In the romanian hotel, the wall facing me was decorated with antique guns and short swords, and I immediately broke out in a cold sweat.
It was as if I had gone back in time to a month in Ukraine, without day or night. Every day I was only able to move at noon, and the rest of the time I had to hide in the dark corner of the closet, listening to the sirens outside and the gunshots coming from nowhere.
During this month, the only thing that can soothe people's hearts a little is food, that is, people.
1. Gas and sour soup
I enjoyed drinking Ukrainian soup, and after arriving in Kiev in January, I went to another city in Ukraine, where I listened to local concerts and watched ballet.
In the restaurants of this country, whatever the soup is delicious, their soup is a little bit like Thailand, it is sour, but not spicy. There were pickled vegetables in it, a bit like Chinese sauerkraut, but with sweetness, I didn't understand their language, I don't know if it was fruit.
I felt that their acid was used to degreas. Ukraine and Russia belong to a diet system, like to eat meat, fish, bear meat, venison, goose meat, etc., there are few vegetables, eating sour food will make the digestive system more comfortable.
When the war began, the landlord escaped, foreigners had the protection of embassies to be relatively safe, and locals, if they stayed, it was dangerous. I stayed in the apartment, so I later cooked by myself and also studied how to make this soup.
I submitted my family's application to return to China on February 3, and on March 3, I boarded the evacuation bus, and during the month, the local water, electricity and gas were not cut off. Neighbors and people in the group told me that the people in charge of water, electricity and gas supplies in Ukraine said they would do their best to keep these basic resources in place until the day they were killed.
Images provided by respondents
So I can still cook during the day, so I imitated this sour soup, put pickled cucumbers and potatoes, and when I first entered it, it was a bit like it, but the aftertaste was still "Chinese".
I went to the bomb shelter once, and the rest of the time I stayed in my apartment on the outskirts of Kiev, and at night I hid in the closet under curfew, trying not to make a sound. Another reason for not going to the bomb shelter is that I am afraid that my mobile phone will not have a signal and I will miss the evacuation notice.
At that time, I was looking forward to the evacuation of overseas Chinese, the withdrawal of overseas Chinese, and the withdrawal of overseas Chinese.
Second, pickle bomb
The first time I saw Ukrainian pickles, I couldn't tell if they were sweet or pickles. A wide variety of fruits and vegetables are sealed in large and small transparent glass bottles, peppers, sour cucumbers, mushrooms, beans, cherry tomatoes, whole tomatoes, and even pickled pineapples and pickled watermelons.
Watermelon has no watermelon sweetness, but the nasal cavity will rush in a summer feeling and watermelon the most primitive kind... DNA. I may not be a foodie, but the taste makes me feel good.
The bottles of pickles are about the same size as the canned bottles of yellow peaches, and I thought they would be sought-after goods to avoid war, but in fact, the pickles on the supermarket shelves were not grabbed, the first to carry was inconvenient, and you were thirsty after eating salty food, and fresh water was even more difficult to carry. The same is true of chocolate, although the impression of hunger is suitable for eating Snickers, but chocolate eats too much, but also costs water. Everyone goes to the supermarket mainly to buy potatoes and bread.
The people of this country have a very deep understanding of war, because there have been wars for so many years, and a large number of people have run away. The concept of their running is to stay in remote villages or border villages, and if there is a problem, they will cross the border, so they will find that half of the people in the residential area are gone, and some small supermarkets are closed.
But the price of food in the supermarket has not risen, but the richness has decreased. Local friends told us that the people who used to drive buses and transport trucks are no longer working. Many roads have become military roads, and people can't walk, let alone carry food trucks. So it is supplied by the warehouse of the supermarket.
I don't think if the war continues for another 20 days, there won't be anything in the supermarket. In addition, the garbage dumps in the residential areas are also full, which is one of the reasons why I left, and there may be plagues soon.
One day I went downstairs to throw out the garbage and found someone picking up glass bottles of pickles. I thought to myself, can I still collect waste products and sell them for money at this time? It was later learned that the local people used these bottles as simple incendiary bombs.
That's the main reason I had to think about escaping, or I might have waited. In the period before the evacuation of overseas Chinese, there would be patrols with guns in the community, and these patrols were not soldiers, but people in the community spontaneously carried guns to patrol and protect everyone.
But I felt the danger. Because once the people resist, they can't be contained, because he is not like a well-trained army. How to use gun explosives, how to get them, in case some are not handled well, will they commit suicide or accidentally injure the people around them?
Screenshots of videos provided by respondents
At that time, food was also a very, very important thing, in addition to eating, people planned to reserve food, how to take food that was not very burdensome to flee on the road. Poland, Slovakia, Belarus, Moldova and Romania are all ok. You can charter a car, you can carpool, you can even take a train, and the embassy has also sent a message saying that everyone can act on their own and try to escape.
Third, in the end, potatoes
Every day I get a greeting message from a local friend: "Are you okay?" Are you still here? In fact, it is simply: "Are you still alive?" That's what it means. I don't like to shed tears, but when I see these messages, my heart is in tears.
In fact, I wanted to say that I was scared, but I didn't say it, because if I collapsed, I really couldn't come back. At that time, when I went to the supermarket, I didn't pick, as long as the food that could keep me alive, whether it was noodles or rice, I didn't eat raw meat, as long as I was alive.
Ukraine was originally a country that didn't have to worry about going hungry, and supermarkets had all kinds of bread, sausages, cheeses, sweets you could expect. When I first arrived, the owner of the apartment, in order to welcome me, put more than 20 kinds of chocolate sweets on the table of the apartment.
The first time I returned from Ukraine, I carried a box of sausages, and the sausages in their country were also strange, as thin as pencils, red and green, and as thick as the hotel kettle. Usually, the local people's food is to add sour cucumbers with bread, and then eat cheese or sausages and drink coffee. Then there's the soup.
They process a lot of food again, and only need simple splicing when eating. It is not necessary to fry fresh vegetables or meat like Chinese cuisine, which may be more suitable for wartime.
I love a bread like the Great Leba, particularly hard, a bit like the hardness of a baguette, needing to be cut with a serrated knife, with that raw fermented sour taste. I was born in the northeast, this flavor of bread, I just liked, very large, can eat for a long time. This bread was hard to grab during the war.
During the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, there was a truce for a while, and people could go to the supermarket to buy things, and every time they needed to go to the supermarket to queue up very early. Sausages and bread are not available first, then rice and noodles. But what is more interesting is that cabbage and onions are not stockpiled, but potatoes are the most sought-after. I couldn't buy potatoes for a week straight. Perhaps the locals think that potatoes are a food that can be used as a vegetable and a staple food.
In "Chosin Lake", each warrior ends up sharing potatoes, because there is a lot of starch, which can replenish the body with energy. I really felt like a war movie in Ukraine, with a man fleeing with his family.
There is another thing in the supermarket that makes me very moved, buying vegetables in the supermarket over there needs to be weighed, I can't understand the local language, I need help from others, when fighting, I thought everyone was crazy to buy, who will help you, right?
But don't worry there, find someone at random, he will help to weigh, see I am a foreigner, will say: good luck. We all have to be lucky.
Sour cucumber pasta | respondents
Four, 3 hours, 20 levels
In the days of the Russian-Ukrainian negotiations, the embassy asked me to collect my documents, but at this time I could not get a car, how could I possibly have a car at that time? I found an acquaintance to help me find a driver, and the fare was only three times the usual. But I still took all the gerry (local currency) with me and was mentally prepared: no matter how much he raised the price halfway, I would give it, just send me to the place.
I am very grateful to this Ukrainian, even now I am willing to donate money to support Ukraine. Because the moment he got into the car, he reassured: "Are you okay?" You don't have to worry, I'll send you. I said to him in translation software, "Can you wait for me there?" Can you send me back again? He said yes.
I said "I'll give you the money first, you must wait for me". He said, "You can rest assured." But even with him, the road is still extremely dangerous.
From the Kiev Oblast to the Chinese Embassy in Kiev City, the whole process takes 20 checkpoints. At every checkpoint, soldiers came up to check it out, and a bunch of guns said to me, "Take out your DOCUMENTS, what are you doing, what are you going to do?" "I don't know which unit they are, all masked and holding guns.
I needed to crouch on the ground and get my papers, and the picture in my head was the news screen: someone got up and ran, or subconsciously put his hand in his pocket, and he was killed. Before going, many people suggested that I bring some self-defense weapons, knives or scissors.
My idea is that I don't carry any weapons, I don't carry anything that harms others, as long as others say surrender, I will surrender, I can do whatever I want, you can trample on me, as long as you keep my life.
At that time, the only idea was that saving my life was the most important.
The usual forty minutes of walking, three hours of walking. The driver had been helping me defend and explain, and when I arrived at the embassy, my whole mind was confused, and I felt that I had finally picked up a life.
After coming out of the embassy, I found that the driver had actually been there waiting for me for two hours, next to a lot of soldiers patrolling.
This process is an experience that I never want to recall in my life. It was the shadow of the war that I cannot recall.
5. Reunion of potato soup
After getting the documents, I received a message from the embassy and began to evacuate the overseas Chinese, and at what time to go to which subway station to get on the bus. Or the driver who sent me there. I gave all my gerry to the owner of the apartment.
The bus opened, the car was full of Chinese, and throughout the process of leaving Ukraine, there was no one in the carriage to chat, there was a dead silence, only the cries of babies, because everyone did not know what the future would be, whether they would encounter a surprise attack by the Russian army. I gave my yogurt to a single man who didn't speak.
Everyone's heart is still very anxious, not knowing whether there is food in the camp, what the situation is, and there is an epidemic. What is touching is that when you arrive in Moldova, you would have to queue for 5 hours to pass, but as long as you bring children, people will automatically give way to a road and let them go to the front of the line, and that picture is really like a movie.
When I entered, I found that there were tents supported by various institutions, volunteers were distributing food, simple clothes could be taken at will, milk powder, toys, food, diapers for children, and the cafeteria did not need money. I remember the food in front of one tent, which was bread cut in half, with a canned polydruge in the middle, and coffee in front of the second tent.
Behind the table in the third tent, there was a large cauldron, steaming, and what was on the table I forgot, Chinese liked to drink hot. I asked for a bowl of soup and put it out, which was the potato soup that I liked to drink.
Although there is no sour cucumber inside, it is really rich and delicious. I drank quickly, and there was a puppy next to me, and I gave it a little bit of what was left at the bottom of the bowl.
6. White tulips
After leaving the camp, the bus rushed all the way into Romania, so that we could rest assured. People from the Romanian Embassy, local chambers of commerce and Chinese companies came to pick us up.
Zhejiang Chamber of Commerce, Fujian Chamber of Commerce, Huawei, Bank of China, etc. have given us great help, and in my impression it seems that an institution charters a bus and arranges free food and accommodation for Chinese leaving Ukraine. I also met a lot of friends in the process.
Now that I have returned to the country, in quarantine, I would have liked to go back to my hometown to quarantine, but the policy of evacuation from Ukraine is that you can only choose the time when the plane takes off, not the city where you land.
I think war is really cruel, war is not good for ordinary people. I don't know much about politics, but no matter what the reason, whether you win or lose, you will always be hurt.
In the past few months in Ukraine, I have met a lot of local friends, but also become comrades-in-arms, they are ordinary people, think about it, many people are young and strong can run, but some people do not even have the strength to run, can only wait there, very helpless to wait, this is very heart-wrenching.
I didn't reverse the jet lag for five days, because there was no concept of dark day and day, and I could only come out at noon during the day, and the rest of the time had to hide in a dark corner or in a basement or an air raid shelter, and I could only listen to the alarm every day.
Even if I have been on the battlefield for less than a month, I will never forget the shadow of the war, not to mention the psychological shadow of the local people, those who can't leave, those who are waiting for death.
So I hope that everyone will pray for peace as much as possible, try to rescue as much as possible, do not advocate war, and do not stand on one side.
In the panic of war, the most soothing thing is not only food, but also people. Neither the locals who volunteered to help me in the bomb shelters nor the volunteers in the camps ignored me because I was a foreigner. While squatting on the ground, a volunteer handed me something, and I took it, and it was a white tulip.
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Please say a little blessing
I hope the war will end soon
Special thanks: George Jong
Interview: Two black
Some of the pictures come from the web
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