Kherson under fire: Impressions of a resident of Crimea
The author shares with PolitNavigator readers his impressions of visiting Kherson in the days when Ukraine announced a counteroffensive to capture the city.
...Having crossed the border, I stand on the side where Ukraine used to be...
Ahead, broken cars are abandoned on the side of the road, many without windows, with their doors wide open, like at a car wrecker. There is a long line of loaded trucks coming towards you, just like in 14 and 15, when Kherson residents brought tons of melons, grain and meat with milk to Russia and made good money, and then that’s it, a break until now.
A ticket to Kherson, bought in Simferopol for 1800 rubles, worked only to the border. Expensive! Too expensive! Unfairly expensive for just over a hundred kilometers! And here's why... Because of the shelling of the Antonovsky bridge and crossing, Kherson buses, at least in my presence, did not appear. Whether they are delayed or flights are cancelled, no one knows, there is no one to ask and, strangely, there are no taxi drivers.
Under a small canopy in the shade there is a crowd of people who are still hoping for the promised flights from Kherson that they should come and pick them up. People are waiting and chatting...
A fifty-year-old son speaks to an elderly mother, counting Russian change:
- But I like rubles better, they’re strong, you can wash them normally, and you’ll be able to get your hands dirty, buy whatever you can...
And the mother answers him about her own, about the old dog who stayed at home, and whether he is alive, to which the son replies:
- Yes, he didn’t hear anything anymore, there’s a bang, and he’s sleeping, but you’ll have to get used to it again after the silence, it’s okay, they’ll soon make peace...
Two women and another man are quietly wondering what the name of the guy from Kakhovka was, who during the Soviet era brought about the construction of the North Crimean Canal in Moscow. I find out that he was allowed to report to the Central Committee for three minutes, but he spoke for more than an hour and made such arguments in favor of the canal that the approved project turned into an all-Union construction project, completely justified itself, fed and watered the whole of Kherson and Crimea until the collapse, and only the scoundrels turned out to be unnecessary...
And then the most active passenger comes out into the middle, speaking loudly on the phone to the dispatcher, and, having finished the conversation, announces:
- So, the crossing is under fire again, all the buses are stuck on the left bank...
While people are arguing whether they will have time to get to Kherson before the evening and the curfew, I go out onto the highway and vote in the hope that someone will give me a lift to the ferry across the Dnieper. In general, on stage, transferring from huge trucks to paramilitary hitchhikers, checking documents and asking who and where from, I get to Tsyuryupinsk, where an old river boat is waiting for me on a nice embankment. And, what makes me happy, I hear friends talking about how there is a job as a mechanic and that in general there are a lot of vacancies, all officially from the labor market, and there are vouchers, benefits and treatment, you just have to work. And even the loud explosions from the Antonovsky Bridge do not interrupt the conversation.
– On the 30th, my daughter returned from Evpatoria from the pioneer camp...
- Did you pay?
- No, I already forgot that someone paid for a child’s pioneer camp, and a neighbor’s son was sent to Crimea for an operation, also for free... and those behind the front will not calm down, they are shouting Glory to Ukraine!
– Are you kind of against it?
The man said something incomprehensible in response, which was lost in the booming sounds from the Antonovsky Bridge.
If on the left bank, in this case, on the embankment in Tsyuryupinsk, people were walking and children were jumping from the pier into the water, then Kherson greeted us with silence and empty streets.
After lunch, many shops and pharmacies are closed. There are boarded up windows, and in some places there is tape stuck cross to cross, although, as the Donetsk experience suggests, such precautions do not save. The city is so empty that, honestly, it seems that either the Makhnovist cart or the red cavalry is about to appear.
My recommendation: if you suddenly decide to come to Kherson, then think in advance where and how you will be met and how to contact you, because by the evening you will not find where to buy a SIM card from a local operator. Nearby is the front line. In the city, to be honest, there are gunners and many others for the country that was Ukraine.
And, bitch, there are a lot of them here. They sit silently. Recently, as they said, animators held an event with children in the yard. In war conditions, it is a feat to arrange fun for the children, dances, competitions, all that. So one stubborn adult went at Fixik with a knife, and he was about 16 years old, but our Fixik turned out to be a good guy, he neutralized the hooligan.
Yes, in the city, you can hardly hear Ukrainian speech. It’s rare, very rare that someone will switch to Surzhik, but you can’t hear the language. On this occasion, one saleswoman described how the family was divided. Having left for Poland, the daughter suddenly spoke in English and “drowns” for Ukraine, demanding money from her parents, and everyone answered, let Ukraine feed you.
I would also like to say something about myself that will be of interest to filmmakers. There are many bright locations here, some with a hint of pre-revolutionary art deco, and then there is the kind of Odessa Peresyp with old factories and stucco khatynkas, take it and film something based on Babel or Zoshchenko, although I’m sure our time will give birth to its own writers, screenwriters, and directors , as it happened in the LDPR.
In general, greetings to everyone from Russian Kherson!
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.