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On February 24, Yulia Bond’s life was turned upside down when Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine.
The 36-year-old mother-of-two now lives in Caerphilly, having fled her home town of Marhanets in eastern Ukraine – just seven kilometres from what is now occupied by Russia.
Speaking to Caerphilly Observer, Yulia said: “Like most people in Ukraine, I was really unprepared for this war.
“It was in the media for months before it started. But, in Ukraine, people were joking about it – not many people really believed this would even be possible.”
After nearly five months of war, more than 17 million people, including Yulia, have been displaced – with between 12,000 and 28,000 civilians killed according to estimates by the Ukrainian government.
Before the invasion, Yulia sent her two children – 12-year-old Jessika and eight-year-old Roland – to stay with relatives in Caerphilly. However, Yulia chose to stay in Ukraine at the time.
“I spent the first month of the invasion in Ukraine. During this time, I was really sure that I’d just stay there until the end – but I realised that was not possible.
“Because I’ve got kids, I decided they needed their mother more than Ukraine would benefit from me.
“It was a really complicated decision. I really wasn’t sure if I should go or stay. It was really, really, tough.
“I felt terrible when I left Ukraine. I was sitting there on the Polish border and I was still thinking ‘maybe I should go back?’.
“When I crossed the border into Poland, I just sat down and cried. I thought maybe this was the wrong decision and I should just go back.”
After Russia invaded, Yulia stayed in Ukraine for a month before deciding to leave.
She said: “All I wanted was to be with my kids. I tried to leave four times. The first time, second time, and third – I couldn’t do it because the train was completely full. Only women with kids were allowed on and not all the kids could even get on the train, so I didn’t even try.
“On the fourth time, I was lucky. I was also lucky to survive because there were two trains that day from the nearest town. When I was on the border, I found out the other train was shot at by Russians.”
Yulia wanted to come to Caerphilly to be reunited with her children. She applied for a UK visa to get here, but due to uncertainty over how long it would take to receive the visa, she caught a bus from Poland to Portugal.
“I had one very small bag with three t-shirts and a few things that I decided to keep in case I never see my home again. So I just took the most valuable things, like our family photos from my grandmother and great grandmother – sentimental things.
“I didn’t have much space for clothes so I only took the three t-shirts. I came to Portugal and it was really hot – I came in winter clothes and boots. I was like this for three days until somebody donated clothes. It was a really tough experience.
“There were 55 people on the bus to Portugal and we travelled for three days.”
She continued: “People were really traumatised. We stopped somewhere in Germany for petrol and there was a plane flying overhead. People reacted badly and were hiding and crying.”
After arriving in Caerphilly in early April and reuniting with her children, Yulia realised just how much of an impact the war had had on them.
“They were really traumatised, even though they didn’t see war,” Yulia explained. “During the whole month I was in Ukraine, my son cried a lot and he asked me to leave.
“When I came to my son’s school here, his teacher told me that he was just talking about me the whole time. I then realised how much trauma my kids had actually been through – just knowing that I could be killed any time.
“They went through a lot as well during that month, even though they were here.”
Despite arriving safely in Wales, Yulia described the first month here as “really tough” and admitted she considered returning to Ukraine.
“Many times I would wake up and just go to kitchen saying ‘I’m going back’. I just felt terrible in many ways – and guilty.
“But my hosts were really understanding and are extremely generous, supportive and helpful.
“They’re really, really amazing,” Yulia added. “And really interesting as well, we have loads in common.
“I felt really bad in a way because I’ve always been self-sufficient and I had been living by myself since I was 16 – so to be dependent on somebody, it didn’t feel that good for me at all.
“I feel like normal now, I have just accepted it. But it was really hard to accept help. I felt like a burden, but then I realised people just wanted to help – they felt good about helping.”
Despite initial struggles settling away from home, Yulia said she is getting to know more people here and has started making friends.
Back home, Yulia was a social activist and the regional head of an environmental political party – but now she is running English classes for other Ukrainian refugees at Caerphilly Miners’ Centre.
As well as helping Ukrainians to learn English, Yulia is hoping the classes will help people make friends, share their experiences and help each other.
However, while Yulia is out of harm’s way with her children, her mother remains in Ukraine.
“I talk to my mother almost every day. I say ‘what’s the point in you dying there?’ Because I know this could happen.
“I know my town has been bombed in the last few days and that’s just the beginning. It’s just escalating.
“In my mind, I accept my town will probably be occupied.”
Another major concern Yulia has is the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which is near her home town but within the Russian occupied area.
The power station is the largest nuclear plant in Europe and one of the largest in the world – seven times larger than Chernobyl. Yulia warned that damage to the plant, which was captured by Russia during the Battle of Enerhodar in early March, could have environmental consequences felt across the globe.
The war in her country has also seen Yulia fall out with family in Russia.
Yulia was actually born to a Ukrainian family in the Russian city of St Petersburg during the days of the Soviet Union, and spent the first decade of her life living in the remote town of Pevek, in the far eastern reaches of Russia – more than 4,000 miles (or 6,500 kilometres) away from Marhanets.
Pevek is in fact nearer to Alaska and Japan than it is to Ukraine.
Yulia grew up speaking Russian as her first language, but later switched to Ukrainian upon returning home as a child.
She still has family living in Russia – but felt angered by their refusal to accept the reality of what was going on in Ukraine – instead parroting lines issued from the Kremlin’s propaganda machine.
During the days of the Soviet Union, many Ukrainians moved far and wide in search of work, with many relocating to places such as Siberia and Kazakhstan – so it is not uncommon for Ukrainians to have family in Russia and vice versa.
But, having been reunited with family in Wales, Yulia spoke of the “huge cultural differences” between Wales and Ukraine but added: “It feels to me like Welsh people understand Ukrainians more, so I feel like we have more in common than other countries.
“I was really amazed how kind and amazing the welcome for refugees is here.”
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