Winter warmth for displaced Ukrainians

I'm a self-funded humanitarian aid volunteer who has been helping Ukrainians since the start of the war.

I’m officially affiliated with two Ukrainian charities: 1) the Renaissance Foundation which is run by a doctor in Kyiv who rapidly gets emergency medical aid to hotspot locations in east Ukraine as new urgent situations arise. 2) ETOC, a foundation which organises frontline evacuations in Kharkiv and helps people sheltering in bunkers in the city.

Along with a small group of other self-funded volunteers we call ourselves Operation Christophorus. Our mission is to alleviate the distress, trauma and hardships faced by people who live close to the Russian border and whose lives have been totally shattered since Russian forces invaded their peaceful lives and occupied their homes, schools and hospitals, destroying them as they leave.

We've been delivering emergency aid such as food, medicines, bedding and clothes to villages and cities which border the frontline. I've also been supplying learning and play equipment for kids. It’s deeply saddening and concerning to hear from the people there that they have no state support and haven’t seen representatives from any of the NGOs. Most have lost their jobs and many their homes to this war and are now living hand to mouth, fully reliant on humanitarian aid.

The winter in Ukraine will be bitterly harsh. The temperature drops to minus twenty degrees and many people will be in extreme poverty, freezing and starving. I've spoken with frontline care workers - doctors, psychologists and social workers who are all extremely concerned. Dr Elena Vaganyan from Poltava asked me "Hymie, please can you help? The villagers here are already poor and now they're having to take on the burden of new incomers from the Luhansk region and they need everything. They have nothing and winter will be disastrous. Please, anything, blankets, food, whatever you have".

So this is what I'll focus on. I'm going to take a van load of sleeping bags, blankets and winter coats. I'd also like to purchase small generators, torches and candles. Hot food is essential and so Operation Christophorus is setting up Project Soups to provide warm, nourishing meals to people most in need. We will deliver to remote villages and underground bunkers in places where groups are sheltering from missiles or have been forced to stay there because their homes are destroyed.

We're going to work with a group of displaced people living in emergency pre-fab shelters in Borodyanka to make soups and stews to their own traditional recipes, empowering them and giving them back a sense of purpose. We’ll deliver these hot meals to other villages so that everyone can be assured of at least one hot meal several times a week. Morale is incredibly low and even the small act of making a pot of soup twice a week or eating a hot meal twice a week can really have a huge positive impact.

I pay for my own expenses (basic accommodation, food etc) from my own pocket so any donation, no matter the size, goes directly to those in need.

Thank you for reading this and thank you for any support you can offer.