We are helping those who remain on the brink of war.
Our ADRA team headed to the village of Semenivka, which is only 10 km from the border with the Russian Federation. We are in an area that is heavily shelled and bombed on a daily basis. Before the war there were over 7,000 inhabitants living here, but most of them have gradually fled, and some of the abandoned houses have been occupied by people resettled here from the front line.
We loaded two small vans with food and hygiene kits for the trip to Semenivka. This way we will be more flexible and, most importantly, we will not attract too much attention from drones or spies with a large van or truck.
After a security briefing, we set off early in the morning from Chernihiv, and after three hours we reached Semenivka by roads - not roads. We passed through forests and swamps, with lots of flies and mosquitoes everywhere. The checkpoints are getting denser and stricter. Fortunately, Father Mikhail has permission for unrestricted entry and movement throughout the area, and even the soldiers greet him respectfully. After all, he also serves them as a chaplain in the field, as well as in the hospitals. „Don't fasten your seat belt (if you need to jump out quickly and cover it delays) and no stopping or taking pictures along the way“. When the cell signal was lost as well, I started to feel very bad...
We transformed a small wooden hut, which serves as a prayer room for the Christian community of the Adventist Church in Semenivka, into a distribution warehouse for ADRA humanitarian aid. One of the volunteers, an elderly man named Victor, joined us in the van to accompany us to the people most affected by the shelling. It would now be dangerous to gather people for distribution. So we go to them and hand over the aid right at their door.
Even though it's a beautiful day, we have to keep working because most people stay hidden at home. We personally deliver food parcels and hygiene items to them and have a little chat with them to encourage them. One gentleman (for obvious reasons we will not mention names) invited us to his house where two rockets had landed. One exploded right in the bedroom where it blew out the windows and the wall. The other flew through the roof and wall, hit the ground, but did not explode and is still there... He was in the house, but by some miracle he survived.
They were not so lucky in the neighbouring house. The old man who accepted the aid package showed us: „A rocket hit us here and killed my son. He was only 30 years old...“ There are no shelters in the village, so during shelling people try to crawl into the cellar or just sit at home, believing that maybe their house won't be hit.
Many houses have only boards instead of windows, others have burned down... This is a true picture of the misery and suffering of war. The gardens are overgrown, because „what is young has fled and what is old has not kept“.
As the fighting spread, several old women were resettled here from nearby settlements. They don't want to leave the area, they are just waiting for it to end, hoping to be able to return home. A young lady, apparently severely depressed, went out on the street, saying that „she doesn't need anything anymore and nothing will help her...“ However, she gradually began to talk. Her husband is in hospital after a stroke and she doesn't know what to do.
Some of the old people joked and we laughed with them and cried again. Everyone had a difficult story. One grandmother gave us all hugs and kisses. I smiled (even through tears) and expressed my admiration for Mikhail, who stayed in the area, bringing help here regularly and taking care of them to make it through mentally as well. Personally, he confided that he is totally exhausted from this too, as he hasn't had a day off or a holiday in years...
I have to admit that there was mostly nothing wise to say about it. Good thing we were able to hand over those boxes, because it doesn't need much comment. Father Mikhail always had a few words of encouragement with a dash of humor. He says not to reinforce the trauma in people, but rather to help them relax and think of others. And it really works. Neighbors help each other in unusual ways.
We return to Chernihiv through endless blockades and checkpoints, and we are glad that the day was really peaceful and incident-free. But what will happen tonight and tomorrow with these people who stayed behind? I very much wish that their wish, „Let it be over as soon as possible so that we can return home!“, will become a reality.
- From Chernihiv region Stano Bielik, Director of ADRA Slovakia
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