We lived a peaceful life, had our jobs, our own comfort, our own everyday routine, own apartment and own house. But somehow it so happened that it became terrifying, and we left.
The very first encounter with the war was when I took my kid from the kindergarten. We have our kindergarten and a highway right close by. My daughter and I were going out. She was three years old then. We were going out and we spotted the tanks. To be honest, we had some kind of reaction that... We just started crying. We were very scared. But I still didn't want to believe it that the million-plus city of Donetsk would be touched.
Active hostilities began. The windows were blown out. It was quite scary. We have a private house area and two nine-storey buildings. And people, civilians, were leaving their homes and going to the bomb shelter of the plant, which is located nearby. My three kids were among those people too, but I could not go, since I stayed with my mother. I just dragged her into the corridor, and I stayed there together with her at night.
This could not last long. We called and said that we were going to leave. Asked to evacuate us! It was 24 July 2014. And they brought us to Odesa region, Serhiivka village. We lived there in a children’s camp until autumn began. We lived in Kuyalnyk, and then the authorities, Donetsk regional state administration, took us from Kuyalnyk here, to Svyatohirsk
It's very scary not to live at home. Do you think we like it here? No. We are strangers. The local authorities would rather want that vacationers dwell in our rooms, and not us living here. And we want to come back home, but it doesn't work.
I pay 2,480 hryvnia (UAH) for two rooms. There is no hot water. There is a shared shower, there is a boiler there, but we all bathe in this room. We don't have a kitchen either. There is a canteen and we pay some money for meals. There are two cooks who cook porridge or soup for us once a day. We also cook something additionally, but it is very inconvenient to do this in one room, which is not suitable for that. Well, we keep living as we have no choice. I tried to find some housing for rent, but no one wants to rent out.
When my mon was young, she once went through the flu “on the go”. She has been ill for over 20 years. The disease progresses. She had the third disability category. She walked badly, staggering. Then she fell, and now she does not get up at all. She has not been getting up for some six years, I think. Now she has the first disability category. She is under a permanent treatment. Twice a year, I get her drips and injections.
We don't know what will happen tomorrow. Firstly, when we settled in here, this sanatorium [health centre] was a state-run facility. At some point, without our knowledge, it turned into a private one, and they can decide whatever they want about us. They raised our rental fee. We try to resist it, but there is nobody here to hear us. There is an owner and he has the right to it, as they say. It is very unpleasant to be in such a situation.
I do not have the right to work as I am caring for a disabled person of the first disability category. That is, this is my employment. Well, I also do haircut, make dumplings at home, if someone orders. Someone could ask for a haircut or hair colouring. I do that too.
I would very much like to see my future bright and beautiful. I very much want my kids to be always healthy. I want to see my grandchildren, to take care of them. I would like to have my own housing. We realized that it is very important to have your own home. I didn't understand this before, because I always had it.
We had a house, an apartment, and I could not even think that I would value it so much. My own bed, my TV, my own furniture, plates, spoons and everything else. This sounds like a trifle, but our entire life is made up of such trifles.
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