First, before I dive into this fascinating personal story, a little background for those of you not following me on Twitter. I have been dealing this week with some very challenging situations which I cannot write about yet (reasons). Yesterday was a very hard day, emotionally. I am grateful I also conducted these interviews this week. They are uplifting and give hope when other situations I cannot describe for now are really difficult to process. I am seeing so much of life and all its faces. It is a lot. There are no simple answers.
Second, the Ukrainian families sharing their personal stories with me agreed to do so because I explained it helps to raise awareness amongst civil society in the west so that we can continue to help refugees with our grocery card program. I haven’t delivered any cards this week yet. I haven’t received any. I know this is to be expected after so many months. We were lucky to raise as much as we did. But I still have a pile of 29 empty envelopes and counting. The arrival center, the hotel downtown, the dorm in the 11th district. Residents all still texting me. All really challenging situations where €50 makes a huge difference. To send me cards please contact me for my mailing address. To donate directly. Thank you so much in advance.
Bubbly Elena (42) meets me in front of Stephansdom in Vienna on Monday carrying Molly. Just like this. She gives me a hug and says she really just wanted to meet me. She thinks she saw me way back then at the train station. I must have been volunteering the day she arrived. We head to a local Starbucks. A cappucino, a latte, and Molly, the two-year old mini spitz, takes a seat on the third chair next to us. Just like a little human.
Elena is a single mother of nearly 18 year-old Evelina. She worked in Odesa as a professional masseuse in two different salons. She is now working full-time as a masseuse in a spa in Vienna, legally employed. Her daughter is a student at business school in Tulln. They arrived in Austria last year on March 13.
On February 24, Elena was woken up in the early hours by the sound of the attack on military storage facilities near her home in Odesa. For two weeks, she mulled what to do. She didn’t want to leave her father, 62, alone. Her mother had died a few years before. Her father refused to consider leaving. The family thought the war would be over quickly. Elena remembers packing only one suitcase, thinking she and Evelina would be home by June. The two women took an evacuation bus to Moldova, then another bus to Romania, and then began taking trains in the direction of Vienna. Their original plan was to go to someone they knew who was already in a seaside town in Italy.
The women arrived in Vienna’s central train station in the morning, on one of the many trains that was arriving full of Ukrainians each day via Hungary. Their tickets to Italy were not until the evening. They walked around Vienna. Elena had been three years prior, as a tourist, for all of five or six hours, on a guided tour. She fell in love with Vienna, but adds “I now know not to mix up tourism and immigration.” The city’s architecture reminded her of Odesa. She said to Evelina, let’s stay here. Let’s not go to Italy. Elena read the Telegram chats intensely. She studied all the options.
Mom and daughter went back to the train station with Molly. There they met an Austrian lady who was brining food for the dogs and cats arriving from Ukraine. She too encouraged them to stay here. She put them in a taxi to the arrival center which was then at Stadion. There they met a couple from Odesa in their 60s. After five hours in Stadion, they were all offered a bus to Salzburg. They had a few minutes to decide. They got on the bus.
At first, they were taken to a fancy hotel. That only lasted a few days. Then, they were moved to a not fancy hotel. Next, they were taken to the mountains, to Lungau. At each step, Elena kept asking about work, about German courses, what would be their permanent address? It felt like they were being passed along. In Lungau, they were housed in a student dorm and given €6.50 each per day for food and €50 for clothing per quarter. The kind director of a local gymnasium came and took Evelina to school. Evelina didn’t understand anything, and Elena couldn’t see where she would find work there. She went back to Salzburg where she met a Ukrainian priest who was helping refugees. She asked him about work and school, and then she took Evelina and Molly moved back to Salzburg. Only the accommodation in Salzburg was a former hotel turned into refugee housing and it was terrible. Theft was a major problem. The food was awful. Elena kept asking about work and she kept being told by all the people in positions of authority in Salzburg with whom she spoke that nothing would be possible without German and without an Austrian degree. At this point, she was ready to work as a cleaner. She knew she needed to get her and Evelina into private accommodation. Evelina also attended a local gymnasium in Salzburg, but not enthusiastically.
Elena reached out to a former work colleague from Odesa who had landed with a host family in a small town in Lower Austria. This friend helped put Elena in touch with local volunteers, who offered a 2x2 meter room in a beer factory. Former employee housing. Mother, daughter and dog left Salzburg, moved into the beer factory, where they were awoken every morning by the sound of glass bottles and trucks and the activity of a working factory. Evelina enrolled in yet another gymnasium. At this point I am fascinated so many schools are willing to take her, and Elena explains they both speak English fluently. This makes all the difference. By now it is the end of April. They have lost count of how many addresses they have changed.
Elena wanted to find a school for Evelina where she could learn a profession. She discovered a trade school (HAK) in Tulln, and enrolled her daughter. The bus connection from Tulbing was easy. By late May / early June, Evelina was enrolled. Elena began to search for better housing in the Tulln area. There is a group of local volunteers who are very helpful. She inquires about a two-room apartment above a cafe. The cafe in Katzelsdorf is owned by a Syrian. He shows the women the apartment on behalf of the landlord. The family negotiated on rent, and moved in. They befriended the Syrian father and son. Evelina began dating the son, who has his own apartment and job.
By fall, Elena found a full-time position as a masseuse in a Vienna spa in the 16th district. Fluent English and experience were the only requirements. She is very happy with her work. As soon as she began working, they got off the social payments scheme. She works with another woman from Donetsk via Chernivtsi who was hired back in April. At the moment, Elena is living with her daughter and her boyfriend, but she would really like to rent her own place. Rents are high. She earns €1400 per month after taxes, and a rental would cost around €750 in Tulln, so no cheaper than in Vienna, not really.
A monthly rail ticket costs Elena €75. For Evelina, it is €79 for an annual ticket. They are all at the moment living with Evelina’s Syrian boyfriend in a Vienna suburb. He has a good job. He helps them with German and navigating life here. The family came from Syria years ago. Father and son. The mother passed away. Evelina’s father also died years ago. For a while, Elena dated the father but it didn’t work out. She has trust issues. Anything even resembling a little white lie and she is out, she explains.
Elena really misses the sea. She would like to go home to Odesa for her birthday in April. To celebrate with her father and her friends. Her dad is managing. He has a small, warm apartment (independent gas heating), and she sends him parcels. To get to Odesa, Elena would pay a driver €150 for a spot in a mini-van. One way. 27 hours. You can send parcels for €2/kilo. Some choose to fly to Chisinau and then take a bus from Moldova. This route is faster but more expensive. Elena rents out her old apartment in Odesa to a couple from Kharkiv who work remotely. The rent is minimal but it is something. She signed them a one year contract. She left her 15 year-old cat with her dad. Her dad is a former taxi driver and still goes out from time to time, to make a little extra money. The men are laying low. They are giving out draft papers on the streets of Odesa. But the strange thing is, Elena explains, those with professional background needed by the army who signed up to be called up haven’t been contacted yet.
I ask Elena if she expected the war. She explains she had several clients who hinted, such as one who asked on February 23rd if Elena had stocked up yet on macaroni, canned goods? Those with government-related jobs had some kind of idea of the risk, the real threat. By February 23, the shelves were empty in some local stores of rice and pasta. “Putin loves famous dates,” Elena explained, referring to Defenders’ of the Fatherland Day, or men’s day, celebrated in Russia on February 23. “He attacked at night just like World War II,” Elena explains.
She is homesick. But she is very happy with her new life in Austria. She sees opportunities for herself and for Evelina. She is realistic about the challenges for foreigners here. She observed the conservative “Austria for Austrians” mentality in certain places, especially outside of Vienna. She has Ukrainian friends who were hosted by wonderful Austrian families. She has a friend who found a job as a waitress with only English. Good things are possible. Another friend has been working full-time in a downtown Vienna department store as an eyebrow artist since last spring. Fluent English opens so many immediate doors. We laugh that neither of us knows a single Ukrainian who ever found a job via AMS (like the job board).
Molly begins barking at a cute little white fluffy dog who has entered Starbucks. She puts her two little black paws on the table and makes herself heard. She licks my hand and let’s me know I have passed the test and been accepted into the circle of trusted humans. “I always dreamed of having a dog,” Elena says, “and two years ago my dream came true.”
We talk briefly about German lessons. Elena took an A1 course in Tulln taught by an older Austrian lady. No one learned anything, but they somehow passed the test. She began to take a A2 course the she found work last fall… I explain you will pick up German from your work and from hearing it and being exposed to it. I am living proof you can learn to speak some kind of passable German without attending formal courses.
We emerge onto the historic streets of downtown Vienna, and I thank Elena for her time and her candor. It is so nice to hear such positive stories despite all the hiccups along the way. The most important lesson, I think, aside from the fact that Elena was very lucky to have a profession to easily transferrable to a new market, is they never stopped moving. They kept asking questions, doing research, exploring, and each move somehow improved their overall conditions (despite the detour to Salzburg which in hindsight was a waste of time, but they could not have known that). Other people experienced detours but never pulled themselves out of them. They would have stayed in Lungau or a bad hotel and complained. That is the key difference. The ability and knowledge and drive to help oneself improve one’s own situation. Hugely important.