"A missile flew into my apartment on Monday, March 7th, after five in the morning," said Marina, a nice black-haired woman in a striped T-shirt, talking about the circumstances regarding her escape from her hometown, showing us a picture of a broken panel house on her tablet. This very heavy bombardment was the last straw for her. After agreement with her friend Anna, she threw some essentials and documents into the bag and together with Anna and Jersey the Labrador, they went to the station in Mykolaiv (Nikolayev in Russian), a city with a population of approximately 500,000 inhabitants located in the south of Ukraine near Odessa.
Anna also depicts the fateful morning when she heard gunshots barking in the streets. "Rat-tat-tat...," she showed the firing rate of bursts with her hands. "It was horrible..." She packed her papers, her laptop, grabbed her suitcase and rushed with Marina to the station, filled with mothers and children. A week-long journey followed: by train from Mykolayiv via Odessa to Chisinau and from there by bus to Bucharest, followed by Budapest and finally Prague. They took Jersey the black dog with them; they didn't find any friends to take her and they didn't want to leave her to strangers. She said she didn't bark on the way. Although, they forget her papers at home in all the confusion. They were pleasantly surprised that their dog was chipped, free of charge by a Czech veterinarian in Prague.
"I wanted so much to go back home in Chisinau, even with the bombs," cried Anna, a professional artist. A children's book with her illustrations was to be published in Ukraine this spring. "Half the pictures are done, but I don't think the will be any publication," complained Anna. "Thanks to the computer, I can paint from anywhere, but I'll take any other job," she added.
Both women are looking for a job in Prague, for example, in education (Marina lectures students on history and law in Mykolayiv), both women speak English. They also speak Russian, but now, they are ashamed to speak the language in public, they don't want people to think of them as Russians.
"You can't imagine how much the solidarity of the Czechs delights us. Our blue and yellow flags in the streets of Prague. We're very grateful for your warm welcome," they both said. They found their first refuge in the Prague hotel Marianeum, the training centre of Caritas Czech Republic. Anna gave one of her romantic illustrations to Caritas for an Easter card.
Marina, Anna and Jersey were granted asylum thanks to your donations.