Summer





This cafe, owned by a husband and wife, serves great falafels and homemade lemonade with mint. The husband is involved with World Central Kitchen, which remains the one international aid organisation that is always at the centre of any crisis, regardless of the difficulties or the danger. Immediately after the recent bombing atrocity of the restaurant in Kramatorsk, WCK was there, serving tea, coffee, etc, trying to help the rescue operation.

Bob is planning to start a beginners English class for adults here, from next week. He is still suffering with his back so we're going to avoid driving on the terrible road between Odesa and Mykolaiv, to Kherson, for the next week.

Pity the people in Kherson. As if constant daily shelling isn't enough, the temperature in the shade was 35°C today and will be 39° tomorrow! Odesa, being by the sea, is about 5 degrees cooler but it's still hot enough.

Further to Bob's concerns yesterday, about the number of photos sent to us as proof of aid being delivered. We live in an age of instant images. We are always snapping photos, which we sort through later, to send to donors and to use in our blog.  Maybe those we deliver aid to see this and think that they, too, need to take lots of photos of aid being distributed to individuals.

It's tempting to use these photos strategically, e.g. photos of cute kids. Again, as Bob said yesterday, some photos are OK - if they illustrate an aspect of life here or the impact of support from donors. For example, it's really touching to see the pleasure that receiving simple toys gives to children. I don't doubt that they have some toys at home - although we have only scraped the surface of the damage the Russians inflicted during the occupation of Kherson - but I suspect children haven't had many new, or different, toys for some time...

So, thank you to Joanna and her neighbours in Krakow for sorting through their children's toys and giving them to us to bring to Kherson.

And thank you, again, for the ongoing care and thoughtfulness of the donations from the Penparcau Hub, Aberystwyth, Wales. Some of the stationery packs that they prepared were distributed at one of the UNICEF centres in Kherson yesterday. We have further stationery and activity packs to distribute at all 3 centres each time we visit, which we'll try to do as often as possible over the summer. Also, from the Penparcau Hub, we left boxes of baby clothes, which the mother of these two appreciated...

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Third Christmas of the War.

Image
I remember when we first went to Ukraine, we thought we'd better hurry up and get over there to help before the war finished, and there'd be nothing for us to do. How naïve were we? The situation in Ukraine at present has got even worse, especially in the areas in close contact with the Russian forces, although with the constant Shahed and missile attacks nowhere is safe. Kherson has become particularly difficult, and delivering aid there is a direct threat to life. Any vehicle or person can be targeted by Russian small killer drones. This week, a vehicle that is used to deliver aid that we have sometimes used, was attacked and badly damaged beyond repair. Miraculously, the driver, a person I know survived but suffered injuries.  The occupants of a bus were not so fortunate. It was attacked, 3 people died and several more injured. It's really terrifying.  What's really sick is that the Russian's then post o...
Read more

The killing goes on.

Image
Time diminishes things. News cycles bring new, more pressing concerns. But the war here in Ukraine grinds on, with deaths a daily occurrence. The killing seems to have become more incideous and heartless.This weekend in Kherson, delivering aid, under the fairly constant sound of artillery and drone attacks, I heard and saw the inhumanity of this senseless war. There is now a real tangible fear about going out in your car in Kherson. Over the last few months, individual cars have been targeted by Russian drones. These carry small bombs or grenade type munitions. . A car is targeted. An initial bomb dropped. The man realises he's  being targeted and tries to drive away at high speed. He then stops suddenly, hoping to get away. Opens his door to run away, but about two metres away from the car a small bomb explodes. With the door open, nothing seems to happen, then as in slow motion, a man falls from the driver's seat onto the road. Dead. It...
Read more

Krakow to Lviv

Image
We left Krakow at 3am because we had heard that there have been up to 3 hour waits on the Poland-Ukraine border. The balance has changed to more people returning to Ukraine (to the relatively safe western Lviv region) than leaving Ukraine. As it happened, we drove through the fairly haphazard border controls with no hold up. The first thing we noticed on the Ukrainian side were miles (literally) of lorries lining the side of the highway, which was only 2 lanes so made for fairly scary driving. On the Polish side was an equally long line of parked cars, waiting to be sold. We also noticed more potholes on Ukrainian roads than even East Lancashire! The purpose of our visit to Ukraine is 2-fold: firstly, we drove our friend, Romana, home to Lviv (in her car) with her 4-year-old daughter, as she decided against coming to England in order to be with her husband and family. Secondly, w...
Read more