My people
My people are killing. My people are dying. My people are watching.
Tied hands at the back. Brains on the ground. Bodies everywhere. Bucha is the new definition of the infinite suffering in this insane war.
One of the burned woman, could have been my mom.
One of the shot men, could have been my uncle.
One of the tortured bodies, could have been me.
In the same time, if my parents made different decisions, and I would have grown up in Russia, and not in Ukraine, it could have been the other way.
I could have become a torturer.
I could have become a rapist.
I could have become a killer.
Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians share a complicated, but common history. We eat the same food. Drink the same drinks. Listen to the same music. Fought in the same war. We all follow the same dumb tradition to watch “Irony of fate” every New Year, forty-seven years in a row.
When I see killed Ukrainians, I say my people. When I see dead Russian soldiers, I say my people. I am ethnic Russian, born in Ukraine, and I am watching as my people became fascists, who came to the land of my people, to exterminate their own people. Their own colleagues, friends, and family. Hard to watch, impossible to look away.
When this war is over, I will take a car and drive. I will visit destroyed cities. I will talk to the people who lost their loved ones. I will put flowers on their graves.
I will make sure that my kids will learn, what we failed. “Never again” will be burned into their mind, and the stories, regardless how painful they are, will be shared.
For now I will just do my part in stopping this war, and protecting Ukrainian people in what ever way I can.
Slava Ukraini.
