![]() ![]() Not only is it my favorite book, I bought it at a very special moment of my life in 1997, so I guess it’s my most precious possession, when it comes to material objects. I take three books: two old Polish books I recently purchased at the Internet flea market, and the first edition of Yuri Andrukhovych’s novel Perversion. I take my daughter’s vyshyvanka (a Ukrainian folk embroidered shirt) for the same reason: I just hate to think anyone may touch it. ![]() ![]() I take my diary, which I gave up after I started to write a book last year. What I learn instantly is that you look differently at your belongings when your home may be destroyed or vandalized. We take all the documents, many toys, and almost all of S’s clothes with us. We send a couple of boxes with clothes by post to pick up in Lviv later. Another voice in my head tells me that we may never come back if the city is occupied or destroyed. I keep telling myself that we will come back in a week, covered with shame. ![]() We were all urged to prepare survival bags, or, if literally translated from Ukrainian, “an anxious backpack.” There were dozens of how-to articles everywhere. During the last month schools and kindergartens in Kyiv and Lviv (I’m not sure about the other cities) taught children what to do in case of an air raid. Her kindergarten, maybe? They were preparing children to go to a shelter, and she might have overheard the older kids. I’m astonished: she couldn’t have heard anything like that from me or Roman, as we didn’t discuss the situation in such a dramatic manner. “Who’s gonna kill us?” She doesn’t answer, just keeps selecting which things I should pack. A few days ago, the older daughter of my husband, a first-year student, left to join her mother who lives abroad.Īs I’m packing, S is running around, exclaiming “Let’s go to Lviv, to Lviv!” An unusual enthusiasm, which I wouldn’t notice if she didn’t also say: “I don’t want him to kill us all!” “Who?” I ask. My husband Roman suggested a week ago that S, our three-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and I stay with my parents in Lviv, but I refused, despite the American and British embassies having already relocated there (and my mother begging us to come). Yesterday, at home in Kyiv, we listened to Boris Johnson’s speech and immediately bought tickets to Lviv. ![]()
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