Migration is not a vacation or a lucky ticket for a chance to build a new life. Migration is a forced exile.

Being an adult is about making decisions and then sticking to them. Joining the AFU for me is the proof of these views. It's about the ability to make a choice. And I made it for myself.

For eight years I never went to the Donetsk region. For me, it was home as long as Ukraine was there. I will go back there when it is under Ukrainian control again. Until then I don't want to.

When I first went to a Silpo supermarket in Kyiv, I started weeping. Tears were pouring down my face and my heart was crushing because I realised that people in Kherson didn't have that, that had been taken away from them.

The shelling wouldn't stop: when I went outside, my ears popped. The temperature was -8°C... The military guy called me again to ask where to pick us up, and then the shooting started on the other end of the line. I could hear him swearing, and the connection went off…

It was the morning of February 24. And when my wife got a wake-up call from her father, I just felt déjà vu — all the same for the second time. 

 I don't know how to describe this feeling —  is when they say that the war started in February 2022... We all need to realize that the war has been going on for eight years and it is the case for the whole country.

At first, we would hear the sounds from afar, but then the aviation started flying right above us. We listened carefully to figure out which way a fighter jet was heading and counted: "The first explosion - not here, that's cool.” You stand still and wait, and then: "The second one... run!"

I was 10 when the war started. In the spring of 2014, strange people started appearing in my hometown and in the region. They started promoting the idea of independence from Kyiv. They said that there had been a military coup there and that we would face the same danger of being killed for speaking Russian.

In the chat of the Union of the Owners of Multiple Houses it was written that orcs were getting into the fourth entrance, trying to tear down the door. I thought then: “Well, that’s it, they’re coming after me!” I dressed up and waited. It turned out that the russians got a person from the fifth floor. At that time it reminded me of the events of 1933 that Remarque described: when Germans from the Gestapo arrested people in their apartments.

A piece of my soul and heart stayed in Mariupol. And it hurts like a wound because Mariupol is the city of my dreams. And I can't believe that this nightmare happened to it.

My grandfather sat in the yard confused and silent, and my husband walked around completely stunned. And I didn't know what to do next, I couldn't speak to anyone because of the poor connection. There was a dead silence around me after the shelling.

I remember going outside after that bombing, and then I felt that the war had begun: an empty city, damaged houses, broken glass, burnt-out cars. You started to understand your fear and it was the fear of war.

Yes, we are Roma. But the passport speaks for itself. Why am I not a Ukrainian, if I was born in Kharkiv? If I lived and studied in Kharkiv, I know the laws, I love my city, and I live by it. I want to help my country, I represent the same people as all Ukrainians, I've also experienced the same stress, people I know and care for with all my heart are dying too.

I realized that my wife is almost at the epicentre of the explosions. I rushed to her. At that point, the Grad multiple rocket launcher systems started firing. Tree branches were flying over us. Shells exploded some 50-60 meters away. Shell-shocked by the explosions, birds fall to the ground. I knew then that I was running towards my death.

It took us a while to adapt to life. The emotional state was a strange one. Work had kept us distracted from all the stress of the war, and we felt a lot of fatigue. And when we arrived and were able to exhale a bit, the stress came back like a spring. Everything that we experienced during the three weeks of volunteering came crashing down, and we could not do anything. Going to a store became incredibly difficult, and speaking to people  — even more so.

We have everything to make our city and our country better. Because we know how to think and how to do things. The difference is that the initiative comes from below, here it's us who's evolving, while in Crimea the initiative comes from above, from the state, making people passive.

"What is home?" is a question without an answer for me. I don't fully understand if I have one. Little by little I try to solve this mystery, then it gets confusing again. But at that time, in Donetsk, I realized that it was not my home.

 Dad got an injury while in Manhush, and he wasn't in the best condition. I think it happened when he was walking with a grocery bag: a missile hit somewhere behind him, he fell down, and when he got up, there was only the handle left of the bag.

I called my grandmother, and she was like, "Don't worry, soon Kharkiv will be freed and everything will be fine." Who will it be freed from, me?

Around March 1, the lights were out, and on March 3, the gas was cut off. We tried to evacuate, but we were turned back, we were told that there was fighting outside the city. We didn't even make it to any of the checkpoints, people were telling each other: "They won't let us out, they won't let us out.”

I was in tenth grade, and my classmates and I were already dreaming of how we would dance the graduation waltz in a year, imagining how we would celebrate the day, and even making a playlist already. And then everything suddenly came to an end because of the war.

In those days, Anya's mother would often say with tears in her eyes, "Thank you so much for bringing my daughter." Those were emotions that we will probably never experience again.

It is as if my internal matrix superimposes on both Kharkiv and Horlivka the image of what they were like before the war. That is, I continue to visualize them as normal, undamaged, and war-free. 

I have not come to terms with the fact that my house continues to be shelled. But I'm ready to go back to Izium. And it doesn't matter what it looks like. I'll be fine, spend a few years there, do something. The main thing is that it should be territory under the control of Ukraine. The way home for me will not be blocked by the IDP certificate.

Now I feel that the victory is ours, but I didn't feel that back in Donetsk. We finally found a home in the Kyiv region and we definitely don't want to start life all over again this time. This is my land, why the fuck should I go?

And now I'm writing a new song, already being put together. It's about Joseph, you know, that person from the Bible. If you read his story without knowing the end, it seems like that's the end of Joseph. Every stage —  there are four or five chapters —  you think, "That's a total shithole." But when you know what the ending is, you're like, "Oh, that's interesting!"

Since I have realized that I lost Mariupol, I don't miss Kharkiv. And I have also realized what roots mean. You can dislike the city where you were born, but the roots still give you their impulses. And you will never confuse what you have lost when you lose it.

It's like they took away what had always been mine and said, "That's it, you have no rights, keep out of it.” But I cannot just distance myself from Crimea: it is my birthplace, a part of my childhood, and of my life.

On that day, the city centre was bombed. "There's a fighter jet in the rearview mirror," he said to us. — If you hear any sound now, jump out of the car and get on the ground."

What struck most painfully was the feeling of being a refugee. You had a home, a hometown, and a life with achievements and accomplishments. And now you are a nobody. You run around social services asking for help because you have nowhere to live. I mean, we ride with our newborn son, and we know there's a chance we'll be spending the night in a field.

The decision to leave was a hard one for me because there were a lot of children in the bomb shelter, and a lot of people who were frightened. Patrick, as a psychologist dog and anti-stress dog, was the one who calmed them down. So when I took him away, I realized that I was depriving children who psychologically needed the help of this truly healing contact with an animal.

I carried 20 guinea pigs from Sloviansk to Kharkiv. There was no public transport then, the bridges were destroyed. My dad drove us to Barvinkove, and from there a shuttle bus went to Kharkiv. I took a plasma box, made shelves for the pigs and they sat there like sprats — there was no other option. Then they got out, and I had to catch them on the bus.

Always, especially when the siren goes off, I imagine a missile hitting my apartment: I see the furniture flying apart and how I get killed. I relive these moments constantly - I accept the fact that I'm going to die, and I feel better.
 

I felt that war brought to light the most valuable things because now every day matters greatly in terms of what you spend your time on and exactly what you devote your art to.