On the morning of 24 February, Kovbasa, who hails from Dnipro, awoke to a message that Russia had invaded Ukraine, her home country. Early on, she says, “I was trying to tell my family that they needed to leave because none of them are military, none of them can help in any way possible. But I can imagine that it’s very difficult to leave when you already have the life that you have, to just flee.”

The days since have been a blur. She says she no longer recalls dates; instead she thinks in terms of “day 12, day 13 of war…” Yet around 1 March, when a cousin’s family got stuck in Mariupol, “with no water, no food, they decided no one wants to wait anymore, and it’s time to go somewhere else.”

Kovbasa was extremely worried that her father--who requires specific medication for his Parkinson’s--might not be able to get them if supplies were cut. “The main goal was to integrate him and my sister’s kids, aged five and eight.”

While her relatives spent two days travelling to the border, Kovbasa was planning on flying into Chișinău, Moldova’s capital, and then meet them at that border--that is, until flights to Moldova were cancelled and rerouted, as Moldova closed its air space. Instead, she travelled to Iasi, Romania, and from there tried seeking out a ride from someone who could get her to the Moldova-Ukraine border. She finally found “a nice volunteer. He’s originally from Moldova, and as a kid he went through a similar situation when Russia backed up their separatist forces in the territory of Moldova, so he could relate to what we were going through and kindly offered his help to get me to the border to evacuate my father and nephews.” 

She says she was overwhelmed with gratitude for the volunteers welcoming people at the border. “The custom workers were extremely compassionate and tried to process kids and sick people faster, all the time passing through the line waiting on the border,” she explains. “And, of course, the volunteers, sharing food and bringing warm clothes, to make sure people were alright.”

Trying to settle in

These days, in between being online or on the phone to help organise humanitarian aid--for example, via the local non-profit organisation --Kovbasa is trying to get her family settled into life in Luxembourg. The situation has been most challenging perhaps for her 69-year-old father, whom she says was a former rocket scientist in the USSR. “He really lived most of his life in the same place because, as you can imagine, rocket scientists were not allowed to travel outside of the USSR. So he was very much attached to his home. But he's doing okay,” she says.

“We agreed that I'm going to rent out a separate apartment for him because he prefers to keep up with his routine and said that it will be uncomfortable to stay in our house.”

Although Kovbasa is now looking after her nephews, her sister and sister’s husband decided to stay behind in Ukraine. During peaceful times, Kovbasa says, the couple owned a food distribution warehouse, servicing a variety of restaurants with ingredients and supplies.  “At the moment, they repurposed and are feeding refugees. Even during peaceful times they were also helping to feed socially vulnerable categories, so they couldn’t abandon them either.”

Kovbasa keeps in touch with her sister two to three times per day but has turned off most of extra social media, only keeping up-to-date with certain organisations or ministries which she feels she can trust. Her concerns now are getting critical medical and hygiene supplies and more to Ukrainians in and those leaving the country, but she has other concerns too. 

She recalls, for example, protesting in Kyiv in 2014, the year of the Russian annexation of Crimea, and wants to see Russians protesting in larger numbers--”I’m pretty sure that from 144m, they can find enough people to do the same in their country” and effect change.

But she is also worried about the narrative from the region, and how this is spilling into the EU. “Ukraine is not an end-goal,” she believes. “For many Ukrainians, we see this information spread, it’s like a flashback to what we’ve seen in our country, how the destabilisation of Ukraine started, and I guess this is some kind of new war tactic.”

She’s concerned there will be bigger rifts between communities within European countries as a result. “Ukraine is suffering immensely at this moment, it’s physical. But Europe is under attack to all this propaganda, destablisation,” she says. “It seems like the propaganda machine works too well… It’s a hybrid war; no matter what politicians are thinking at the moment, they are knee-deep in all of this, it’s just a matter of realising it.” 

Getting involved

Kovbasa has been spending plenty of time organising humanitarian assistance with other volunteers. They’ve also been spending time sorting supplies at the Hôpital Kirchberg.

“The hospital was really kind to offer us their facilities,” Kovbasa says, “but it’s during working hours, and it's difficult to find a lot of people in the community who can help during working hours.”

For those wanting to help, they can visit the back entrance of the hospital from 8am-6pm or reach out to , which is also accepting donations so they can send needed medical supplies, basic necessities and more to Ukraine.