The train between the town of Przemysl, on the Polish-Ukrainian border, and the Austrian city of Graz is almost full. Several carriages are marked with the blue and yellow banner that indicates where the refugees fleeing the Russian invasion travel. Many suitcases and hastily closed bags invade the corridors, also populated by dogs and cats. Trains are inevitably late because most of their passengers are disoriented. But when it gets going, some breathe a sigh of relief. “Slava Ukraini!” a woman says goodbye. Glory to Ukraine!
Tiredness strikes when people relax. Soon, women and children fall exhausted. Tears run down some cheeks in silence, while the teenagers continue through their mobile phones -thanks to a SIM card provided free of charge by various companies- the destruction of their country. President Zelensky’s voice sounds in several of them. “I don’t know if I will ever be able to return to my country. I hope so,” says Oksana, a 21-year-old. “If they kill my boyfriend, I don’t think he’ll ever come back.” He, a computer scientist, has stayed to defend the country. “Not by choice, but by obligation,” she stresses.
In car 14, little Oleg is speechless. Look out the window in silence. His mother, in very basic English, asks if there will be any host NGOs in Krakow, his destination. You can rest easy, because the central station of this historic Polish city is abuzz with organizations that help refugees. It is an intermediate point from which these are distributed to different countries, including Spain.
At a counter, several volunteers ask passengers where they want to go and search a list for the phone number they can call: there is free transportation to Barcelona, Lisbon, Berlin and even Dublin. But not everyone needs it: Maria enjoyed a comfortable life in the Ukraine and has bought plane tickets to fly to Amsterdam with her mother and her son. As soon as she arrives, she opens the Uber application and asks for a car to go to the airport. “This can happen to anyone. Also to you », she points out. It is not a reproach, just a comment with which she reminds that Ukraine is also Europe.
Interestingly, more than 200 kilometers from the border, in Krakow, the chaos is more evident than in Przemysl. There are people sleeping on mats because the rooms set aside for refugees to rest are overflowing. Cáritas has erected several tents in the station square and there World Food Kitchen, the NGO of Spanish chef José Andrés, offers thousands of meals daily. Police officers constantly patrol to avoid brawls and help those who need it. “Some women lose sight of their children and become very nervous, but there have been no serious incidents,” says an agent. Quite an achievement considering that two million refugees have already entered Poland.
burgers for everyone
Without a doubt, food is not lacking. In addition to the best-known NGOs, volunteers like the Irishman Declan Flynn have traveled to Krakow to lend a hand. He buys hamburgers and fries at the station’s McDonald’s and distributes them for free to the refugees. It may not be the healthiest food, but kids and teens scramble for one and a whole cart only lasts a few minutes. “With the donations I have received in Ireland, I have already distributed more than 500 meals,” he says.
Not far from the station, in the main square of the city’s delightful old quarter, a large group of Poles demonstrate to demand “that NATO impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine.” With megaphone in hand, the demonstrators spoke in Polish, but also in English. “We want to tell tourists that we must stop this massacre by putting pressure on our governments,” invokes the one who has the singing voice. Some distance away, American soldiers stationed in Poland look curiously at the scene as a young man climbs the central monument with a Ukrainian flag. “In Poland we have suffered from fascism and communism. We must not allow history to repeat itself, ”says the one with the megaphone.
The whole of Krakow has been decked out in blue and yellow. Even Uber offers its services with a bonus that will go to refugees. And, on the street, some collect donations “for the Ukrainian army.” They are not the only ones: members of some Christian movement walk the refugee trains distributing psalms in Ukrainian. “Let yourselves be embraced by the Lord,” says a woman in English as a colleague translates her words to the new arrivals from the war.
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