#here go my 10 hryvnias

[aif0s-w]

Yet another portion of “not all russians”

https://twitter.com/banderivkaz/status/1541348608116662272?s=21&t=Pi_cRSxHWbYkyT7p8ONRJQ

#I’ll stop posting these once people stop telling me about not all russians are guilty #here go my 10 hryvnias #ukraine #war

[qocsuing]

First aid kits for the military

In recent weeks, the number of calls and requests from the military to UA First Aid has increased several times. All from Bakhmut and surrounding areas.To get more news about nano zeolite hemostatic combat gauze, you can visit rusuntacmed.com official website.

This is written by facebook volunteer Les Yakymchuk informs Censor. NO.

“The enemy is throwing everything they have and is suffering heavy losses. Unfortunately, our losses are also very high. The pressure on the defenders is enormous. The need for IFAK first-aid kits has become very urgent again,” he writes.

According to him, IFAK is a combat medical kit of the American standard, which includes the most important things for saving a soldier’s life: tourniquet, bandage, hemostatic, occlusive sticker, nasopharyngeal tube and others. Unfortunately, it is impossible to buy these ingredients in Ukrainian pharmacies. “Our organization buys them from different parts of the world and packs them into summaries and sends them to the defenders. Each such first-aid kit costs from $ 70 per piece at cost price. Recently, for my birthday, I opened a collection for 100 of these IFAKs, but I will be honest, the requests that come in to us, much larger. It is very difficult for me to communicate with the military now, who are asking for these first-aid kits at any price, because they have to go to war tomorrow (!) but the first-aid kits either burned or were used. Community, we do not charge such “We must do something together,” he notes.

Therefore, Yakymchuk calls to mobilize to support the front and save the lives of those who save us from the enemy every day. Our boys and girls are on the defensive, which means that lead of various kinds is poured on them every day, which hurts in one way or another! When injured, in case of massive bleeding, a person dies in 2 minutes (this is not a metaphor, it’s literally 2 minutes) We need tourniquets, we need bandages and hemostatics, we need occlusive stickers and other components. We ask for your help, let’s think together where to find money on these IFAKs, maybe through one handshake with you, we will be able to reach out to benefactors, private companies or foundations that will help close the requests of the fighters, if not with money, then with the constituents themselves. Do not ask “why do we still have a problem with this? where is the state?!”. Now you and I are the state!” – remarked the volunteer.

“Donate and spread information about our fees. Every 10 hryvnias in the total amount will close the request and save lives! In turn, we at UA FirstAid undertake to quickly and qualitatively collect what is needed and deliver it to the front lines. I know that we have been for a year (! ) we will contribute and it is exhausting. But always remember, some have been sitting in the trenches for a year, driving under fire, clearing roadblocks, saving human lives! The darkest night, before the dawn. We will pull it out, but we have to do it together. We are here in the rear , they are in hell,” the volunteer summarizes.

[thewidowsghost]

Fox - Chapter 21

Previously on Fox:

"We need you two to escort a nuclear engineer out of Iran. It will need to be an undercover mission. Leave the Quinjet about a hundred miles from the facility, and drive the engineer back to the Quinjet," (Y/n) nods. "You need to get there as soon as possible, but tonight if you can," Hill says. "Try to have him here by Sunday."

"Yes, ma'am," Natasha and (Y/n) say in unison, standing up.

"Good luck," Hill says, nodding to dismiss the two women.

With a nod from (Y/n), her and Natasha run back outside to their Quinjet and pull it into the air.

3rd Person POV

That night, (Y/n) and Natasha land the Quinjet in Odessa and get a car before starting to drive to the facility in Iran.

"If we pull an all nighter, we could be ten minutes from the facility by 7:30," (Y/n) says. "It doesn't open until 10:00, maybe we could get breakfast," (Y/n) offers.

"As long as we get there in time to get the engineer out in time," Natasha says and (Y/n) nods.

"Of course," (Y/n) answers. "I'll take the first shift, then I'll wake you when I'm ready to sleep. That good?" she asks.

"Okay," Natasha agrees.

"I'm going to get some coffee first," (Y/n) glances over at Natasha, a smile on her face. "To, you know, fuel that addiction." Natasha rolls her eyes and smiles.

"Of course," she says and (Y/n) pulls over at a coffee shop.

"You want anything?" (Y/n) asks. "Pumpkin spice is in season now," she offers.

"Sure," Natasha says and (Y/n) smiles. (Y/n) pulls her wallet out of the middle console of the car and opens the door.

"See you in a minute," (Y/n) says, jumping out of the car and walking into the coffee shop.

(Y/n) walks in and up to the counter. "Могу я пол��чить две большие латте из тыквенных специй, пожалуйста?" Can I get two large pumpkin spice lattes, please?  (Y/n) asks the women at the counter.

The women smiles, "Да, мэм," Yes, ma'am, the women answers. She bustles around behind the counter and after a minute, she sets two large coffees on the counter.

(Y/n) hands the women 271 Ukrainian Hryvnia, "Здесь, сохранить изменения." Here, keep the change, the women smiles and nods.

"Спасибо," Thank you, the women says, and (Y/n) nods.

"нет проблем," No problem, (Y/n) picks up the coffees and walks out the door to the car. Natasha rolls down the window and (Y/n) hands the redhead one of the lattes.

(Y/n) gets in the car, setting her cup in the cup holder. "That women was surprisingly nice," (Y/n) says, backing the car out of the parking lot and continuing on the road. Natasha sends her a strange look as she takes a sip of her coffee.

"Why's that?" Natasha asks.

"She understood my awful Russian," (Y/n) says and Natasha looks at her again.

"You speak Russian?" Natasha asks interestingly.

"Я могу говорить кое-что обо всем на самом деле. Испанский, французский, немецкий, латинский, китайский, португальский, польский, итальянский, немного греческий.," I can speak some of everything really. Spanish, French, German, Latin, Chinese, Portuguese, Polish, Italian, some Greek. (Y/n) says and Natasha looks over at her, impressed.

"I'm impressed Stark," Natasha says and (Y/n) rolls her eyes.

"What can you speak Agent Romanoff?" (Y/n) asks, glancing over at the redhead.

"French, Russian and Latin," Natasha answers. "Not as much as you, but I could learn. How do you keep that much information in that brain of yours?" Natasha asks, then adds teasingly, "Doesn't seem too big."

"Haha, very funny," (Y/n) answers. "I have a photographic memory, so I remember just about everything, from anytime." Natasha suddenly looks guilty, "What?" (Y/n) asks, concern evident in her voice.

"You remember me shooting you?" Natasha asks softly.

"Nat, it wasn't that long ago, and I'm fine," (Y/n) answers, taking a sip of her latte. "If you're really that concerned," (Y/n) pulls her shirt up and with one hand, points to where the bullet had struck her, just above the scar from the spear in Budapest. "See, nothing there, except the stupid spear scar," (Y/n) says, dropping her shirt. "Get some sleep, Nat. I'll wake you when I'm ready to switch out."

"Okay (Y/n)," Natasha says softly and (Y/n) summons a blanket out of nowhere and Natasha relaxes underneath it.

(Y/n) drives all night, careful not to wake the former assassin. She knew that if it came to a fight, she would need Natasha's skills.

Around 7:30, Natasha wakes up, seeing that (Y/n) is still driving. She sits up, and annoyed look on her face.

"(Y/n) Stark!" Natasha yells and (Y/n) turns to her. "Why didn't you wake me up?" she asks.

"One, you seemed tired, two, I sleep to much, three, I had coffee, four, I figured if something led to fight, you may as well be well rested," (Y/n) says, and Natasha scowls at her.

"I hate you," Natasha mutters and (Y/n) raises and eyebrow at her.

"Yeah, love you too, sweetheart," (Y/n) teases and Natasha raises and eyebrow at her. "Hate me enough that you don't want breakfast?" (Y/n) asks.

"No," Natasha mutters.

"Thought so," (Y/n) smiles pulling into a parking lot in front of a restaurant.

"I still don't like you," Natasha says as the two get out of the car.

(Y/n) sighs and rolls her eyes. The two walk over to the door, and (Y/n) opens it for Natasha.

"Thanks," Natasha says, walking in.

"Привет дамы, сколько?" Hello ladies, how many? A host asks.

"Два, пожалуйста," Two please, (Y/n) answers in Russian.

"Ладно, следуй за мной," Okay, follow me, the man says, picking up two menus and leading the way to a booth. Natasha and (Y/n) sit down. "Американцы?" Americans?  the man asks and (Y/n) nods. "I do speak English if that helps," the host says in a heavy Russian accent. "What can I get you ladies to drink?" the man asks, pulling out a notepad.

"I'll take -" (Y/n) begins, but Natasha cuts her off.

"Two coffees, please," Natasha says and the man sends the two a knowing look before walking away.

"Romanoff, you know me so well," (Y/n) says, smiling at Natasha, but the redhead frowns back.

"Doesn't mean I hate you any less," Natasha says and (Y/n) sighs.

"I'm never going to win you back, am I?" (Y/n) asks sadly.

"Nope," Natasha says and (Y/n) leans back against the back of the booth, and crosses her arms.

"Here you ladies go," the host says, setting down the two coffees. "Now, what can I get the two of you?" he asks in his heavy Russian accent.

"I'll take the pancakes," (Y/n) says uncrossing her arms and sitting up and Natasha nods.

"Same," Natasha says and the man nods, walking over to the kitchen and relaying the orders of pancakes in Russian.

(Y/n) leans back, recrossing her arms, her biceps flexing as she does so. "So, I guess we're not talking anymore?" (Y/n) asks, looking at Natasha. "This might make this mission slightly awkward."

Natasha doesn't answer and that seems to be (Y/n)'s answer. After a couple of minutes, the man brings out the pancakes and (Y/n) smiles.

"Thank you, sir," (Y/n) says and the man nods.

The two eat their pancakes in an uncomfortable silence. After about an hour and a half, the two pay the man, leaving a generous tip, and walk silently out to the car. (Y/n) hops into the driver's seat and finish the drive to the facility.

"We've got about fifteen minutes to kill, so..." (Y/n) trails off, a hurt look in her eyes when Natasha doesn't answer. "I guess I'll go scout the perimeter before we get the engineer out of here," Natasha nods and (Y/n) gets out of the car.

Natasha watches (Y/n) as the women walks behind the building. (Y/n) climbs up the back of the building, making sure to keep out of sight as she moves towards the edge of the building, senses on high alert. She reaches the edge wall, making sure no one suspicious was around. After checking all around, (Y/n) stands up nodding to Natasha who was looking up at her, then drops down from the roof, landing in a crouch on the ground, about a hundred feet below.

(Y/n) walks back over to the driver side door and opens it, getting in the car. "I couldn't sense anyone around, but I feel that there was a reason they chose the two of us to escort the nuclear engineer out of here. We should be on alert when getting the engineer out of here," Natasha nods in agreement. "You drive, I'll keep watch out the back window?" (Y/n) offers and Natasha nods. "Good," (Y/n) answers. "From what I remember from the file, the engineer is always the first one here. His name is Alistair Fitz," Natasha nods. "I guess if your not going to talk, I'll wait outside." (Y/n) gets out of the car and leans up against the back of the car.

A few minutes later, a car drives up and parks outside the facility. (Y/n) nods to Natasha and walks over to the car, standing about ten feet away. She waits until the man exits his car to walk up to him.

"You must be my escort," the man says turning to (Y/n). The man has curly blondish-brown hair, blue eyes, and is about six feet tall. "I was told that there were two women here to pick me up. Where's the other?" he asks.

"She's in the car," (Y/n) says, pointing to the car.

"I suggest we get moving now," the man says and (Y/n) nods.

"Sorry, sir," (Y/n) says. "Is there anything you need me to grab?"

"I just have a suitcase in the back, if you wouldn't mind," he says and (Y/n) nods.

"Go ahead and tell my partner to get out of your seat and into the driver's seat," (Y/n) says and Fitz laughs before making his way over to the car. He says a few words to Natasha and the redhead moves over to the driver's seat, and Fitz moves into the passenger. (Y/n) grabs Fitz's suitcase and puts in in the truck before getting in the back seat.

"Natasha, drive," (Y/n) says, and Natasha backs out of the parking lot, (Y/n)'s senses on high alert for anything that seemed out of the ordinary.

A few hours later, the trio are just outside of Odessa when something awful happens. Someone shoots out the tires as Natasha is driving around a cliff side. (Y/n) makes a split second decision and punches through the passenger side window. Natasha grabs Fitz and dives through as (Y/n) burns a hole through the side of the door and jumps through it. The car goes over the edge of the cliff.

(Y/n) jumps to her feet, her senses on high alert. She looks around, and catches a flash of silver in the corner of her eye. (Y/n) whirls around and catches a metal fist, the force sending her back a few feet.

(Y/n) grabs the other fist and turns to see Natasha covering the engineer, "Nat, take him, and run," Natasha meets (Y/n)'s gaze and Natasha sees something that she wishes she could never see in those usually gentle (E/C) eyes - pure, unguarded terror. "Go!" she yells and Natasha reluctantly grabs the engineer's arm and begins to lead the engineer away.

(Y/n) focuses on the man that she was struggling to contain. He was tall, brown hair, blue eyes, but clearly trying to kill her, Natasha, and the engineer so she doesn't hesitate to light her hand clenched around the metal fist on fire.

Instead of reacting, the man takes his a leg and sweeps (Y/n)'s out from under her and pinning her to the hard asphalt underneath her. There is a strange metallic grinding  noise and (Y/n) rolls out of the way as the metal fist comes down and breaks the asphalt just where her head had been. (Y/n) rolls far enough away and jumps to her feet, her muscles tensed for a fight, keeping part of her mind fixed on Natasha and the engineer behind her.

The man stares at (Y/n) as she slowly moves closer, one hand on fire and the other crackling with lightning. Then, the man pulls out a gun, and (Y/n) stands where she is, remembering once again that Natasha and the engineer were behind her.

(Y/n) charges at the man and he fires two shots before (Y/n) reaches him, one in the right shoulder, and the other in her left hip, but (Y/n) doesn't break the sprint, landing a lightning surrounded fist on the mechanical arm which makes the arm freeze for a minute before landing a fire punch at his head but the man dodges, grabbing her right arm and pinning it behind her back, spinning her towards Natasha. (Y/n) meets Natasha's green gaze.

"Go! Leave me here! Finish the mission!" (Y/n) calls out, flipping onto the man's back, ripping her shoulder out of it's socket with a loud pop. (Y/n) uses her left arm and pulls the man into a choke hold, slowly pulling the man down to the ground, her right arm hanging uselessly at her side. The man pulls up his metal arm but (Y/n) uses a leg to pin the arm back. (Y/n) meets Natasha's gaze again and the redhead sees something else there, determination.

The man struggles underneath (Y/n)'s strength but (Y/n) locks her left arm in. The man seems to make one last desperate attempt to kill the engineer and fires a bullet, straight through Natasha's upper left hip, killing Fitz, who was cowering behind the former assassin.

Natasha, her green eyes widening, crosses her right arm across her body, clutching the bullet wound.

(Y/n), who's gaze had been fixed on Natasha, loosens her grip slightly, giving the metal armed man the chance he needed to grab (Y/n)'s right arm making her cry out in pain. He flips her over his shoulder, grabbing her left arm and kicking her in the back, sending her sprawling onto the ground.

Natasha slumps to the ground, her face pale, but she meets (Y/n)'s (E/C) gaze once again. (Y/n) kicks the man in the stomach and he stumbles before grabbing her left leg, snapping it in two, or rather, four, each of the main bones being snapped in half.

Seemingly satisfied, the man leaves the two women lying on the ground.

(Y/n) drags herself over to Natasha and Natasha, realizing what she was going to do, tries to drag herself away, but (Y/n) reaches her first.

(Y/n) grabs her ankle and Natasha screams at her to stop but (Y/n) just says, "Nat, I would give my life to save yours. You have so much more good to give this world. I did my part, now it's your turn," she just concentrates on healing Natasha's bullet wound.

It drains her and before the wound is completely healed, her head cracks against the pavement, black spots swimming in her eyes, she weakly snaps her fingers and a SHIELD COM appears in Natasha's hand. The only thing running through Natasha's mind is the hurt look (Y/n) had had on her face earlier, and it was tearing Natasha apart.

Word Count: 2624 words

Forget me saying that I'm no good at writing fight scenes, I think this one was pretty good. I mean, I think it was good. What do you guys think?

I also hope I wasn't making Nat seem helpless here. The whole premises was that (Y/N) was keeping the man at bay while Natasha got the engineer.

Side note, I didn't know who the engineer was so I made up a name, well not really. I took the name of a SHIELD engineer and searched up his dad.

Okay, Imma go now, see y'all in the next chapter!

Love,           Kaitlynn ❤😍

Imma tag peoples now: @confusinggemini612​, @gay-disaster826​, @thelastavenger-3000​, @osugahunnyicedtea​, @night-howl199​, @minicastle​, @happilyeverafterfantasybooks​, @billiebanner​, @me-and-sweatpants​, @scottjudah​, @scarlet-raccoon​, @whore-for-charlynch​, @nyx-aria, @night-howl199​, @brittanyrenne2004​, @juegamiri29​, @minicastle​, @peggycarter-steverogers​, @gay-disaster826​, @guitargodme, @avengers-avenging

#natasha romanoff #tony stark #steve rogers #thor odinson #clint barton #bruce banner #wanda maximoff #pietro maximoff #fem reader #skye #nick fury #maria hill #phil coulson #melinda may #jemma simmons #leo fitz #grant ward #daisy johnson #peter parker #pepper potts #happy hogan #black widow x reader #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanoff x femreader #natasha-romanoff-x-female-reader

[thetravellingvagrant]

Day 10- Lviv: In Which I Befriend A Scrotum

Today was my last day in Ukraine. By some miracle during my time here, I had managed to not get mowed down by Russian machine gun fire, though, it hadn't escaped my notice, I had also managed to not do a great many other things that I had actually wanted to, either. Today, I planned to remedy that. I roused myself from bed uncharacteristically early and- for once- being that I felt ruinously befuckled in neither my mind or guts, saw myself leaving my rubbish little apartment on the less pleasant side of noon. My first stop of the day was Lviv's natural history museum- there having been a conspicuous and gaping absence of nightmare fuel on this trip, thus far.

After a not insubstantial amount of difficulty finding the place, I was eventually waved inside by a stern man, paid my entrance fee of 20 hryvnia  (not a lot of money...) to an equally stern woman and was finally ready to bust the natural history seal of this trip wide open. I was genuinely excited; an emotion I thought I would never feel again after Belarus.

...I shouldn't have been, though. I think this was, by really quite some distance, the worst natural history museum I have ever been to in my life. It was comprised of just three living-room sized halls, sparsely decorated with not-very-many-at-all stuffed animals, jars of pickled fish and just the worst, most poorly written, poorly spelled, frankly vapid signage imaginable.

Fucking try.

still though, the big mantis was cool

Pictured: large boi

and there were some incredibly pleasing examples of bad taxidermy on show

Hwellp. I guess God’s dead, or whatever.

and so, despite paying one full hryvnia for each minute I had spent there, (again, not a lot of money), I still left the museum having enjoyed it thoroughly for what it was- i.e. total garbage. Oh well, on to my next destination: an internet cafe, to print my bus ticket for tomorrow.

The cafe, situated not far from the museum was an odd place; looking like and indeed actually being situated in someone's apartment, as it was. I stood outside for some minutes, wondering whether or not I should actually go in, as the last thing I wanted to do was accidentally just walk into some guys house and demand he print things for me, though eventually the little switch in my brain that makes me go “fuck it” flipped and I stepped inside to, thankfully, the right place.

Once in, the printing process was fast, painless and cheap. I was charged a single hryvnia (approximately 2.5p) and left triumphant, ticket in hand, five minutes later.  The entire experience being so streamlined, coupled with the...diminutive nature of the museum had meant that I had, at this point, chewed through two of my four plans for the day in under an hour and for under one pound.

I decided that, given the unexpected glut of free time I had found myself with, it may be prudent to spend some of it scoping out my bus stop for tomorrow. My ticket, rather unhelpfully, read simply “near pizzeria napoletana” and given that this was the single most expensive item I had bought during my time, here and that my bus was due to depart at seven in the morning, with no opportunity to catch another one until mid-afternoon the same day, I was- I feel- understandably anxious enough to make sure that I would be at least standing in vaguely the right place when it arrived.

The stance was some distance away from any of my intended stops for the day, though the walk to it would take me through another lovely (lvivly?) park, or two, at the very least, so I pushed on, regardless. It was in one of these Lvivly parks, that I was stopped by two young men; Max and...Dimitri, I think? They were students, or very pleasant scam artists selling greetings cards to generate money for some student initiative to raise the quality of living for young people in the city or something. Or just drugs. Either way, we became embroiled in conversation. We talked about the usual sort of things you'd imagine- where I was from, what I was doing in Lviv, why, god, why did you come here now? Doodoodoodoodoo and all that. It wasn't until they found out that I was from the UK, though that things got awkward.

“Ah, then you must be excited for Brexit” Max said, beaming.

I exhaled loudly through my nose and shot him a look as if to say “don't go there, girlfriend”, except whiter and less sassy than that.

“Oh?” he said, a quizzical look playing across his face “you don't like Brexit?”

I told him that I thought it was an undemocratic omnishambles of the highest order.

“Huh...” he mused. “I thought all British people were really into the idea.”

and there it was. The single most embarrassing moment of the trip, so far. Worse than forgetting to sign my passport or nearly shitting myself while skidding around ice; this was the moment at which my face was reddest (fortunately, it being so fucking cold, it was already a bit red and you couldn't tell). I politely informed Max that not everyone in the UK endorsed Brexit and in fact in Scotland, the vast majority of people opposed it and then, out of shame more than anything else, bought one of his stupid fucking greetings cards and bid him a good day. Enjoy the drugs. Bastard.

My search for the bus stop went poorly. I arrived at the compound and found...several pizzerias. None of which were named Napoletana. I walked around for a while, hoping to stumble upon a clue as to where buses might actually stop in this god-forsaken place, but found nothing. Being without phone internet due to the ludicrous price of data on Vodafone, when travelling outside of standard touristy countries, there was little I could do except leave and hope that the Google gods would answer my concerns, later.

My last stop of the day (the penultimate one, The Scientists' House- a big fancy house where all scientists used to live- being such a non event that it wasn't even really worth mentioning. I couldn't find it and gave up, basically.) was Lviv's only and indeed my very first visit to a cat-cafe. I took my seat in a small booth in the corner and before my face could even unfreeze enough to order food, I was set upon by a very lovely and seemingly also very, very old sphinx cat, whom I immediately named Ballbag Snugginz, owing to his affectionate nature and also because he looked like a scrotum. Ballbag hopped onto my table (perhaps slightly unsanitary, though I'll forgive it...), took one look at the scarf I had laid across my lap and said to himself “I'm 'avin' that, I am”. He made a bee-line for my groin and after some very awkward kneading, wound himself into a little fleshy coil

and fell soundly asleep. Looks like I was here for the long haul.

Gross.

I ordered some food (Salmon and spinach strudel; amazing) and a pot of tea (ginger and mint; fine) and merrily munched through it, Ballbag still softly purring in my lap, which is now the best sentence in this blog and pretty much always will be. Ordering salmon in a cat cafe was a good call, I think. While I was strictly forbidden from feeding any of feline residents, the stench of the fish nonetheless bought them to me, albeit in each case incredibly briefly once they realised I wasn't for sharing, in droves.

By the time I had scraped the last of my strudel from the plate and gulped down the final drops of tea, Lord Snugginz had, if anything, only entrenched himself further into my groin in an even tighter coil and was now lightly snore-purring. I ordered a chocolate lava cake so as to not need to get up and go, right away.

The cake, as with pretty much everything else about this cafe was excellent but all too soon, it was gone and so too, did I need to be. I lifted Ballbag away from me and plopped him down on the seat adjacent to myself. I'll be honest, it didn't feel very nice, neither emotionally, nor physically. If you've ever seen the music video for Aphex Twin's song “Rubber Johnny”- moving Ballbag Snugginz was the tactile version of that. Absolutely manky.

Not in the slightest happy with that arrangement at all, Ballbag very angrily clambered back on top of me and with a look, as if to say “oh no you betta don't” except whiter and less sassy than that and went back to sleep. For fucks sake, Ballbag.

I decided to awkwardly put my coat, scarf and gloves on around him, much to the amusement of the staff, before moving him off for the final time and quickly darting away, as he sat, bleary eyed and grumpy, wondering what the fuck had just happened. I ended up leaving the cafe something like a 75% tip, as first, it was very nice, second, I hoped it would all go to B. Snugginz and third, I just had so much Ukrainian cash left that I didn't even really know what to do with it.

Despite it being crazy cold and also very late- my experience in the cat cafe, all told, lasting...several hours more than I intended- I decided to hop back to that god-awful supermarket for what I hoped would be the last time, to chew through some of my cash. I reasoned that I could save myself some Zloty by buying ingredients for tomorrow's dinner here, in advance.

Let me tell you, I went mental; I bought enough food for three dinners; the most expensive sausage I could find, a huge block of cheese, crisps, wafers, the whole nine yards and was still somehow left with the equivalent of £9 in local currency, which I was just, at this point, unable to spend. I returned home to bibble, clean and get some sleep, atop my hoard of remaining hyryvnia, like some kind of tiny, very shit dragon. Tomorrow: Poland. Again.

#lviv #ukraine #cat #cats #cafe #cat cafe #natural history #museum #cold #dinner #sausage #sphinx cat #sphinx

[visitkiev-org]

KIEV UKRAINE

Hello everybody, or should i say Priviet! I just came back from an amazing trip to Kiev I would like to share some views of our trip with all of you and maybe give some advice for beginner travelers We flew with Ukrainian Airlines, landed in Boryspil Airport Right after changing our euro with Ukranian Hryvnia we jumped on the first bus that brings to the city center that is situated around 40 km away from the airport Since the first moment we fell in love with this city full of orthodox churches, stunning colours and golden domes Among the most famous religion buildings in whole Europe St. Sophia Cathedral, that is Unesco World Heritage and the golden domed one - St. Michale Monastery Maidan Nezalezhnosti is the main square of Kiev The column in the center of this square symbolizes independence of Ukraine. Many revolutions have taken place in this square, as well as many victories have been celebrated here Nowadays there are many festivals in the area and it is a point of meeting for hundreds of young people On hot summer days you can even find kids playing in the fountain In 2014 this square was an epicenter of a civil revolution against Ukrainian government Unfortunately, many people lost their life here Khreshchatyk street is the main street in the center Wherever you look all you will see is shops, coffee places and restaurants I highly recommend stopping there for a cup of coffee just to relax for a minute and fully enjoy the vibes of this place Every weekend this street is closed for traffic because of the stages for dancers and musicians, street artists The historical district of Podil is the most prestigious neighborhood in Kiev In the streets situated around you can find many trendy coffee places and little restaurants where you can stop and relax If you don’t plan to go to Pripyat during your visit in Ukraine I suggest you at least to visit the Chernobyl museum That is located next to the Kontraktova Ploshcha metro station You will get a lot of information about the nuclear disaster that happened in 1986 April My recommendation is to take the audio guide at the entrance Because all the descriptions in the museum are only in Ukraine and Russian 5 km away from the city center there is Park of Glory With a museum of the history of Ukraine during the Second World War And some open-air expositions of tanks, planes that were used during the WWII But the most interesting thing to see in the park is definitely The Motherland Monument measuring 102 m and dedicated to the victory of the Soviet Union fighting against Nazi Germany Even taking a metro in Kiev is an adventure full of adrenaline It will take you 5 minutes down the escalators to get 100 meters underground into the deepest metro in the world. It is truly a city full of unique emotions There are several parks where you can chill and enjoy the days of nice weather in open areas Landscape Alley is located near the ancient hill in Kiev center and it contains dozens of modern art statues and sculptures Obviously, we haven’t missed a chance to try Borscht national soup made of beetroot, potatoes and herbs and Kiev cutlet – chicken fillets rolled up with butter and breadcrumbs on the outside really delicious! Kiev is a city that I highly recommend visiting As you have already seen there are many things to do, see and visit But there is another thing that will attract you to visit this city Especially if you are a student or a young traveler on a budget it s the price! It is one of the cheapest cities in Europe Just think that the price of a metro ticket is around 0,16€ A pack of cigarettes around 1€ A bottle of beer in a supermarket around 0,50 € A meal of fast food, for example McMeal is around 2,3€ A dinner in a restaurant starting with appetizers, first plate, dessert and wine Is only 10€ per person I hope you liked the video if some of you is planning to go to visit Kiev and have some questions in your mind you can leave it in the comments down below and I will answer and help you! https://youtu.be/mPe3gjYSSAQ

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[newstfionline]

Waiting Out the War

By Yuliana Romanyshyn, Der Spiegel, Jan. 23, 2017

The war in eastern Ukraine has uprooted hundreds of thousands of people, forcing them to flee from the constant shelling. Many of them have since found shelter, but they are yearning to return to their old lives.

Over a dozen gray metal containers, interlaced with paths and power lines, sit on the outskirts of Kharkiv. The sound of children’s laughter rises from a playground in the fenced-in compound. “Transit Modular Housing Nadiya,” reads a sign on one of the containers. Nadiya means “hope” in Ukrainian.

At capacity, the facility provides temporary shelter to 400 internally displaced people (IDPs), all of whom escaped the conflict-ravaged region of Donbass and settled in Kharkiv, a city of 1.5 million citizens located just 200 kilometers from the front lines. They are among the at least 1.8 million people who, according to Ukraine’s Ministry of Social Affairs, were driven from their homes by the conflict in eastern Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea.

Some of the displaced applied for asylum in the European Union, fled abroad or moved to Russia. But a huge number of them sought shelter elsewhere in Ukraine, making the country’s domestic refugee crisis one of the largest seen in Europe since the Yugoslav wars from 1991 to 2001. According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, the number of internally displaced people in Ukraine places the country in the top 10 worldwide.

Olena Churina and her nine children are among those living at the “Hope” shelter. Her story is similar to those of many of her fellow Ukrainians: The family fled their home to escape the constant shelling, expecting to be back within weeks. But despite the Minsk II ceasefire deal, signed by Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany in February 2015, the shelling still hasn’t stopped--and the internally displaced have been away from their homes since summer 2014.

Churina fled from the village of Hlafirivka, located in the Luhansk Oblast some 60 kilometers from the border with Russia. Today, her hometown, as is the case for everyone living in the “Hope” shelter, is occupied by pro-Russian separatists. Moreover, her house is likely damaged beyond repair or looted--and Churina, with her husband having decided to return to Luhansk to live with his father, is raising her nine children, aged two to 19, all by herself.

When the conflict began in April 2014, she had hoped it wouldn’t be long before things quieted down again. But they didn’t. The constant explosions meant that soon, any loud noise was enough to terrify her children. After five months of waiting, she decided to leave.

“We had Ukrainian troops on one side and Russians on the other,” she recalls. “And we were in the middle.”

The family owned a three-room home in the village along with some land for farming, a garden and two cows. For the last year in the shelter, though, the family of 10 has been crammed into a space measuring just 24 square meters (260 square feet). “I ask them: ‘Do you want to go back?’” she says, referring to her children. “They tell me: ‘No, there is a war.’”

The “Hope” shelter in Kharkiv is one of seven similar projects financed by the German government and built by the German Society for International Cooperation (GIZ). In total, Berlin has invested 19 million euros in the hostels, which provide home to some 2,300 internally displaced persons in Ukraine.

“Hope” consists of 10 metal containers for apartment housing and three additional dormitory containers divided into dozens of cubicles. There are also several administration modules. All the buildings are supplied with water and electrical heating.

Churina’s family occupies one of the apartment containers, which is equipped with one bathroom, a tiny kitchen and a single room; at night, the 10-person family squeezes into seven bunk beds. Still, having hot water from the tap was a step up: Back in Hlafirivka they had no running water in the house at all.

The shelter compound is secured with a fence and equipped with round-the-clock surveillance cameras so she doesn’t have to worry about her children walking to the playground alone. The camp has three full-time staff members in addition to volunteers from the Red Cross and the UN Refugee Agency, who visit the shelter and entertain the children. A pediatrician visits the hostel twice a week and consultations are free of charge.

Initially, the housing was meant to be temporary, says Bärbel Schwaiger, head of development at GIZ. But the majority of those who have moved into the shelters have now been living there for well over a year and have nowhere else to go. They get married here, give birth and celebrate important events, all united by a similar wartime past. “When we began, the primary goal was to provide people with roofs over their heads for the coming winter,” Schwaiger recalls. In countries where weather conditions are less severe, housing shortages can often be resolved with the help of tents, she says. In Ukraine, though, mid- and long-term solutions should be implemented as soon as possible, she adds.

Once the shelters were completed, the local government and the State Emergency Service were responsible for allocating domestic refugees to the facility. Certain categories of people, however, were given preference. Thus, the majority of residents are single women, large families and people with disabilities. Being a mother of nine helped Churina get a spot.

The boarding isn’t entirely free, with adults required to pay 350 hryvnia (12 euros) and children 175 hryvnia (6 euros) per month to cover utilities. That money comes out of the 900 hryvnia (around 30 euros) she receives in government assistance for displaced persons in addition to further assistance she gets as a single mother of several children.

Although “Hope” inhabitants complain about excessive heat during summer, the absence of air conditioning, the tight space and the high utility fees, there are plenty of people who would like a spot in the modular housing. The manager of “Hope,” Svitlana Chuprina, says that around 1,500 IDPs are still waiting for a vacant room in Kharkiv.

Plus, it’s far better than being back home. Churina’s family had to suffer through frequent shelling before they left Hlafirivka and, at one point, the electricity was cut off and didn’t come back for three months. Much of the time, they were forced to take shelter in the cellar, only coming out to cook over an open fire in the yard or to feed the cows.

The cellar, though, was too small for the entire family. If some of her children were in the house when the shelling started, they would stay upstairs and hunker down under their beds. Down below, Churina would place her youngest child, a son she gave birth to after the war started, on a piece of cloth and shelter him with her body. “I would get claustrophobic. It was hard to breathe because of all of the children and I was afraid that the cellar might collapse and someone would have to dig us out,” she says.

The only thing Churina was able to bring with her when they finally fled Hlafirivka were six bags full of children’s clothing. “It’s so painful to see how you slowly accumulate your belongings and now there is nothing left--and no hope,” she says.

Not only is her house likely to be destroyed, but there’s no way back because of hostile relations with her neighbors. She was among 15 to 20 families who left, but her’s is the only one that hasn’t returned to the village. She has been branded a traitor as a result, she says. “But peace above our heads is more important. I want to see my kids laughing not crying.”

Here, her children take part in various activities led by volunteers, including English lessons, games, visits to the circus and other outings. The kids go to a local school and play with other IDPs. “It is much easier for the children to develop here, because rural life is rural life. Here, they can have a lot of fun,” she says. One of her daughters even went for a month to an American family, while the rest enjoy the local entertainment.

Churina says she is slowly beginning to overcome the terror she experienced in the war zone, as are her children, who make regular visits to psychologists. It helps, she adds, to not think about what they should do next. “We seize the day here.”

Ayshat Natarova, 56, a former resident of Stanytsya Luhanska, clearly recalls the shells flying over her house. She even still keeps a bomb fragment that ended up on the pillow of a bed after crashing through a window. “Luckily, no one was lying there at the time,” she says, showing the heavy shard of metal.

Her house had been freshly renovated just before it happened. She remembers the shells exploding in her yard with shrapnel piercing one side of her house. What wasn’t destroyed by the shelling was stolen by looters, she adds.

Before the war, Natarova had worked some 30 kilometers away in the city of Luhansk. Now, the journey that she made every day is impossible, with the front line running through her hometown. While Luhansk remains occupied, Stanytsya Luhanska has been tapped as the first city where heavy weaponry is to be withdrawn in accordance with the Minsk II ceasefire deal. Both Ukrainian forces and Kremlin-backed separatists are supposed to move back one kilometer from the front line, creating a two-kilometer-wide buffer zone in Stanytsya Luhanska.

Most inhabitants of the “Hope” shelter rely on government assistance, but Natarova doesn’t like sitting idly. Instead, she has found a job as a housekeeper in the shelter. “I am a mop chief,” she jokes. In Kharkiv, the family is slowly recovering from their traumatic war-zone experience. Natarova say that it was even an ordeal for her two-year-old granddaughter, even though she is too young to remember much. Initially, when the child heard a loud noise, she would immediately try to hide.

Now, though, children play together on the playground, produce colorful drawings and laugh--and that is the most important thing for Natarova. “I am satisfied with everything, because if children feel good, I feel good too.”

Mariya Bulda, now living some 300 kilometers from her native Donetsk, feels like she is in a foreign country. In Donetsk, she owned a four-room house on the outskirts of the city--but now, she and her husband share a tiny container with five other members of the family.

The part of town where the Bulda family lived was more than likely wiped out. Their house was close to the airport, which served as the Ukrainian army’s last Donetsk outpost until pro-Russian forces took it over completely in January 2015.

They weren’t able to take anything with them when they fled Donetsk. The elderly couple ran from their cellar during shelling and got on the closest bus heading for the bus station. Today, everything they are wearing was donated by locals.

Tears flow as the family recalls their former life. Yevhen and Mariya worked in a factory for 50 years and both survived World War II. Now, they dream of returning to their hometown, at least in time for their own funerals.

But their grandchildren are still able to distract them from their brooding as they run around and grab Yevhen’s hand to drag him with them to the playground. Seeing them, he smiles, and adds that in total, he has 10 great-grandchildren.

Unlike the others, Iryna Olyunina--from the town of Horlivka in Donetsk Oblast--lives in a 12-square-meter room in dormitory container. She shares a kitchen with 12 other families but has her own bathroom.

She fled Donbas on the last train, with 14 people crammed into a single compartment, although she didn’t realize at the time that train service would be cut off. A half-year later, she was living in the shelter. “It was pure happiness to get here, like heaven on earth,” she says.

Olyunina is one of the lucky ones. Her apartment on the outskirts of Horlivka has been untouched by the violence and relatives even stop by to water her plants. Olyunina, though, is afraid of returning to Donbas. “It is much quieter to live in a hostel. Back home, you had to turn up your television to drown out the shelling,” she says. Her hometown currently straddles the front lines.

In her new life, Olyunina is slowly realizing a dream of her youth--designing fashion. Ever since she was 20, she has wanted to start a fashion studio and create her own line of clothing. Recently, volunteers gave her a sewing machine and now, Olyunina works as a dressmaker at “Hope.”

“We live and are happy here, satisfied with everything,” she says.

#Ukraine #eastern Ukraine #internally displaced people