Fleeing The War

Hi, my name is Igor and I am a fourteen-year-old Ukranian refugee. I am fleeing from my country
because a massive war has erupted between Ukraine and Russia. And now, my mom Antonina, my sister
Anichka and I are leaving the country because there is nowhere we can safely live anymore. Sadly, we
had to leave my dad Antin behind, because he had to stay and fight in the war. I still remember the last
thing he said to me before we left “Go Igor, you must become the man of the house now. Your name
means that you are under the protection of God, so let us hope he will protect you and our family. I will
be back, I promise.”

The war had started when Putin the Russian President had realized how close we were to joining Nato
(North Atlantic Treaty Organization). There are a lot of major powers in this alliance and to Putin it
would be like some of his biggest enemies were at his front door. So, Putin had planted a lot of Russian
troops at our border claiming it was only an exercise so that no other countries would intervene and
then suddenly, he attacked. He at once took Chernobyl, and then launched a massive airstrike all over
Ukraine. I remember hearing the sirens suddenly just start blaring that ear-piercing noise. My class had
been having lunch when it started, and we all ran inside and hid under the tables. My friend Kriystiyan’s
house had been blown to bits but luckily no one had been inside, a girl from the class above me had not
been so lucky and I remember seeing her just standing there emotionless looking at her dead mother’s
corpse.

Russia invaded on the twenty fourth of February and it is now the twenty first of March and our Country
has still received no military support from any other countries. We left Ukraine on the sixteenth of
March and we only just reached Poland yesterday. My feet have big, red blisters on them and I am
covered head to foot in cuts, bruises, and muck. My poor sister Anichka had fallen on the first day of
walking and had twisted her ankle. We had finally reached Poland and the first thing I did was charge my
phone and see if there was any news on the war and I had prayed that my dad’s name would not be on
the list of the dead that I had just seen.

The walk from Kiev to a small town on the border of Poland and Ukraine called Mendyka. It had taken us
four long tiring days to get there and I remember the night before we left thinking of what to bring, I had
brought my phone because I could use google maps and keep an eye on the news, I brought three
changes of clothes, my binoculars, and my hiking boots that I had gotten from my dad as a present last
year. For, the first day it was mostly chaos as thousands and thousands of people are fleeing Ukraine
every day. We had walked for six hours but then Anichka had twisted her ankle and we had a break of
some water, a banana, and a chicken sandwich. After walking for about another four hours we decided
to stop for the day and get some well-needed shut-eye. The next morning, I felt as if I had broken a
million different bones all over my body, everything ached and I had no idea how I managed to keep
going, but I did. We had another problem though, Anichka’s ankle had swollen three times its normal
size and she could not put any weight on it.

By the end of day 3 Anichka was half dead on her feet, and mom and I weren’t doing much better.
Altogether, we had walked for about thirty-six hours (about one and a half days) at this point and we still
had about another ten hours of walking to do. My phone had run out of charge after day two and I had
been dying to check the news and see what was happening in the war. We had found a refugee camp
and we met a couple of our friends there, we exchanged stories, had some food, charged up our phones
and headed off once again. Day four came around with a bang when we realized that someone had
taken all our food and water while we were sleeping, funnily enough they had left our phones behind.
Maybe they had their own phones with them, but still they could have sold our phones when they got to
Poland for some money. I guess, food and water were just more valuable to them.

We were water-deprived, hungry, and just wanted to fall over and get some sleep. When we finally
reached the Polish border, we realized that it was going to be a lot harder to settle in than we thought,
for one, only a small few of the polish spoke Ukrainian, we spoke no Polish and we had little to no
money.

It is now the present day and it doesn’t look particularly good for our fresh start at life, but luckily
enough there was a refugee camp for us to stay the night at and have the food and water that we really
needed. It’s day five and I just played a game of football with a couple of other refugees, Anichka made
a couple of friends and they played a game of hide and seek around the campus. One of my friends who
we had met at the other had refugee camp had died on the journey, I got the news two hours ago and I
am still numb with shock, I just can’t believe Andriy is gone, he was always the bravest of us and it made
sense that his name meant “warrior”, he always seemed so invincible but now that he’s dead I finally
realize what war is really like, war is like throwing a stone at a glass house, the glass hits everyone.

It has been three months since we moved to Poland and we managed to get a good deal for a small
apartment we could just about afford. It is summer so we don’t have to go to school, because of this me
and Anichka are doing anything we can to help mom, because I'm fourteen I managed to get a job as a
shop assistant, but since Anichka is only ten she works around the house doing all the cleaning, cooking
and washing. My mom has to work in two jobs to get the money we need for food and clothes. First, she
works as a nurse in St. John Paul II’s Hospital and then she has to work during the night as a cleaner in
the local primary school. I earn a bit of money as a shop assistant but not enough to really help our
family.

I have made a lot of friends since going to school, because a scaringly lot of the kids in my year are
Ukranian refugees. Yesterday my mom somehow convinced me to go to my friend's birthday party, not
that I didn’t want to go of course it’s just that I thought it would be better off if I worked an extra shift at
the shop. People are saying the war is going to go on for months to come but I really hope not because
the longer the war goes on the higher chance there is of my dad getting killed. Today I saw a scary article
in the newspaper, it said that in Kiev were the Ukrainian soldiers have been fighting off the Russians for
the past month there has been a massive outbreak of Malaria in the Ukranian trenches that my dad
happened to be fighting in. One of my friend’s dads had gotten the disease and had luckily survived but
had been sent away from the war as he was too sick to fight. He is due to arrive here in about six days. I
kind of want my dad to get Malaria because then they will hopefully send him back to us, but on the
other hand, I really don’t want to him get sick and maybe die.

It has been two weeks since the Malaria outbreak in the trenches in Kiev and guess what? My dad got
Malaria but he recovered and he’s finally coming back to us! He is going to be here tomorrow. I couldn’t
sleep last night because I was so excited. I’ve been pacing around the entrance of the refugee camp for
the past hour, and I don’t understand why he isn’t here yet. What if the Malaria affected him worse than
we thought and he’s died on the way? No, I can’t think like that, it will only make things worse. Igor,
come inside, he’ll be here soon but you pacing around like that won’t speed things up, all it’s doing is
annoying me. I headed towards our apartment when I heard “Igor” I spun around to see a bearded
skinny man walking towards me, “Dad”? I whispered in disbelief. I broke into a run, “Dad” I shouted, as I
jumped into his embrace, mom and Anichka heard me and came rushing out to join in in the family hug.
We were finally a family again. The End.