The families arrived at a small, two-room preschool at 1am, exhausted after the long drive from their homes in Cherkasy, 480km away. Afraid of the Russian invasion, they decided it was time to leave for the safer regions of western Ukraine, alongside tens of thousands of people.
The trip took a long time. The roads were congested, full of Ukrainians leaving in the same exodus. As they settled down to sleep for a few hours in beds made for four-year-olds, sirens began blaring from the neighboring administrative building, warning of an air raid.
The next morning, with snow falling on the patio, Karolina Tupitska, 11, and her younger sister, Albina, brushed their teeth, played with a puppy and set their spirits for another long day on the road. They were going to Poland with their mother Lyuba. “My grandparents and my dad stayed in Cherkasi,” Karolina said, saying she was sad she couldn’t bring her white hamster, Pearl.
In Ukraine, everyone who has the means to do so is on the road, displaced by a war that seemed unimaginable but has come. People are fleeing physical danger, of course — the artillery attacks that have already destroyed hospitals, squares and apartment buildings — but also the desperation of wartime conditions evident in food shortages, loss of work and lack of medicine.
More than 1 million Ukrainians have fled to neighboring countries in the past seven days, according to the UN. Another million are displaced within their country. Humanitarian organizations describe what is happening as one of the biggest humanitarian crises in recent memory. The European Union said on Thursday it would give temporary legal protection to Ukrainians to live and work in the bloc for up to three years. The US also said it will offer temporary protected status to Ukrainians.
Irina Boicharenko, 19, who also hails from Cherkasi, was sleeping in one of the preschool rooms with her family. The school’s walls were painted with Soviet-era comics: a wolf playing the accordion, a donkey as a balalaika and a bear wearing “vishivanka”, a traditional Ukrainian costume.
“I got in the car and started crying,” said Irina. “I started to cry because I realized: I’m leaving my country, fleeing the war. It’s a horrible feeling.”
The main westbound national highway, the E-50, is congested. The journey from Kiev to Lviv, which normally takes seven hours by car, is taking days. Cars must pass dozens of makeshift checkpoints with steel anti-tank barriers and concrete observation posts.
Parts of eastern and southern Ukraine are being emptied of their inhabitants. On Thursday, traffic was so stopped that people were having to relieve themselves in a ditch on the side of the road. The gas station shelves along the way were almost empty. Most families, like Irina’s, brought enough food from home to last them a few days.
But along the way there were also some encouraging signs. The Ukrainian flag — yellow to represent wheat, and blue to indicate the sky — was visible everywhere, in a display of solidarity and national pride that has gripped this country of 44 million people since Russia first invaded it in 2014. In overcrowded hotels, local families provided mattresses and blankets for travelers looking for sleeping spaces on the corridor floor.
On many streets and roads you can see billboards criticizing the Russians. A common message is an obscene phrase in Russian addressed to Russian soldiers. It’s a meme that started after Ukrainian soldiers on an island shouted the same curse at a Russian military ship. The soldiers were taken prisoner, but the incident, which was filmed, ended up representing the resilience and style with which many Ukrainians, including the president, have faced a war they did not want.
Elsewhere, road signs had been removed, following orders from city officials, in an attempt to confuse Russian invaders. One traveler, Anton, said he was driving his family from Kiev to the western town of Ternopil after spending five nights in a bomb shelter. Like other people interviewed for this story, Anton only wanted to give his first name, fearing for his safety. He said he was optimistic despite the difficulties, given the unity and strength that his country’s army has been demonstrating against the Russians.
Anton is not alone in believing in a Ukrainian victory. Simultaneously with the heavy flow of refugees towards the west, traffic was also heavy on the lanes towards the east, towards Kiev. According to a Facebook post by the Ukrainian border security agency, more than 50,000 Ukrainian citizens residing abroad have returned to the country to join the war effort.
At a hotel in Viitivtsi called the Swallow’s Nest, guests crowded into every available corner. A woman and her daughter slept in a second-floor lobby, under a piano. Outside, cars lined up on the side of the road. With the 8pm curfew approaching, its occupants were trying to see where they could sleep. The hotel’s owner, Larisa Mahlyovana, said that before the war the establishment was often used for wedding parties. Now, however, it is crowded with people seeking shelter in the freezing night. She is hosting them for free.
“At first people were sleeping on cardboard boxes, but we launched a cry for help, and within hours people were donating mattresses, pillows and blankets,” said Mahlyovana. “No one can remain indifferent.” For the woman sleeping under the piano, Natasha, it was the second time she had fled to the West since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014.
Natasha is 36 years old and originally came from Luhansk, a Russian separatist enclave in the east of the country. Her 7-year-old daughter “was born under bombs,” she said, after which she left the region for a suburb of Kiev. She got work as a seamstress and befriended another person who had fled the other breakaway territory, Donetsk. Now she’s on the run again.
“I already rebuilt my life once,” he said, as his daughter played with a candle.
A siren sounded, warning of an air strike, and everyone present descended a metal ladder into the icy basement. Holding her daughter in her arms, Natasha kissed her and told her everything would be fine. When she came out of the shelter, she said she was happy because this time, at least, the world is paying attention. “Thank God the whole world is on our side now,” she commented.
