A couple of years before the armed aggression of muscovy in 2014, it once occurred to me that our generation is lucky: we do not know what war, death, and destruction are, because the horrors of previous world wars are in the distant past. Of course, local conflicts happen all the time, but they are far away and do not directly affect us. In modern times, it was very difficult to imagine such barbarism. Indeed, who could attack us? Peace, at least in our region, seemed to be a self-evident, unshakable, and logical stage of human development. Who needs wars if there is diplomacy?
More than 10 years have passed since then, and to be honest, we have forgotten what that peaceful time was like.
What it was like to wake up at home and first think about the list of things to do for the day, instead of reading the news to make sure that no one died from shelling overnight, or on the worst days to find out that someone did not survive the night…
What it is like when the number of contacts in your phone and friends in social networks increases, and not the other way around – there are more and more people you will never write to or call again…
What it is like when you can meet all your friends in a cafe and not visit them at the cemetery.
How it feels to look at old travel photos with nostalgia and a desire to somehow return there, and not with indescribable longing and regret, as with photos of Sievierodonetsk, Mariupol, Bakhmut and Crimea…
How it feels when your country is known in the world for its hospitality, singing and delicious cuisine, and not for war and refugees.
How it feels to be safe, having to carry a first aid kit everywhere.
What it feels like when 200 and 300 are just numbers, and not the lives and destinies of people.
What it feels like when you have to clean your clothes from wine stains, not from the blood of the wounded.
What it feels like to have strong nerves, not to flinch at the sound of thunder, or any sharp, loud sound in general…
What it feels like to teach your daughters to cook, not to take apart a machine gun and put together a turnstile.
What it feels like to say goodbye to people and know that you will definitely see them again, and not to say goodbye every time as if forever…
What it feels like to take photos of loved ones just as a memento, to catch a happy moment, and not because you are afraid it might be their last photo…
How it feels to have clear plans for the future and not to live for the moment because tomorrow may not come.
How it feels to greet people and wish them only happiness, health, love, success, and not, as everyone does these days, Victory, above all (that’s right, with a capital V), because without it, everything else loses its meaning… But it is this long-awaited, suffered, blood-spattered victory that can give us real, lasting peace.
Of course, it will not be a magical happy ending. We will still have to mourn all our dead, return prisoners, abductees and refugees, socialize the military, restore the physical and mental health of all the victims, convict all those responsible for war crimes and make muscovy pay reparations, rebuild our destroyed cities, towns, villages and economy, fight corruption and the imperfection of the state system, build a strong defense sector, join the EU and NATO, learn the lessons of history and do everything to ensure that “never again! “.
When all of this happens, only then will peaceful life truly come and we will be able to say with a clear conscience that everything was not in vain. And our fallen, who gave their lives in the struggle, will look at us from photographs, memorials, monuments, street and park names and remind us at what cost we won and gained peace.
Anastasiia Vinslavska, a medic with the 67th Brigade
The initiative is implemented within the framework of the project “Strengthening the capacity of the women’s network of volunteers in Lviv region” (#FemaleVolunteersLviv) with the technical support of UN Women Ukraine and funded by the UN Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund (WPHF).
The WPHF is a flexible and rapid funding instrument that supports quality interventions that increase the capacity of local women to prevent conflict, respond to crises and emergencies, and seize key peacebuilding opportunities.
* This publication has been prepared with the financial support of the United Nations Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund (WPHF), but the views and contents expressed herein are not necessarily those of the United Nations and are not officially endorsed or recognized by the United Nations.