70-year-old Svetlana, with her 9-year-old grandson Kyril on her lap, sits on a bench in the concourse of the Ukrainian border town of Chop. They have been en route for four days from Poltava, a city east of Kiev. They stood in front of the Ukrainian-Polish border for three days. They first tried to cross the border by car and then on foot, ‘but there was no movement’. Now they finally have a train ticket, to the Czech Republic. Yet there is no sign of relief on their faces. “We’re empty.” She points to the boy on her lap and whispers, “The only reason I’m still on my feet.”
Chup is located in the extreme western tip of Transcarpathia, in southwestern Ukraine. The train station, now filled with refugees and military personnel, used to be known in Ukraine as the gateway to the Soviet Union. It is an impressive station for a small village. But little of the former grandeur is still visible: the large works of art by brave soldiers of the Red Army that hang above the cash registers were covered with yellow plastic a few years ago by order of the Ukrainian government.
According to the UN, half a million people have fled Ukraine. Most refugees seem to be moving to Poland, but here near the Slovakian border the cars have been standing still for days. The traffic jam reached the center of the town of Uzhhorod on Sunday evening. Monday afternoon there is still 6 kilometers. Many trains are fully booked for the coming days. To meet the demand, neighboring countries are deploying extra trains. Here in Tsjop a free train leaves at 3 pm to the Czech Republic, a little later a stop train goes to Hungary.
The fact that the EU has announced that all refugees from Ukraine will receive temporary residence status is a good thing for 30-year-old Aleksej from Kiev. ‘Not that it gives people extra motivation to go, everyone who wanted to has already left, but it does feel like moral support.’ Support that the Ukrainians did not get eight years ago, when Putin annexed Crimea. Some refugees are therefore curious: ‘Is it really true that hundreds of thousands of people have demonstrated in Berlin for us?’ and: ‘Do you no longer believe the Russian propaganda?’
Others look glassy when asked about Europe or refugee policy. They have their heads with missile strikes, sick relatives they had to leave behind, or a traumatic flight.
The refugees in the station hall come from all corners of Ukraine: Kharkov, Kiev, Odessa, but there are also large families of Hungarian Ukrainians from the villages in the area. And a striking number of international students, from Palestine, India and Nigeria.
While his friends are discussing at a currency exchange office, 20-year-old Nigerian student Kevin Ossai looks straight ahead without seeing anything. He can’t remember what day he left. Only fragments pass his lips: about his pharmacy studies in Kiev, air raid shelters, a train to Lviv and how he couldn’t find transport to the border for hours there. “I can’t get Lviv out of my head,” he says softly.
Last weekend when Alexei was about to board the train to Lviv, the air raid siren just sounded. ‘We had to choose: to the train or to the bomb shelter. Everyone started running. People got on the track.’ The soldiers did not let any men on the train and started firing into the air, he says. There were also international students there, such as Kevin, who did not speak the language, ‘they panicked completely’.
Big life choices
Food and blankets are brought to aid centers in the region, and people are offering extra rooms. But as often in a war, money is also made from the refugees. Hotel rooms are being resold for double prices, and apartment prices have also risen in recent days. The refugees at the station don’t blame the locals: everyone is afraid of the Russians, you never know what will happen tomorrow.
On the sidewalk in front of the station, a woman is arguing with her boyfriend between backpacks. Alexei (40) tries to convince Irina (39) to take the train to Budapest. He is not allowed to cross the border and has to take care of his family. She doesn’t know what to do, she says. “It’s not just that I’m leaving him behind, but I’ve seen so much suffering in the past few days. And I can’t make big life choices when I’m in that state.”
Later, somewhat calmer, the woman from Odessa tells that she has worked with trauma patients in a previous job. ‘In Lviv I saw it in so many women and children: in the way they looked, in their posture, it was dissociation. But also aggression, towards others. I saw some black students, who were totally disoriented. I can’t believe what this kind of stress does to people.’
In the station hall, 70-year-old Svetlana looks forward to arriving in Poland and meeting her daughter who lives there again. It does her good to hear in the news that the Poles are so helpful. She hopes that she can come to herself there again, that it ‘feels normal again, if that is still possible’. Her 9-year-old grandson on her lap thinks otherwise. He is not relieved, he says. His father stays behind in Ukraine. And he doesn’t want to go to Poland, to a new school with new Polish children. “I just want to go home.”