Photo 1. Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko, 45 years old. Black and white selfie of the man. He sits with a naked torso in front of white shelves with office folders, propping his chin with his hand. Vyacheslav has thick black hair and a short beard, strong jawline, high forehead and narrow lips. His eyes are almond-shaped and have large eyelids; one eye looks into the lens, the other to the side. Around his neck hangs something that looks like a headphone wire.

Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko

kharkiv -> frankrurt

Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko was born on 29th October 1977 in the city of Shakhty, Russia. Shortly after that his family moved to Horlivka, Donetsk region, Ukraine. Since 1995 he has lived in Kharkiv where he moved to study at the Kharkiv Aviation Institute. For many years he was a builder and a social activist. He has been having a disability since childhood due to visual impairment.

Until 24th February 2022, Vyacheslav lived in Kharkiv with his wife and three children. He headed the non-governmental organisation Seeing by Talking and was organising online training for visually impaired people and people with locomotor disabilities.

MORNING OF FEBRUARY 24, 2022

Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko woke up on the morning of 24th February 2022 at his home in Kharkiv to the sounds of a heavy motor plane that should not have been flying over the city. He realized that it was a bomber plane. Then a series of explosions that took place near Chuhuiv began.

Vyacheslav and his family were partially prepared for this scenario. They had a supply of food and cash. Therefore, it was much easier for them to accept the situation.

We were preparing for this moment in advance, understanding that Kharkiv could simply be under occupation, so we were somewhat ready for such a development: both with food and morally... My daughter woke up, got nervous, and went to pekty keksy [from ukr. “bake cupcakes” — translator’s note][smiling — editor’s note], thus calming herself down. The boys woke up, somehow took it well”.

During the day (24th February), Vyacheslav and his children drove around the city evacuating a blind girl they knew.
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At that moment, the behaviour of Kharkiv residents started to change: some of them were evacuating although the city had not yet been shelled.

People who were the smartest took their suitcases and quickly skedaddled — it looked, of course, funny, but it seems that these very people were the smartest back then, because at that time, there was no shelling in Kharkiv yet”.

Vyacheslav believes that the key day for him and his family was 28th February 2022. Back then, he went out with his children to buy bread which turned out to be already sold out. As they were heading home, three shells landed in their yard.

On the 28th, when we were already on our way back, three Smerch shells flew into our yard. They were blanks. It was a kind of key that you can't really get away from it all... If they weren’t blanks there would probably have been trouble, big trouble. And the next day, in the morning, we found out that one woman had been hurt. She was alive at first. And then, the next day, she died of blood loss. This woman was near my daughter — a rocket fell just three meters behind my daughter”.

DECISION TO EVACUATE

On 1 March, after a shell hit the building of the Kharkiv Regional State Administration, Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko decided to evacuate immediately with his family.

Exactly the same shell as near our house fell on the Regional Council the next day… On 1st March, it was a turning point that there was enough of waiting, there would be no blockade. Since they started shelling around the city so heavily, we had to leave”.

Within an hour, they packed up their belongings (documents, money, laptop, phones, clothes) and went on foot to the V. Korolenko Specialised School of Kharkiv from which people were evacuated. The evacuation was organised by Vyacheslav’s friend Valentyna Butenko.

Together with the Red Cross, they travelled through the “green corridor” to Lithuania.

We were travelling like kittens in a sack. Everyone [laughing — editor’s note]. No one told us anything. They said, ‘Don’t tell anyone anything, don't call to tell where you’re going, how you’re going, where you are, it’s dangerous. That’s it, until we get you there, don’t tell anyone anything”.

In the evening of 2nd March, the bus arrived in Lviv. The bus passengers spent the night in Lviv Special Boarding School №100 for visually impaired children.

‍In the morning, on 3rd March, the bus with Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko and his family left for Lithuania via Poland. All the passengers of the bus in Poland were transferred to another, Lithuanian bus. Late in the evening of 3rd March, Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko arrived in Lithuania. The Ovsiyenko family was settled in an orphanage.

They stayed there for a week. Despite the fact that Lithuania has been helping Ukrainian refugees a lot, the border with Belarus was very close. Artillery shots were heard during military exercises, which was frightening Vyacheslav's children.

Фото 3. Табличка на бетонній стіні біля входу. На ній напис литовською: «Будівництво дитячих будинків у місті Расейняй. Проект спільно фінансують Європейський Союз та Литовська Республіка. Ми створюємо майбутнє Литви».

Artillery drills were heard there, and these sounds, they scared both the children and my wife… At that moment, it was not clear at all [what was going on — translator’s note], because the advance of Russian troops was very, very active. It was decided to move as far away as possible from the border. I personally didn’t care. But I saw how uncomfortable it was for the children and my wife to shudder and hear all this”.

Vyacheslav and his family decided to go to Germany where their relatives had already evacuated to. In the evening of 9th March, they took a bus to Warsaw, Poland. The tickets were bought by the staff of the centre in which they lived in Lithuania.

DESTINATION — GERMANY

At about 9 a.m. on 10 th March, Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko and his family arrived in Warsaw. There they were met by a volunteer to accompany them to the Polish-German border. A few hours later, after crossing the border, Vyacheslav and his family took a train to Hannover where there was a camp for Ukrainian refugees.

It was a huge room with fabric partitions, with cot beds. I mean, there was a big partition, like curtains, dividing the hangar, and also some partitions on the floor. The kids, the animals, everyone in the world was there. But still we managed to fall asleep because what to do? There were tents, like separate tents for groups. We could hear them too, it was all fabric. The toilet was okay. I don’t remember about the shower room. We didn’t go to the shower room but I think it was somewhere out there. There were ambulances, there was food, security — it was all there”.

The next day, on 12th March, they travelled to Frankfurt am Main. There they were met by acquaintances who helped them settle in a hotel in the city centre, near the zoo. Two rooms were allocated for them: 3-bed for children; 2-bed for Vyacheslav and his wife.

Almost immediately, Vyacheslav Ovsiyenko joined the work started by Valentyna Butenko on the evacuation of people with disabilities from Ukraine.

Фото 4. Сірий одноповерховий будинок із чорним дахом і чорними вікнами. По один бік великих скляних дверей висить табличка, що на фото 3, по інший — український стяг. На самих дверях скотчем наліплені різноманітні карти й пам’ятки.

I was more in charge of Germany: communicating, writing letters and so on. We established some serious process there... We led everyone who entered Poland, either within Poland or communicated, looking for places [for them to stay — editor’s note]: who would host, whom, how, and so on. This is a different story, though. So my job was to lead the Germany group, to find out who would host them, and so on”.

At the same time, Vyacheslav started looking for permanent housing in Germany. It was difficult to find accommodation in Frankfurt am Main.

Therefore, in mid-April, the Ovsiyenko family moved to a village near the city of Stuttgart. After some time, volunteers evacuated from Kharkiv to Vyacheslav and his family their pets: five cats and a hamster. The family now lives in a private house together with its owner.

They were given two floors at their disposal. The children started attending school. Vyacheslav tried to attend language courses. But they were not adapted for him as a person with disabilities.

Фото 2. В’ячеслав стоїть у світлому приміщенні, тримаючи великий прапор України. Чоловік легко всміхається. На ньому дві футболки: чорна та зверху біла. На білій написано англійською: «Харків. Залізобетон» і намальовано будинок Держпрому, на даху якого майорить стяг України.

It was a poorly lit room, there were some workbooks with — how do you say it? — a font size 14pt, 16pt at the most. Those teachers, two Germans who didn’t speak Russian, that writing of some words on the board… That is, for a person who has low vision — if any at all — it’s extremely difficult to even understand what’s going on”.

Vyacheslav and his family plan to stay in Germany as long as Kharkiv is frequently shelled and until the city’s damaged or destroyed infrastructure is restored.

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