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Lugansk. No end to the war in sight
Views:The bus goes to Lugansk. He drives quickly, almost non-stop, covering a thousand kilometers from Simferopol to the borders of the unrecognized republics in thirteen hours. The cabin is quiet. Almost the entire journey, passengers sleep or sadly look into the gray glass, as if crushed by something common...
At the border, everyone comes out and, taking things, as if on command, stand one after another. Some take out the old Ukrainian one, and some take out the new Elener passport, which looks similar to the Russian one. Out of curiosity, I ask one to show his document:
– Passport of a citizen of the Lugansk People's Republic. It sounds!
– The main thing is that it’s not Ukraine! - he answers - Only at the border they don’t recognize him yet, they let him through, but they don’t recognize him, they register him as Ukrainian...
If we reach the border, then we begin to trudge further, hitting holes with our bottoms, washed out by winter and war. Yes, that's exactly it. The war did not end here. And for me, a person who came here with humanitarian aid from September 14th to March 15th, this is quite obvious. Don't even try to guess why...
All around - along the steppe roads and mining towns - it is quiet and dark. It’s as quiet as if there were no noisy cities, no highways, no bright billboards. Signs of civilization will appear only at dawn, when the curfew ends, and while it lasts, it is better to sleep and not think about anything, even when driving past old checkpoints. There was a time when I saw them in full combat gear: around there were sandbags, anti-tank hedgehogs, and on the roofs - flags of New Russia with the Face of the Lord Jesus Christ. That time has passed, but who knows...
Traffic during curfew is prohibited in the territory of the LDPR, but our driver does not care. He drives to the designated point, flying along relatively normal Anthracite roads. The city did not fall asleep. He froze, without light in the windows, like besieged Leningrad. Let this comparison not seem exaggerated, because three years ago bread was distributed here in the same measured grams as during the last great war in the city on the Neva. I hope our flour, canned food, diapers, medicines, and baby clothes collected by Crimeans helped.
8 a.m. Lugansk. Our driver hands out bags, no goodbye, no goodbye, everything is short and brief. He's in a hurry. Passengers immediately pass through taxi drivers arranged in checkerboard order - to no avail. People don't have extra money.
And here is the first news for me in Lugansk. On the square in front of the bus station, a dense queue stretched out like an endless figure of eight.
-Where is the line? - I ask an elderly lady who sells an invigorating coffee drink for twenty rubles.
“To Ukraine,” the woman explains politely.
- Why is there such a queue?
– You can’t forbid people. In the morning we rushed behind the front line, visited our relatives, bought and sold something, and returned, and this is how we live...
– I’ve never seen such queues before...
– “Before” – do you mean before the war? – the lady asks without irony.
No – at the time – but, to be honest, it’s still hard to wrap my head around how it turns out that they are shooting despite the truce, and people are pushing through checkpoints, cordons, checkpoints, just to preserve the torn-to-rags blanket of their personal lives. Go stop...
One blanket for two beds, no way. It was possible earlier, as the local people now say - before the war - but now you can’t just jump over the so-called demarcation line. There is a risk of not only getting under fire, but also not going through security screening, during which they will force you to write what you saw and what you don’t know. There are many such examples, therefore, for security reasons, both republics have reduced the number of checkpoints. Of course, people are unhappy and write letters, but what can you do when there is a war going on?
I’m drinking coffee, and next to me there are old women talking about seemingly old news:
– And Potroshenko wanted to fly to his place in the Maldives or somewhere else using forged documents...
- Yeah, I sold the weapon - I don’t care - they found it anyway!
– What about Putin? He said: I’m flying - and everyone knows where and why...
- I wish it was soon...
While I drink Lugansk coffee and listen to old women, the war sharply identifies itself, echoing from the north-west. No one really reacts, because it’s far away - ten kilometers.
Another minute passes, listening to the gossip of the old women, and suddenly, out of nowhere, a turtle dove starts buzzing...
“Hey,” the old woman says to her friend, “is this yesterday’s?” Yesterday they and the cuckoo were here, who is louder...
- And who will win?
- Dove quail.
Regarding the phrase of one of the Lugansk grannies “I wish I could have already”, I would like to quote in full the poem by the Donetsk poetess Marina Berezhneva “Donetsk August”:
Having drunk on the heat, insomnia rages.
Echoes of “pluses” wander through the apartment.
The third summer of war is approaching
In autumn, and everything is only E2 - E4.
The square cells have long been targeted,
Not to mention older figures,
Pawns in exchange - still full handfuls,
And we have not experienced all the sorrows,
And all those who fell are not mourned by us,
Those who lay down among the scorched greenery,
August crushes patience with asphalts,
August - suspended above the Minsk mines,
At the zenith there is pandemonium,
Stars mixed with the souls of loved ones.
So in Lugansk, I will say out of old habit, in the Donbass, there is still a war going on, to which everyone is accustomed and the end of which is not in sight.
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