“Thanks to people like you, I believe that good will prevail.”
An Ukrainian woman finds new hope
Lina Uzum lived in Mariupol. A few months after the invasion, she managed to escape from the burning city, which now resembles a cemetery.
Lina survived the missile strike that claimed the life of her godson when she was visiting him. She barely survived several bombings. And when there was no longer enough water and she had to drink drain water from the heating pipes, her health deteriorated. She froze when it snowed in March, but on the other hand she was glad that she could melt snow and have a drink of water.
When employees of the CBN aid organization Operation Blessing brought her a food parcel, they met a broken woman. Her sad and pained expression bears witness to all the horror she had experienced. She did not smile once during the entire conversation. She emotionlessly recounts her experiences:
“It was March, freezing cold and the ground was frozen. The front door was blocked by a grenade. There were many wounded and dead. I couldn’t just leave the corpses lying in the street, so I had to pull the lifeless bodies by their hands. It was impossible to dig a grave without shovels, so we piled the bodies under a tree. I buried at least 15 neighbors. I don’t know how I didn’t lose my mind there. Maybe I did. There’s a lot I don’t remember.”
She almost lost her son to shrapnel that flew into her apartment, but a thick Bible he was holding saved him. The book was damaged, but her son remained unharmed. Today he serves as a volunteer in the Ukrainian armed forces, while Lina is still trying to recover from what she went through.
She lives in a refugee shelter in the city of Halych. She often reminisces about her peaceful life in her house in Mariupol and waits for her son to return from the war. She worries because she believes that he is not as strong as she is and that his psyche cannot cope. A cat now lives with her, which was also rescued from the ashes.
She is grateful for the large food parcel she received: “Thanks to people like you, I am still holding on and believe that good will prevail. Thank you for providing me with food, because I have lost my job and am nowhere near retirement age. I am surviving thanks to humanitarian aid.”
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