My name is Ivan Kostyuk, and I am Ukrainian-Canadian. I am fundraising for my oldest friend, Vladyslava (Vlada) Orel, whose family feels extremely fortunate to be alive today. As Ukraine got invaded, they found themselves trapped in her parent's home in Irpin on the outskirts of Kyiv. Over the past 2 weeks, Irpin has received international recognition as the epicenter of fighting between Russian invaders and Ukrainian defending forces.

 

Vlada's family consists of her husband, Oleg, her 2 boys, Kyryl (11) and Anton (5), and her parents, Larisa and Stanislav. The six of them went through absolute hell and back. While Vlada, her boys and her parents are now safely out of Ukraine, Oleg had to stay back as males between the ages of 18-60 are not allowed to leave the country. He has now enlisted as a civilian volunteer fighter.

 

Their lives changed forever. They have no money, no income and no home. I helped them purchase bus tickets to Bologna, Italy where Vlada has a friend that offered to take them in. I am asking for your support to help them start a new life.

 

I asked Vlada to write about her experiences from the beginning of the invasion so that I can share them with you here. She wrote to me in Ukrainian, and I did my best to translate it to English.

 

Feb 24th, 2022 - Day 1

Shortly before 6am, Oleg ran into the bedroom where I was sleeping with my youngest son and started screaming: "Get up! Quickly! The war has started. Pack what you can and get in the car - we're leaving." Feeling half asleep, I couldn't understand if this was true or some evil practical joke. I started looking for a suitcase and packing up. We got ready in 10minutes and left our Kyiv apartment. Once on the street, I was surprised to see that we were not the only ones fleeing - there were a lot of cars packed full of people and luggage.

 

My parent's house is 8km away in Irpin, and there is never any traffic, especially this early in the morning. However, this morning, the traffic was awful. We eventually made it, but my Mom and Dad refused to go anywhere and abandon their house. Also, both of our cars were too low on gas to set off on a long journey. We tried to fill up anyway - we lined up and waited in a 3hour queue, but the gas station closed as we got close. That day, I also managed to spend 2 hours in an ATM queue to get some cash (3,000UAH limit, appx $130CAD) to buy groceries. By the time I made it to the store, it was out of meat, bread and grains.

 

 

 

 

We reconvened at my parent's house to discuss what we should be doing next. It was impossible to flee that day - we didn't have gas and traffic was horrendous. We decided to not panic and attempt to leave the next day. Then at 4pm, we heard the first explosion. We spent the evening on the floor as explosions were starting to become more and more frequent. We went to sleep in separate rooms in beds. I couldn't sleep as I counted explosions. Then at 1 am, explosion #12 was so loud and strong that the whole house shook. I quickly grabbed the kids and went to sleep on the floor in the kitchen on the ground floor. By morning, I counted 22 explosions overnight.

 

Feb 25th, 2022 - Day 2

The loud explosion we heard the night before turned out to be a bridge 3kms away that led south back to Kyiv. That route was now destroyed. We couldn't go north either as that's where the Russians were coming from. There was still an opportunity to flee west, however, the traffic was beyond awful and we still didn't have gas. So we decided to sit tight and wait until the traffic thins out. That was a big mistake.

 

Next 4-5 days

Explosions were constant - some quieter, some louder. During these days, I still went out and tried to go to the grocery store and the drug store. Lineups were insane - people waited and periodically crouched down as explosions were heard from all over. One day, I got home and noticed that my toes showed signs of early hypothermia after I spent 4hours in a drug store queue getting heart medicine for my dad, a heart attack survivor who can't live without his meds.

 

Every day explosions got stronger and closer. There was a moment when I was petrified as I realized that we could all be dead in a blink of an eye. We tried to gently, without scaring them, explain to our kids what to do and where to run if something happened to the grown-ups.

 

March 4th, 2022

The evacuation of civilians got underway, but it was only for women and children. My Mom and I didn't want to leave the men in this situation, and frankly, we were scared to evacuate. By now, we've seen that Russians would shoot at evacuees and bomb civilians and their homes.

 

March 5th, 2022

Things got much worse when we lost power and cell service. On this day, the fighting advanced into our city. We spent all of our time behind a cement bar stand in the kitchen - that's where we were hiding, eating and sleeping. Explosions got even louder and louder. Adults took turns covering the kids with their bodies in hopes that their lives would be saved if anything was to happen.

 

 

Around 7pm, a home a few doors down was hit by a missile. The house was burning down in front of my eyes. I wanted to run outside to try and put out the fire, but I couldn't because I could hear soldiers and gunshots on a neighbouring street.

 

 

During our last days there, neighbouring homes were badly damaged - roofs were gone and windows were shattered by the blasts. Luckily, our home was untouched. We covered the windows with packing tape, hoping that it would prevent glass shards from injuring us in case of a blast. We placed mattresses and various wooden boards in front of the windows to try to better protect ourselves.

 

 

Those couple of days feel like a fog. These days were unbearable and very frightening. Fighting didn't stop, not even for a minute. But when breaks did occur for a moment, it got even more frightening as we were left wondering of what might come next. During these days, I started to give my children sedatives to calm them down and help them sleep. My youngest, Anton, started to get stutters, and eldest, Kyryl, got shortness of breath attacks as he's asthmatic. There were tanks and fighting taking place on a neighbouring street.

 

Sunday, March 6th, 2022

In addition to losing power and cell service, we lost water and heating on Sunday. It became clear that if we didn't die from a bullet or a shell, we would either freeze or starve to death. Our neighbours attempted to flee by car, but quickly came back as they learned that the only remaining road out of the city was controlled by Russians, who would open fire on civilian vehicles.

 

Monday, March 7th, 2022

Since the very first day, we were always packed and ready to run at any moment. We even wore our coats and shoes indoors. As soon as we realized that we wouldn't be able to flee by car, we repacked again, and then again, to make sure we could easily carry all of our belongings. In the end, our entire lives were packed in a suitcase and a backpack each.

 

On Monday morning, we got up, had a quick breakfast, and decided to flee. We made a plan - Kids and I caught a ride with our neighbours south to the destroyed bridge, while my parents and husband would travel 3km by foot. We had 2 electric scooters that made it easier to transport the luggage. We got to the bridge, and immediately a Ukrainian soldier yelled at us to get off and hide under the bridge as an active Russian sniper was targeting the area. There were a lot of people under the bridge, all waiting to cross the river through a makeshift crossing. There were abandoned bikes, strollers, and even pets everywhere. Once we crossed the bridge I thought, "at last, we are safe", when two soldiers grabbed each one of my kids and started sprinting and yelling at me to keep up and duck down at the same time. Eventually, they pointed us in the direction of a van that was transporting evacuees to a safer spot. This van was not intended for passengers and didn't have any seats or anything to hold onto, but that hardly mattered at this point.

 

 

 

Once we got back to Kyiv, it was clearly a very different city - there were checkpoints, cement blockades and steel hedgehogs everywhere. Kids and I were now anxiously waiting for the rest of our family. They all got separated and arrived one by one, but they arrived. All but our dog. A missile strike landed close to my Mom and Dad and caused them to fall on the ground and scared our dog away. They were not allowed to chase after him as the whole area was under siege.

 

A volunteer approached us and took us to his church. From there, the church arranged transportation to Western Ukraine. The bus ride was very long as the driver drove through villages instead of main routes, which got frequently shelled. At one point, when we were driving through a field, we saw a fighter jet that was dropping bombs. The driver immediately stopped the bus and turned all lights completely off. We heard two explosions, waited until the fighter jet was gone, and continued our journey.

 

Once we got to Lutsk on March 9th we decided to flee the country and cross into Poland. Here, my kids and I said goodbye to Oleg, hopefully not forever.

 

Refugee centre in Warsaw