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16.10 Red alert, the more serious flight alarm, missiles are coming in direction towards Kyiv. The police comes and chase out the hundreds of people sitting and waiting for delayed trains. Everyone except an old woman obediently walk out of the train station and down into the underground shelter. The woman screams loudly in desperation, shouting her contempt at the young policeman. He has to give in. Wonder how she will survive this night. When the danger is over, everyone q

14.10 The train to Kyiv leaves shortly after ten in the evening. We take a taxi to the station to avoid risking overcrowded buses. Track number seven, and we head out to the train that will leave in half an hour. Mattias's bag is gone! It's the first time we've seen any crime during any of our eight tours. The rest of us get on the train, while Mattias and his friend Thomas stay behind to look for it. The police arrives, and they get help from a friend of Asya. The train leav

13.10 Forgot to show you the moving moment in the morning. At 09.00 every moprning this old man signals the minute of silence to honor the men and women defending the country. Sorry, the video did not show 14.10 By bus we were taken around Odesa to see different places where Russian terror have caused damage and deaths. Here is a 25 floors high rise housing complex. The upper floors are wrecked. They people who lived there do not live at all today. Most windows are now replac

Walking the streets of Mykolaiv 12.10 Hired bus 140 km along Black Sea coast. Oleksii Rybakov took us around the city of Mykolaiv. A constantly busy and hardworking person. His phone is ringing all the time, the spider in a network that calls itself "Angels of Victory." Everyone in the group wants to walk alongside him; questions are flying. Oleksii is critical of the large foreign organizations. "They come in new, big, expensive cars, always wearing sunglasses. Ask, what wh

10.10 Morning around 4 o´clock there was a hard bang on the door of our compartment. Evacuation! There were drones heading in our direction. Train stopped. I was faster than expected down from my upper bunk. All of us were out and waited for the signal that danger was over. After a quarter of an hour we could return to the train and try to fall asleep again. Back to train in the morning sun Around eight o'clock the same thing happened again. Out of the train and into the nea

9.10 In the morning I met with Greg Brook. An American professor who was with us on last tour in April. Said he had to return. Now he is in Lviv teaching English at the university, conversation clubs and giving speeches in various places. But he also volunteers at Lviv Kitchen, peeling potatoes and cutting carrots. An admirable man. "You changed my life with that tour", he said. Mykola in his workshop We went to again meet Social Drone, a one-man operated organization. Some

To the left, our former tour leader Iryna, now is expecting a child in two weeks. Asya (Anastasiia Lazo), to the right has proved an excellent substitute. Tilman from Germany was not allowed in to Ukraine for reasons not clear to me, nor to Tilman himself. As our driver had already started driving. I told him to stop the car. He refused. I got more and more angry. Shouted, screamed. Had I not been in the second backseat I would have taken the steering weel. Now he understood

Maximum no of participants are 20. This what I have said and written. 6.10 Suddenly she came to meet me at the ferry terminal. I recognized her from a previous tour to Ukraine. But you were supposed to travel in April, I said . She had a different idea. Since 1975 I have arranged tours, but never this. OK, it was difficult to say no. Boel worked on her phone and managed to book a seat on two Polish trains. I called the tour guide Asya, who after 10 minutes triumphantly wrote

A big thank you to everyone who has sent me a contribution. From a few hundred Swedish kronor to several thousand, though not as much as before. I hear from many organizations, both here in Sweden and in Ukraine, that it has become harder to get support, meaning money. Many people have grown tired of sharing after nearly five years of misery. The Ukrainians are even more exhausted but have to continue, enduring constant air raid alarms and bombardments of the cities. Some die

Oleksii is taking care of us in Mykolaiv 9 days left until we go again. Plannnig is done; hotels and train tickets are booked and our tour leader Anastasiia is ready. Still there may be last minute changes and and on the spot while on tour. This time, the risks may seem higher than before. After all, we are going to Odesa, Mykolaiv, and Kyiv, all exposed to intensified Russian bombardment in recent weeks. And no one has canceled in the last month despite the horrors reported

The tour in October is now fully booked. 20 people, of which 8 are from countries other than Sweden. BUT from (bad) experience I know there will be cancellations. If you want to join that tour, you should apply NOW and you will probably get a place. Our previous tour leader Iryna Prokopushin is expecting a baby in November. I got to know that only at departure from Kyiv Railwaystation in April. Since then I have been searching for her replacement. Only last week it was decid

We paid a visit to volunteer organization Glory UA With some of effort, me and Boel have managed to get all the figures for how much money we spent in Ukraine (not in Poland) during our tour in April. The figures are in SEK. Some figures are rounded Payments in Ukraine 79,491 Donations during the trip 45,380 Participants’ personal expenses and donations 433,000 Donations after the trip 88,100 Total left in Ukraine 558,000 SEK. (50 700€ or 59 500$ or 2,604,000 HRV) This

The Monument at Independance Square, Maidan. Photo Richard Bilhaut Children of Heroes "The Heroes" are men and women who have died at the front. This organization provides financial support to the heroes' children. This is a large nationwide organization that last year had a turnover of 11 million dollars. 95% have lost their father in the war. Currently, they support 17,000 children aged from one week to 18 years. The number increases each time we visit them. Most children l

29.4 Yesterday we went sightseeing in the city. The problem is that Kyiv has so incredibly much beautiful, interesting, and important to offer. The churches are breathtaking, but they make me wonder how previous rulers spent the country's resources to please God and thereby secure themselves a fast track to Paradise. Next year I want to have more time to see all the wonders. And there is certainly much more than the churches. The Museum of Contemporary History shows the count

27-28.4. Volunteer organization Dobrobat supports the military hospital in Chernihiv. They arranged a tour with the chief physician. He is an eye specialist and the one who operated on Artem, whom we had met the day before. Crowded and a lot of people who rushed inbetwen different tasks. We peeped into the hospital wards with about ten beds in each. A doctor earned €500 a month, a nurse €200. Boel and I chose to walk back to our hotel along river Desna. Longer than I thoug

26.4 Just after five, I woke up to a loud bang. Sounded like a anti-aircraft gun. The fligh alarme was blaring outside our hotel. A projectile had hit next to a multistorey building. No injuries, but all windows were shattered. Later in the morning, we met Artem Rakitin. Known, famous, and heavily decorated in Ukraine for having evacuated 25,000 women and children during the Russian siege of Chernihiv. He was also one of the commando soldiers who retook Snake Island from the

25.4 The train departed Lviv punctually at 23:18. By then, I had already made my upper berth. Making the bed is a bit problematic when four people are supposed to make it. The carriage swayed a little at the beginning, then I don't remember anything until just before we punctually arrived in Chernihiv around 10 am. Checked in at Hotel Prydesnyansky. We were welcomed by Stanislav, who participated in the defense of Chernihiv when the Russians attacked in February 2022. Here h

24.4 Social drone is a one-man project and Mykola is the spider in a network of some 9000 more or less active volunteers. These people assemble drones at their kitchen tables. The parts they buy online from Ali Express in China. They glue and solder according to instructions. Then send it to Mykola who tests them before they move on to various army units. There they are equipped with what that particular unit needs at the very moment. The larger drones take 1.5 kg of explosiv

23.4 I´ve come this way several times, but there still this special feeling when leaving a relative zone of comfort and beginning something less predictable. I´m not the least scared, but there is a difference when entering a Ukranian train that soon willl cross the border and drop me in L´viv. L´viv This slogan was placed in each railway car In L´viv our tourleader Iryna (Ira) met on the platform as she has done so many times. After leaving our luggage at the hotel we went o

Writing on the train on the way to Przemyl, a Polish border town. Right now we are passing Zaczarowanej (Polish is a wonderful language). Yesterday we left Nynäshamn with 14 participants with Gedansk as our destination. Nice sunset through the archipelago. The shipping company offered a three-course meal and breakfast the next morning. Curt Sörmark, is one of us, this is his fourth tour with us to Ukraine. At home he works with Ukrainian refugees in Jönköing. He says that som