“Russia does not deserve history. In case of occupation, I had my personal sabotage plan in mind…”

Kateryna Hryshchenko is a candidate of historical sciences and a senior researcher at the D.I. Yavornytskyi Dnipropetrovsk National Historical Museum. She expected the full-scale invasion to begin on 23 February 2022. That “landmark” day passed normally without any cataclysms, so it seemed that the threat passed by... Yet in the morning, the big war broke out.

Kateryna had no scruple about it – she would not leave her hometown, and would not leave the museum. So, from the very morning of 24 February 2022, together with her colleagues, they started to take out numerous packages with priceless exhibits (there are about 350,000 of them in the museum). The researcher and historian remembers how the pain in her legs then reminded her of those days, but this mechanical and even physical work was the best distraction from the tragic news and explosions outside the window.

The biggest fear was that the museum might end up under the occupation, but in this case, Kateryna Hryshchenko had a whole plan of personal sabotage in mind...