Finding the light (Day 46)
Another busy morning at Wien HBF. Translation of anonymous reports by Ukrainian women from Wien Messe (temporary mass housing) & ACV (registration, social payments).
I was scrolling through old photos just now and this seems to match the mood of the moment perfectly. There is light at the end of the tunnel, but for the most part, for Ukrainians seeking refuge in Europe, most things are still surrounded in darkness. It is still an uphill battle. This morning I met dozens of women, kids, old men, a few pets. They were arriving from Mykolaiv (lots of Mykolaiv, so much Mykolaiv today, both city and oblast), Odesa, Kharkiv.
Some from Kyiv are already going home. As one man in his 60s joked, no one knows how safe Kyiv really is right now “they might just drop a bomb on May 7”. May 7, I asked? “Yes, you know, for Victory Day”. 9 May is the day Russia celebrates the Soviet victor in World War II. Many have suggested Putin is looking to secure some kind of tangible “victory” by then.
The women emerge in various levels of stressed out — often they have been travelling for days. Not all are travelling light. Little kids are crying and there isn’t much you can do to console them. Everyone is exhausted at this point and nerves are frayed. I find myself spending a lot of time translating near the ÖBB (Austrian railways) ticket counters were a very patient group of employees help process the free tickets for Ukrainians. Only now, there are bumps in the road.
The trains are full. It’s Easter. Europe is also on the move. In order to get a seat, even if you have a free ticket as a Ukrainian citizen, you need a seat reservation. That costs €3.50 per person. When I am there, I pay (using donations) for those who cannot. When I am not there, well, they have to pay themselves or take a chance with no seat reservation. I heard this morning people were already taken off of one train. The trains to Germany are usually packed. Standing is not permitted. If you can’t find a seat, the railway operator may remove you from the train. So, I always say, please ask for a seat reservation. Better to take a later train and make sure you get a spot.
Many people, especially those with nowhere to stay, ask for night trains. Those are actually totally free because they have to give you a seat (it’s complicated). Some Ukrainians have now decided free tickets means let’s go visit our friends or relatives in Italy or Prague. We have to explain that is no the intent. The intent is to help you leave Ukraine and reach your final destination in Europe. Croatia already said no more free tickets. I helped a mom and son by FlixBus tickets instead to Split (again, thanks to your donations, we covered half the cost). I always tell the Ukrainians: if you try to get free tickets to travel around, they will end the whole program, and you will then be preventing your fellow Ukrainians from reaching Europe. They are usually quiet after that.
At some times today there were ten people saying “Tanja” all at once. It does get overwhelming. You have to prioritise and tell people to wait their turn. I bought snacks, seat reservations, cigarettes, McDonalds for a pair of sisters who were travelling with two toddlers and said the cafeteria, which is free, was simply too far to walk. I gave money to a mom and daughter who left Kharkiv and had a very long layover in Bologna. They told me they waited until the end, but when even their normally quiet neighbourhood got hit by the Russians, they realised it was time to go.
One exasperated granny from Mykolaiv was nearly hysterical. She looked at me, and said, “What country am I in? What city is this again? Are they Germans here?” and then a tirade super loud about how the Russians are much worse than the Germans ever were except she kept using the Russian word FASCHISTI used to refer to the Nazis and I kept saying shuushhhh. We got her the tickets to Stuttgart. We got her an entry ticket to the cafeteria. I hope she is now nearly on her way.
I got home and got two phone calls within an hour of each other both desperately searching for apartments near Vienna. Two men called about two moms with two teens, both can afford to pay. Vienna or suburbs. The women came via car. I explained I am not operating a real estate database but sometimes Austrians let me know what they have. I promised to get in touch while managing expectations.
A mom came to pick up a used suitcase on wheels I had to donate. She has free housing from a Vienna-based insurance company as she was their employee in Kyiv, but she seemed really short on money. I gave her some diapers from the donation table at the train station, and promised to take her shopping one day. She lives near me. She came with her teenage son. I hope the people I meet understand there is only one of me and so many of them. I hope they don’t find me rude or short tempered. Sometimes I have to cut people off, to explain I cannot spend now 30 minutes on you because another dozen people are waiting.
Today I would also like to share with you two anonymous reports. I read them both yesterday in Telegram groups for Austrians in Ukraine. I contacted both authors, and asked if I could share their stories here in translation, preserving their anonymity. They both agreed, and wanted to be sure that I know they are so grateful to be able to be here in Austria, but hope that by sharing their experiences it might make things better for others in the future. Please remember they are thankful for a safe place “without bombs falling eight times a day” as one wrote me. Personally, I think Austrians want to know how Ukrainians are being treated here by “official Austria” — an umbrella term I use for government and charity organisations charged with providing the official response.
The first post was from, let’s call her Oksana, in response to a question, what is it like if you go to Messe Wien if you have nowhere to live in Austria?
"I will tell you solely from my personal experience, I don't want to offend anyone, but I don't recommend the refugee center at Messe to anyone, if there is any kind of possibility, try not to go there. We arrived with mom at night, they drove us to Messe from the train station around 22:30, they performed a covid test. Messe does this one time when you register (but if you need things or something else, they send you first to Stadion, and each time you go there they try and find corona in your nose).
Next they gave us sheets and took us to places between a large group of Roma. There was only one translator on duty, a local, who only understood every second word. We had been travelling for eight hours, we hadn't eaten anything, we were hungry, there was only bread, jam, and tea. I ate two pieces of bread. It was lying open, everyone probably touched it with their hands. I drank a cup of tea, and lay down.
Around 2am I started vomiting, I got a terrible diarrhoea. By 6am I had drunk two litres of water to try and clean out my system. It didn't get better. I kept vomiting. I went to the medical station, there were five people there. No one knew anything. They probably sent medical students or something. They didn't have any medicine, they said to wait until 8am, the doctor will come. I went back to suffer alone. I kept feeling worse.
No doctor came at 8. They offered to take my blood pressure. I said, I need a doctor. My blood pressure was really low. They sent me to lie down again, said they would look for a doctor in Vienna. At 9:30am I crawled to the medical station again, no response, they asked if I am better, I said, I am going to die soon, I laid down, and another 30 minutes passed until a translator showed me a map of the subway where there is a doctor. I fell there. It was the U2, I don't remember how many stations, they said I had to walk through a residential area.
I said, you have to drive me, I will pay for it, I cannot even make it to the toilet. They said lie down and wait, that they cannot do anything. It took me an hour and I got to the doctor, waited in line, showed them with my fingers that I am sick, asked for a drip (in Dnipro they would have immediately given me a drip and put me in hospital with such severe vomiting). They said no, gave me a bunch of papers (instructions to other doctors), and a prescription for two medicines to stop vomiting and diarrhoea.
Your health is in your own hands and legs. There was no hot food in Messe, only bread rolls, spreads, something sweet, tea. Later they said the workers there started to hand out food themselves, so that no one would touch the teapot itself. There is a shower and a washing machine. If you have a strong immune system, you might be ok, otherwise, best to look for other options. This is only my personal opinion and my experience one week ago."
Oksana also wrote to me last night:
“I in no way wanted to offend any of the workers in the center, or Austria as a country, thank you so much for welcoming us, for feeding and taking care of us, organising such a big center, trying to make it livable with a children’s corner, shower, washing machine, basic items, free transport, free excursions! My mom and I are really grateful to Vienna for all of that. In Dnipro there are air raid sirens every day, 8 rockets landing, it was really scary to stay there! I just think my digestive system couldn't handle the local food, and well the medical care was offered how I described. If that helps someone else avoid getting sick, I would only be happy.”
The second post which I saw immediately after Oksana’s post was about the registration process at ACV and receiving social payments. Let’s call the author Viktoria. This was posted around late this Friday evening. Viktoria wrote:
"I was in Austria Center Vienna today to receive the payments. I had an appointment for 16:00 and left at 21:00. The fact that you have an appointment does not mean anything. Once you get inside, you are going to have to wait in a line (according to numbers everyone is handed, you get a number when you walk inside). If you aren't in a hurry to get paid in cash, you can ask them to transfer the money to your bank account. They say that takes a few days, but in reality it takes 7-9 days. They pay the social payments from the day you have a residential address (Meldezettel) until the end of May, so for three months. They give you the next appointment for June in a local Caritas office, and you won't have to go to ACV anymore. Regarding financial support for paying rent, help with buying food, clothing and payments for kids in school -- all of that will be only in June. They are not accepting those applications now. They don't have the mechanism set up yet to process those requests. I hope this information is helpful for some of you. Go get your appointments!"
Viktoria also wrote to me then, privately:
“You can also add that children must be present when the money is paid out and I was there with my two year-old child. It was ok as long as the children’s play area was open, but it closed at 17:00, and they kept us there until 21:00 (and my kid was really losing his mind, because there is nothing for kids to do there). If my feedback will help someone improve the system, it would make life easier for everyone. Good that we suffered through and don’t have to go back again. They really have a lot of superfluous processes that aren’t necessary.”
My point in sharing both of these true stories is the information is then out there in the open if anyone truly has a vested interest in making things better for Ukrainians. Maybe not. Maybe the powers that be think everything is fine as it is. But I do know ordinary Austrians (and not only) want to know how things are working for Ukrainians in practice. In practice they are working: not great.
We volunteers and people with communication skills are filling in gaps that should not have to be filled in a perfect world. A perfect world it is not, but it could be a lot more efficient if someone spent just a few minutes questioning why things are being done a certain way. Austria’s love of bureaucratic paperwork and creating six lines when two would work too just baffles me. It is a disease and it is everywhere. Almost as if inefficiency is rewarded because then you get a bigger budget…
That’s probably more than enough for today. Thank you for reading and thank you for your (ongoing) support.