Respite. After the end of the siege of the capital, its citizens try to return to normality and overcome the terror of the massacres suffered just a few kilometers away
A week after the Ukrainian authorities proclaimed the liberation of the northern front in kyiv, the Ukrainian capital is slowly coming to life. She does it between the desire to move forward and the uncertainty generated by a possible new Russian offensive. The enemy has remained at the gates and after his withdrawal has left a trail of destruction and death. The area has also been littered with the corpses of its soldiers and tanks and armored vehicles converted into charred scrap metal. This time kyiv has been spared by only a few kilometers, but everyone has seen what happened in Irpin, Bucha or Borodianka. The absolute horror is a few minutes drive away.
Like every morning since February 24, Sergei takes his car and drives the fifty kilometers from his house to the central station in kyiv. This majestic building in the center of the capital has become since the outbreak of the war a kind of heart beating trains in which millions of people have escaped the fighting. The harder the bombs fell, the more people crowded onto the platforms in search of a saving convoy that would take them in the direction of the West, as far as possible from the front lines opened by Vladimir Putin. A very high percentage of the more than ten million people who have left their homes have done so thanks to the railway.
“As the days go by, what I see is that there are fewer people, although it is still difficult to find tickets on the daily international routes to Warsaw and Vienna,” explains Sergei, who has left his job in a suit and tie in an office at the administration of the national railway company to serve passengers every day from nine to four in an improvised information booth located at the main main entrance.
THE KEYS:
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Reactivation.
Vegetable markets and coffee stalls are back and it is already possible to get gasoline -
Uncertainty.
The curfew is maintained at nine o’clock and civilians who escape continue to arrive at their station
Civilians escape the war by train and journalists travel the other way by the same means. Also politicians, as was the case of the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrel, on his trip to meet the president, Volodímir Zelenski. It is important to arrive in kyiv outside of curfew because otherwise you have to spend the night at the station. Since martial law came into force, kyiv lives on a reduced schedule, from six in the morning to nine at night. At that moment the restriction to go out into the streets comes into force and what was known as the ‘city of light’ becomes the ‘city of darkness’.
When you leave the station there are no taxis waiting, but all you have to do is download applications like Uklon and one will arrive in a few minutes. Uber is the only one that has stopped operating. The rest works and even many Kievans who have lost their jobs have joined these companies in order to earn a few hryvnias.
The prices of products in supermarkets are maintained and are once again well stocked. Markets have also returned to the streets, where you can find fruit and vegetables from farmers in the kyiv ring.
two weeks in shock
The shock of becoming a city with war on the doorstep lasted two weeks. At that time the streets were emptied, all shops closed – except for some supermarkets and pharmacies – and getting gasoline was an impossible task. Fuel was in short supply and long queues had to be expected at the few open pumps. “In some the price shot up to 50 hryvnias, but fourteen days later it dropped to 33, four below its usual price. The Government removed taxes to make it cheaper and, for the moment, it is maintained, “says Pavel, a car mechanic converted into a temporary taxi driver due to the lack of work.
Arthur also spent two weeks in a bunker, but then decided to go out and reopen his cafeteria, located in a northern neighborhood, the area where the fighting is most heard. kyiv is the city of street stalls selling coffee for just under a euro. There are some that belong to large national chains and others, like Arthur’s, that are particularly cute, as their walls are lined with packages of coffee from all over the world.
He has adapted the pace of work to the curfew and has lost a second sales point that he had north of the city because it was damaged in one of the explosions, but he is “happy to recover activity and see lifelong customers who they have stayed in kyiv.” The machine does not stop working until four in the afternoon. As it is such a small stall, only two customers enter inside. The rest take their coffee outside. Here, as in the whole city, the drink is free for the volunteers who have taken up arms to defend the checkpoints.
The city council, with the omnipresent mayor, Vasily Klitchko, at the helm, has been taking steps to try to restore normality in a city that is still half empty and with non-essential businesses closed. The metro increases its services every day and is no longer used as a refuge, Primary and Secondary schools give distance classes to students and some of the checkpoints and barricades that were erected to stop the enemy advance are being removed.
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Eddie is an Australian news reporter with over 9 years in the industry and has published on Forbes and tech crunch.