military came. They said that they had come in peace, 04:24.110 --> 04:35.800 position:50% align:middle to liberate us. It was unclear what they had come to “liberate” us from. They did not let us out of the basement for 2 days, they told us to sit down, 04:35.800 --> 04:50.119 position:50% align:middle they said it would be calmer that way. Then on March 23rd we packed up, got into the car and left. We drove to Manhush, then from Manhush 04:50.119 --> 04:59.237 position:50% align:middle we drove to Chervone Pole. There I crashed my car and ended up in hospital. They brought me to Berdiansk. There were russian military there too. 04:59.237 --> 05:10.117 position:50% align:middle Then I tried to get back to my family. I was travelling with a guy, he was driving me, and we were stopped in Urzuf and asked to go with them. And that was it. 05:10.117 --> 05:24.903 position:50% align:middle We sat first in Urzuf for 6 hours, and then they took us to Manhush by bus. They left our car in Urzuf, took our fingerprints there, took a full photo. 05:24.903 --> 05:32.535 position:50% align:middle They stripped me down to my waist, I have a tattoo there, and they photographed me completely. Then we just sat there and waited for a long time. 05:32.535 --> 05:43.487 position:50% align:middle In the end some guy came out and said that’s it, we are free to go. They gave us some passes, square papers and told us to go. And where to go when the curfew 05:43.487 --> 05:52.183 position:50% align:middle had already started? So you can’t move around there, basically. But he explained to us where to go to spend the night. So we went there and spent the night. 05:52.183 --> 06:00.840 position:50% align:middle The whole time we were held, we had no food, no water, nothing. So no one bothers about it there: whether you want to eat or not. 06:00.840 --> 06:07.388 position:50% align:middle There were small children there too. People came there themselves. It’s just easier to move there with these passes. At checkpoints, 06:07.388 --> 06:15.943 position:50% align:middle you show your pass and they don’t even ask you for your passport. We sat in Berdiansk for about 4 days, and when the convoy was on its way here, 42 buses... 06:15.943 --> 06:27.260 position:50% align:middle We left at about 10 a.m. and arrived here at 11 p.m. They said it was a “green corridor”, but in my understanding, when it is a “green corridor”, 06:27.260 --> 06:35.865 position:50% align:middle there are no checkpoints at all and the convoy goes on its way quietly. And there were probably 7 or 8 russian checkpoints. 06:35.865 --> 06:45.804 position:50% align:middle And at each one we were taken off the bus, some of us were undressed, some of us were not. They didn’t look at our belongings, because it was long. 06:45.804 --> 06:57.952 position:50% align:middle Towards the end, when we had already reached Vasylivka, they told us to lie down on the floor in case there was shooting. 06:57.952 --> 07:08.601 position:50% align:middle And the bus was travelling at night with its lights off. The driver was good, he managed. I have a daughter here. My second daughter is in the Old Crimea, 07:08.601 --> 07:19.163 position:50% align:middle in Mariupol, she stayed with my ex-wife. I don’t know where my mum is, I don’t know where my younger brother is either. I want to see everyone. 07:19.163 --> 07:28.203 position:50% align:middle I miss everyone. It’s been two months. Ukraine will win, that’s how the war will end. We’re on our own land, we didn’t have to be “liberated” from everything. 07:28.203 --> 07:37.472 position:50% align:middle And they were told that we live badly here, that we are humiliated here. People told me: when they [russians] get to villages and see a laptop in the village 07:37.472 --> 07:51.020 position:50% align:middle and a toilet in the house, they behave like savages. We were fine, we didn’t need all this.