Valeriy Malishevskyi survived in the enemy-occupied Bucha.

When the russian troops entered the town, the real horror began there. Looting and violence against the civilian population became the new norm. High-rise buildings were burning and innocent people were dying before his eyes.

On the first day of the war, my son called me in the morning, at around 5 o’clock, and said that the war began. I had a premonition that it was going to happen because there were [some signs]… that it was possible. And I already heard... I got up in the morning, went to the store to buy some food, and when I was coming back with packages of food, two […] flew by. I thought that those were some planes. The roaring noise was as if from the planes, but then, literally 10-15 seconds later, there were two explosions in Hostomel.

It turned out that those were rockets flying. Only then did I understand: the battle for Hostomel began.

Their planes and helicopters were flying here. I was watching there from the ninth floor. Everything was very scary. The russians entered on 4 March, and this was on 12 March. There is a church on Vokzalna Street, not far from the co-operative society. When we were passing by, we were stopped there once, and then stopped for the second time, and I noticed: their mortar was standing there, dug in the ground between the houses and the church. It was firing in the direction of Hostomel. They were digging in there. And I noticed that there was one person naked, undressed, and tied to a tree – it was scary then. When we went there to pick up the car, their APC was driving there, pulling out doors and gates. In short, they were stealing cars.

They ransacked, kicked out the doors, and our car was standing already damaged there. When we approached, one russian came out. It was obvious that he was a mercenary. He was with a beard and a machine gun in his hands. He asked,

“Why are you here?” We said, “We want to take the car.” And he said, “You better leave because you won’t take anything here.”

And another one stopped us there, on the way out... Well, there were a lot of Asians here. One russian, yes, an Asian man, stopped us. We shouted to him, “Let us through!” He persistently wanted to stop us, but he said, “Let them go.” And that’s it, we left. I realized then that I needed to leave here.

When I was walking through the park, I collected some small tree branches to make a fire. We made a fire in the yard and cooked some food on it. They were here in the sauna... They stayed for the night here. I was stopped here when I was walking by.

He called me up and told me to stand against the wall. I stood against the wall. “Take off your clothes”, he ordered me to undress. I turned around and he checked that I did not have anything, any tattoos. “That’s it. You may go.”

Then they came to our flat. They went around on a raid, looked and checked who was still living, who was still there. I realized then: they checked who was there and who was not, so that they could come specifically, without breaking down the door... They lived opposite us. They set the house on fire and two sections burned down, while two other sections remained intact. They lived there, stayed for the night. In the morning, they went out. Their sniper came out first and looked at the windows, looked around. Then they went out and gathered behind the building. They hid there. Their armoured personnel carrier drove up, they jumped in and drove off.

We left on 13 March. We just accidentally learned that there would be an evacuation. I went to the hospital, took a wheelchair for my wife, and then everyone gathered here and we ran straight there. There were several killed people lying near Novus store. So we ran by there.

Further, at the road crossing, some more people were lying on the ground too. Well, those were killed people, civilians, and no one picked them up because there were very few people left here.

So we got there. There were not many of us there either, and literally half an hour later, the buses came. And thank God, we got on the buses right away. When we arrived, when we got to the Ukrainian checkpoint, all the passengers on the bus were crying because we made it there. We were brought to Kyiv, to the train station. We were fed there and I went to Vinnytsia region, and the rest of the people went to Zakarpattia. I returned here in May.

When I pass by Novus store, I remember that dead people were lying there. Then later, I watched many videos. I saw the photos. Then I found out that... Well, I learned that our house miraculously survived, that it was not looted like other houses.

I remember how we passed by the church, and a tractor was digging a ditch there. I thought, “Why is he digging? The war is around and he is digging.” Then we went to the hospital... When we came to the hospital, we brought some food to the nurses because they were there all the time. They said that people were buried there.

Then we were collecting more, it was at the beginning of March. This is what was here. And I realized that it was scary to stay here. We need to see this war end and a certain time needs to pass for us to forget all this, for things to return to [normal]... I think that it will not return to the way it was previously.