12 Not Expecting This
We arrived in Lviv in the evening. We had planned to take a train to Poland, but first, we had to meet with Kiril, a good friend of Rita who lives there.
Lviv is the largest, most important city in western Ukraine, about 60 km from the Polish border. One of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever visited as a tourist, was now transformed into a hub for hundreds of thousands of people trying to get to safety.
When we got off the train, it started to become obvious that we were not going to be able to board a train anytime soon. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many people in my life outside of a massive concert or a sporting event. The station was packed, the platforms were full of people waiting for trains, and outside in the street, the crowd went on for several blocks. Here I got a small glimpse of the modern Ukrainian demographics, with groups of Africans (some of them English or French speakers), Indians, Asians and South East Asians, all trying to figure out what to do next. Professional television crews and amateur vloggers were scattered in the street, interviewing people, or streaming and talking to their phones.
We stopped in the middle of the street and turned 360 degrees looking around at the sea of people. I estimated a few thousands just in sight.
“What are we going to do now?” Rita said, I felt the anguish in her voice. “I was not expecting this…”
I didn’t know if everyone was waiting for trains, so I talked to the first person that looked like a foreigner
“Excuse me, do you speak English?”
“Yes.” the guy replied, he was carrying a baby.
“Did you just arrive here in Lviv?”
“Yes, with my family.”
“Are you planning to stay here? or to go out?”
“No no no, we want to go out.”
“Do you have tickets? Are you going to take just the next train?”
“I don’t know.” he said, and he kept walking, catching up with a woman and a second baby.
I felt so small. I was just one more number in a growing humanitarian crisis that I never thought could happen in Europe, let alone be part of it.
“Kiril is close by, let’s go.” Rita said, popping my thought bubble, so we walked further away from the station, to meet him.
We walked about 500m from the station and we met Kiril, I knew him from pictures only, but I knew they were good friends. Rita had stayed with him and his girlfriend Irina before, the last time that she visited Lviv and I was in New York.
We walked all the way to his apartment, which was close enough to the train station, and Irina showed us a room they had for us and the cats. We let Pusha and Kobe out of their carriers and left them in the room so we could sit at the table and have something to eat.
While we were at the table, the air raid siren went off. Everyone rushed to get their shoes on, and Kiril leashed their dog. Maybe we were too tired, or just numb, but Rita and I decided to leave Pusha and Kobe in the room, they were already stressed enough, so we just got our shoes and went downstairs, to a bunker in the basement of the building.
A few neighbors joined us after a couple of minutes, they grabbed some chairs and sat down in silence. I was standing up, I didn’t want to sit after the long train trip.
I don’t know if there was an official clearance, because we couldn’t hear anything in the bunker, but we all got up and went back upstairs after 15-20 minutes. I realized that it was snowing outside.
Back in the apartment, we spend an hour or so just getting to know each other and talking war related issues. Kiril told us he could drive us to the border in the morning, as long as the snow was not too thick because he had just put the spring tires on his car.
We went to bed that night still with the uncertainty of the next day, but at least it was quiet outside. The whole country seemed to be quiet on the West side.