Last weekend marked two years since the official Russian war on Ukraine began, just as we were getting ready to fly back. I have only seen our staff and "kids" there over video chat since, although Garry has been back three times for visits and is busy getting ready to leave again in two weeks. Of course this marked ten years since the Russian army moved to take over Crimea and the eastern part of Ukraine, so most think that was the real start of the war.
Thursday morning I had a delightful conversation with almost four year old Angelina, who likes to swipe her mom's phone and call us on messenger. With the time difference this can happen in the middle of the night sometimes, but its fun to try to communicate with her. She always starts with "hello! " many times since it's one of the two or three English words she knows. Eventually she carried the phone into the kitchen, so I got to say hello to all the girls who live in our house, as she turned to all of them, before her mom hung up.
Yesterday one of the new girls in the house (she came in the summer of 2022) celebrated her birthday, Yulia is the one holding the doll, so I was able to get some photos from Oleg's facebook post. Valentina is holding baby Nazar, who was born in November. If you have visited our project, you will recognize Sasha and Leila.
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| That's Angelina on the right, Alona's and Nikolai's kids Sofia and Danil in the center between Oleg and Elena's boys |
It is strange looking at the house you used to live in, seeing all your plates and dishes and all our "kids" (or young adults) in the program, including the little ones I haven't seen since they were born in the last two years.
Garry called Max this morning to check on the building plans for when he's there, they hope to get started tomorrow by drilling holes for the corner poles for the dry cow shed they plan to build, and start pouring cement soon.
Garry leaves here the evening of March 13th and will be traveling from Warsaw by train with two missionary friends, his return flight is on April 6th, but he lands after midnight in Winnipeg, so that's officially the 7th. We'll have to have family Easter later like last year, since he will be in Ukraine March 31st. I haven't looked to see when Easter is in Ukraine this year, it always followed the Orthodox calendar. Officially Christmas was December 25th instead of January 6th this year, as part of the distancing Ukraine from Russia, so I'll have to check that out.
It's not until May this year, although public holidays are suspended due to the war, I read, so government offices remain open. I remember another year when it was the end of March here and May in the village. Last year I think it was only a week difference in dates.
