The aid run to Snihurivka

This blog covers yesterday....with no internet and then no electricity and water

We were unable to post... but here it is....

We started off this morning from Odesa at about 8:00, after having spent the night with our kind host, George.

We arrived in Mykolaiv, where we were met by Pastor Andri, a Protestant vicar, if you will, who was our guide to the village of Snihurivka. The main road between Kherson and Mykolaiv is not usable and only authorised people can us that road....so we had to make a detour. The roads are undescribably bad. Some 50km took 2.5 hours. Mud, pot holes, unexploded mines in fields along the road. Poor weather conditions.

We arrived at the partly destroyed village. We were told some awful stories of the conditions many villagers lived in under the Russian occupation. The soldiers were billeted in homes in the village. If a villager complained they were shot in the leg. Things were stolen from homes. There was no gas or electricity or water for 8 months. Many people left, leaving mainly older people behind. 

When the Russians retreated they mined the homes, leaving additional mines and trip wires in the destroyed homes.

It's hard to describe the situation. Wanton destruction and neglect due to the empty homes. It was surely never rich before the war, but the place appeared, initially, to have lost it's meaning and soul. 

But things can be deceiving. At a small church...and I use the word in it's broadest sense - a room with a large cross - we unloaded the aid. 

In conversation with some of the women, they told us that, since Snihurivk's liberation, laughter and smiles had returned to the faces of people in the town: people had "come out of their shells." Maybe the process of finding the soul of this place has started. We hope that the aid will be put to good use. I'm sure that the Pastor and the women will ensure that it's distributed effectively.

With warm goodbyes we set off on the long journey back to Mykolaiv, staying with Svitlana for the night. Exhausted, we arrived some 3 hours later. Fiona had had nothing to eat all day, I only a little at breakfast, and we were hungry. Svitlana had prepared a meal for us, including wonderful mushroom soup. Rarely has food tasted so good. 

With no internet and then no electricity or water we sat around a stranger's table, communicating as best we could in the light of candles. Svitlana showing pictures of her husband and oldest son, soldiers fighting Putin's arrmy in Bakmut. Tears forming as she spoke of her son. Pride and fear.

As the dinning table was folded and chairs put to one side....our sofa bed made up in candlelight, juice drinks given, presents of amazing bead necklaces having been given to Fiona earlier. Strangers no longer. 

A bewildering day of emotions, at least for me. I have not been so exhausted at the end of a day as I was today in a long time.

What we did today will not change much. It will help. But, most of all, I think, it shows that people here are not forgotten.