Hearts of Ukraine

We are Luke Davies and Niall O'Brien #racingtoUkraine. Along with Dave Sykes, we completed our first mission to the Ukrainian - Romanian border, delivering aid on a horsebox, meeting some wonderful people, and learning many lessons about how we can help move forward.

We have seen that the needs for the refugee crisis are changing daily and that we have to evolve our support. We have contacts from the local social assistance and border control, and we monitor the situation. We will concentrate on the Ukrainians that have arrived in Romania, and we will be supporting them in the towns of Medias and Sibiu.

Through conversations with local NGOs, Local authorities and Ukrainians, we have identified three different areas where there is a need for support:

1. Internal transport

- To take children to schools.

- Transport to and from drop-in centres

- Transport to other cities.

- Transport from villages to cities for shopping and launderettes

- Transport to local authorities for legal paperwork.

2. Humanitarian Aid

- Clothes, food, sanitary products, shoes, bedding etc.

- Drop-in centre in Medias

3. Schooling

- Schools need to have staff wages

- Books and other learning material, lunches and after school clubs/activities

What we want to do

1. We want to raise money in an emergency fund to support all the local initiatives to continue their activities (everything mentioned in the 3 points above) and continue our border transporting services when needed again. This fund would be at least €50,000.

2. We want to set up a drop-in centre in Medias and help current support initiatives work at a higher level.

3. We want to provide internal transport for Ukrainians who have made Sibiu and Medias areas their home for the duration of the war. The minibus that we have purchased with the initial fundraising will be available for any need that involves Ukrainians. (What was mentioned in point 1 above.)

Everything will work much more efficiently if we can get everything in place before the next wave of Ukrainians arrives. And we need your help with this.