Tag: Demyan Om

At a High Cost

The morning begins with a final farewell to a soldier in our yard. He died in the war. A message about this appeared in the neighbor chat yesterday, indicating the building number and the entrance. High-rise buildings, just like low-rise ones, can’t avoid loss in wartime. There are more than 800 apartments in our building. Is there at least one unaffected by the war?

Alive. Love You

He was so eager to join the army. Finally, he got conscripted. We couldn’t get in touch with him for several days, I already began bracing ourselves to say goodbye to him. And then in the evening Valerik sent me a message: ‘Alive. Love you’.

Stencil of the 20th Century

During Andriy Lyubka’s literary soiree, we talk about literature and travel around Ukraine, about how we manage to help the Army, about the importance of every person working for our victory. Andriy reads his texts, which send waves of eager joyous laughter throughout the audience. At the end of the event, visitors applaud for a long time.

Write, just to forget

People come to meetings with writers in the wartime for many reasons. The first of them is an opportunity to speak on the topics that cannot be hushed up. To hear how one should fight the enemy, but remain a human, with love in one’s heart.

Kherson is Ukraine

They were killing people of culture for their unwillingness to cooperate. Thus, one of the numerous crimes still remains shocking: the chief conductor of Kherson Music and Drama Theatre Yuriy Kerpatenko was killed by Russian military men in his own house after he refused to cooperate with the invaders. Con-duc-tor!

Habit 2022: Surviving

Residents of Ukrainian cities, who, for almost a year now, have been living in the conditions of great war, constant shelling and daily disasters, do not wake up to an alarm clock. They are awakened by an app that loudly imitates a siren and warns: “Air raid alarm! Immediately follow to the nearest shelter!”

When will you go away, you traitor?

The Ukrainian city of Kherson was under occupation for more than eight months. Having occupied the city in spite of the powerful civic resistance, on March 1 the Russian army shot 17 territorial defense soldiers from tanks.

Light at the end of the war

Kyiv. It is night outdoors. It is absolutely dark in this yard. Two multi-storeyed buildings standing one after the other are not lit at all. Adults, children, elderly people with specific needs live in these buildings.

Musicians Do Not Live Underground

I was arranging the sheet music on the stand, trying to follow the correct order, but Sonia’s words still echoed in my head. She had repeated the word “try” so many times for the past day and the past hour as if I had a choice.