The day Vladimir Putin ordered his soldiers to enter the Ukraine, Arina had planned a dance class after work and then a party. Three days later, the English teacher was making Molotov cocktails in a park.
I found her crouched on the floor with dozens of other women, shredding pieces of Styrofoam like cheese and tearing sheets in rags to make homemade bottle bombs.
Scenes like these are unimaginable for most of Europe. Before, they were unthinkable here too.
But the city of Dnipro is now preparing to defend itself against the advancing Russian troops.
“No one thought that this would be how we would spend the weekend, but it seems to be the only important thing we can do now”, Arina told me, her face and hair splattered with white Styrofoam powder.
“It’s pretty scary. I think we don’t really realize what we’re doing; we just need to be doing something”, she says.
A few meters away, Elena and Yulia they said they had left their children with their grandparents to come help make these weapons.
“Sitting at home doing nothing would be even more terrifying,” says Elena, non-stop. not work on the pumps for a second.
She laughs that she is a good cook and that this process is not that different.
“I can’t believe this is happening to us, but what option have? No one consulted us,” says Elena.
Citizen initiative
Da the feeling that this whole city had sprung into action.
The steps of a nearby hall are littered with donated clothes, blankets, and buckwheat.
A torrent of people keep coming with more things – including gasoline, water and toiletries – as volunteers shout instructions on where to leave them.
The supplies are for Ukrainian fighters, as well as anyone forced to flee to Dnipro from another fighting site.
But it is also a reserve in case this strategic city is besieged.
This gigantic initiative was started by five women and a handful of social media posts.
Now, dozens of people are coordinating a huge relief effort that looks chaotic but isn’t.
There is a completely separate area for those who want to get a weapon and register to fight; that tail stretches far into the distance.
“The official organizations couldn’t keep up, so we created this center”, Katerina Leonova explains to me, with the phone detached from her ear for a brief moment.
” do you really think you can take over Ukraine and turn it into Russia? We are not afraid here. We are furious”, he says.
Constant flow
Dnipro has already felt the cost of this war.
The 400 military hospital beds are full and the staff now receives hundreds of wounded every day. They have installed cots in the corridors to deal with the flow of patients.
“I think we are at a critical moment. There is fighting everywhere”, the hospital spokesman, Sergei Bachinsky, tells me in an urgent voice.
“Before, we knew exactly where the fighting was taking place and we could prepare to receive the wounded even before they were evacuated. Now, the flow is constant“.
The military cannot use helicopters: Russian forces will shoot them down. By road, it takes much longer to get to urgent care.
But Sergei insists that morale is high, even among the injured.
“Even the men with burns or concussions want to return to their units to continue fighting”, he assures.
While we were talking, two buses left the hospital full of soldiers. The walking wounded were being moved to facilities in other parts of Ukraine, freeing up beds closer to the front lines.
There is no shortage of supplies for them. People bring bags of medicine, syringes and bandages to the hospital, non-stop. I saw a man handing over an old pair of crutches. Nothing was rejected.
Dnipro is managing. An entire city is gathering. But the pressure on everyone is increasing.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=3DcAg6VIlgw&list=PLLhUyPZ749cuGx7oIziYZtxLPG 838bLy&index=1&t