Sunflowers
A mystery in Lower Austria, frustration & hope. Odesa. A few local updates. What to read.
I drove out to Lower Austria on Friday. I do not like driving out to Lower Austria. I do it to visit Natasha and Pasha, but this time I actually didn’t see either of them. Natasha was in hospital, having surgery on her arm after having experienced a terrible fall off her bicycle while I was away on holiday. I visited with D, Natasha’s adult daughter who came to Austria from Kyiv (where she lives with her husband) after the accident happened. Pasha, she told me, was working for a local farmer. By evening, Pasha was calling me, telling me the farmer didn’t pay him or his friend (also a Ukrainian teen) for a day’s work of manual labor, and they had to walk 20km home. I tweeted about it, and many of you reached out, and tomorrow I will give the boys in cash the money they lost (€30 each), thanks to your generosity. As for the farmer, as I wrote earlier, there is a special place in hell for such “people”.
I didn’t get to see Natasha as she was still in the post-op “waking up from anaesthesia” room when D and I arrived to the local hospital. The local hospital was in fact brand new and much, much nicer than anything I have seen in Vienna. Natasha’s surgeon was actually Ukrainian, so D was able to call him and ask how everything went. I left fruit and flowers in Natasha’s hospital room which she shared with three local grannies, and promised to visit again when Natasha is home. D and I then drove to the fields where the accident happened, curious for any clues. Natasha only remembers feeding the goats, and picking sunflower seeds. She doesn’t remember how she fell or what happened. The police and/or emergency services haven’t shared any more details. We don’t even know yet who found Natasha unconscious and who called the ambulance. She suffered bad cuts to the face, was briefly in ICU for suspected bleeding in her brain, a broken rib, a broken arm. The operation on Friday was to re-attach a tendon her elbow. I still haven’t seen a page of paperwork. It remains a giant, tragic mystery.
This family arrived in Austria over a year ago after having experienced what no one should ever have to go through. War crimes. Events so terrible we don’t even repeat out loud what happened to them. Looking back, my gut instinct that they were not in an ideal set up for people like them in the place where they ended up in Lower Austria was unfortunately correct, for reasons I could not foresee at the time, and simply a lack of a social network or NGO infrastructure like we have in Vienna.
I don’t know what to recommend going forward other than to perhaps seriously consider a return to Ukraine if programs do exist in Kyiv for victims of war crimes and sexual violence, because the resources simply do not exist in a small-ish town in a new country where their story is not of interest to anyone, and sympathy appears, at least from the outside, to have long run out. There is also no perfect victim, and building a new life in a new country is not easy for anyone, certainly not for people who would otherwise perhaps never have left Ukraine, and for whom the day-to-day is challenging, for whom it is difficult to advocate. It feels at times, and I haven’t been in constant contact, as I myself have found the whole situation emotionally overwhelming at times, like we are trying to shove a circle peg into a triangular hole. That perhaps forcing things to work here isn’t the right goal. It was a local journalist back home, who interviewed the family, who encouraged them to go to Europe shortly after the village was liberated. I do get upset at times when I think about people in Ukraine not comprehending what the aid in Europe looks like. Europe is not a panacea. Because some get very lucky, yes, and others fall totally through the cracks. A new life in a new language with very limited financial means and very limited job opportunities (because don’t forget, you start working, you lose your housing subsidy), and trauma, trauma to last a lifetime you carry with you — that is not for everyone.
So I will visit tomorrow and at least share my honest opinion, fully understanding the decision is not mine to make. But as I have morphed into the person the kids call first when shit hits the fan, I feel obligated to also share my thoughts on possible paths forward.
This weekend we all observed the horrible attacks on Odesa. I shared some videos here and here. Odesa has such a special place in Russian-speaking Jewish culture, to hit the historic city center with such power is surely no accident. It rather demonstrates an intention to rewrite everything. Just like we have seen Russians talking now about buying up seaside apartments in Mariupol. All red lines have surely been crossed. And yet naive, dare I say stupid people in the west still talk about negotiations and offering Putin what he wants. He wants war. He wants the world to fear him. He cannot stop now. He will never be able to stop. Therefore he must be stopped by the rest of us. Surely it is evident now that if the Russians can bomb their own orthodox churches, as they did in Odesa this weekend, there are no more red lines. Those dropping the bombs do not question. They just take orders. This cartoon sums it all up rather succinctly.
I wish I could say that the politicians of Europe collectively understand this. I cannot, unfortunately. The political dialogue in Austria is still 99% focused on domestic nonsense. The U.S. will be inward-looking as well as the reality of a mega-geriatric presidential election with one candidate actively facing several felony lawsuits takes over. I imagine the U.S. will also retreat into itself. Musk turning Twitter into “X” reminds me of the Russian “Z” and I have absolutely nothing positive to say about that. Quite the opposite. I shudder in horror and ask myself how much does one have to love money to agree to help him do it.
So I do what I can, and focus each day on the micro situations that are brought to my attention. In addition to sending out cards, which I continue to do, thank you. The photos have started to roll in again, this time mostly from Spar, and the summer fruits and watermelon make me particularly happy. Thank you!
I received a text from one of the car owners whose car with Ukrainian license plates was vandalised by the “Z” spray paint a few weeks ago in Vienna’s 22nd district. Unfortunately, the paint job to remove the “Z”s will cost €400. Oleksandr just got a job recently at McDonalds. He cannot afford €400, but he explains his car is the only asset he has left, and if he does not fix it, it will have no re-sale value, and he needs to preserve the value, as it is his only asset which he can sell if a rainy day arrives.
This weekend there was a bad bus accident on the Vienna - Kyiv route, 50 km from the Ukrainian border, inside Hungary. The bus, operated by the private company Euroclub, went into a ditch. There were 60+ passengers on board, including many children, and those with injuries were taken to local hospitals across the east of Hungary. It was 2am, pouring rain, and there was chaos. The chaos continued into the next day, as relatives could not reach representatives from the bus company. Two women in my Telegram group had their mothers on the bus, one of whom is still in hospital with serious injuries. I wrote a brief thread here with updates as we learned them. There is so much traffic between Ukraine and Europe this summer, and with air routes closed, and trains sold out for weeks, private bus companies are the transportation option most people turn to. A local media article with photos from the scene here.
Yesterday afternoon a mother of a handicapped 7 year old boy wrote me asking if we could find a stroller. I tweeted about it and Train of Hope has found one. So nice when something so simple can be sorted out so quickly. If only all the problems were that easy to solve…
…this morning I woke up to a message which I think was sent from Ukraine. From a grandmother whose granddaughter and daughter have both been diagnosed with leukaemia. She was asking about coming to Austria for treatment and finding housing. I had to be the bearer of a reality check: yes you can come, no there may not be housing immediately available, same with healthcare, it does take some time to get an insurance card and see a doctor…do not expect instant results and some of the housing offered, even to those who have serious iillnesses such as cancer, is really sub-par and not sufficient for long-term accommodation. With all that said, I promised to help in whatever way I can, and also gave a contact of someone I know who works with social housing not in Vienna, explaining that it is an urban myth that healthcare can only be accessed in the capital. Quite the opposite, in fact.
So that is this Monday morning, so far. Three cards sent out, thank you, including to the mom who wrote me about the wheelchair yesterday. I am still working with a surplus which I am not advertising, preferring at the moment to reply to requests as they come in organically, rather than rushing to give cards to those not the most in need. Those who need help write me, and I send €50 from Spar immediately to them. Which is a super nice feeling. One I do not take for granted!
A Ukrainian mom wrote me this week (we helped find a wheelchair for her mother via Vienna Mission for Ukraine — huge thanks to them) and shared that she learned if you go to Hofer on a Friday evening, there are even more discounted items. Three generations live in a hotel where they are “fed” so they cannot shop to fill up a fridge. I love seeing the ice cream and fresh fruit. A slice of normality.
What to read:
Ukraine is now the most mined country. It will take decades to make safe.
Their City in Ruins, a Ukrainian University and Its Students Perservere
Thank you for reading and for your continued support of Cards for Ukraine.