Odesa, Mykolaiv and destroyed villages

10.8

Citytour on foot in company of Misha. Perfect English with humour and his personal thoughts about politics. A pessimist despite working hard also with volunteering work. He is the one who received 35 kg of old mobiles to be dismanteled and some components used for making, what...., drones?

Odesa is a great city with a lot of historical buildings and more greenery than ie Stockholm.

Taras Shevchenko, the national poet of Ukraine. He stands staue in every city

Many men crippled by the war. "City of cats". Here a stue on a bench with a tablet.

Pivdenna Palianytsia

The full meaning I do not know, but Palianytsia is a typical Ukranian bread. Here the name of an organization supporting families where the man is a serving soldier. A hard working couple, Eugene an his wife Ksenia. They took us by bus around to places recently destroyed by missiles and drones. Most chocking was the attack on an electric substation. We had to get a special permit to visit with our passports checked in advance. And no pictures allowed!

The manager, some engineers and the spokeswoman from electrical dept received us.

Only picture permitted

Most attacks are on civilian housing. Generally at night in order to cause most suffering.

These houses were bombed only a week ago

Eugene said: Never donate to the big organizations! Never give to Red Cross, UNHCR!

In Europe people are getting tired of donating, helping after 3,5 years of war. Eugene said:

Come here and see for yourself!

We cannot tire!

Mykolaiv and deoccupied villages

11.8

Bus 130 km eastwards to Mykolaiv. Dumped our luggage at our hotel and continued east into Kherson Region, 37 km from the front. We were joined by Oleksii entrepeneur and vlunteer worker whom I had the pleasure to meet also in April.

The village Blahadatne had 500 ihabitants. All houses were destroyed, some had been somewhat repaired and a few were basic recontructions. There was a small team of Americans from a church, Living Hope Fellowship led by David 30 years, who worked hard on reconstruction. Now 30 people had returned.

The meaning of Blahadatne village, is the Blessed village. Mupy means peace. The address of this house is 22 Peace Street, Blessed village.

Beautifully traditionally decorated houses. Here was the school

We then went to to village Partisanskya. It was under Russian artillery bombardment, but never occupied. One third of the population had now returned, among them 30 children who was now having distance education. We were lucky to meet with the mayor Mrs Raisa, was invited to the administration building and entertained with tea and cookis.

Mayor Raisa. - "Tell your friends that we will win the war

Not only a war

We have seen much of the destruction caused by the Russian invaders. But one an torment rarely comes alone. Much of sothern Ukraine has been under an unusual heat wave with little rain. Agriculture in this part is badly hit. I made the bus stop to take a picture of an enormous, but completely dry sunflower field.

The flowers turned away from the direction of the sun

A great morning in Mykolaiv

12.8

Every morning, at 9 am sharp, an old man plays the national anthem in the park ourside our hotel. He collects money for the army. Today he got a lot.

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He also played the wellknown song Chervona Kalyna (about the red elderberry) which is also sung every Monday at Norrmalmstorg in Stockholm

The afternoon Oleksii joined us again for a walk around this interesting town. I had done that earlier and skipped it in order to write the above.

Thank you Denmark

It was a surprise to see this large wall painting by the street. The lady in the picture is Marie, our first participant from Denmark.

Tak Danmark - Thank you Denmark

Our night train for Kyiv left at 21.54.