Note: This quick interview took place after more than a few drinks during a group dinner.
Vic: So what was in the jar that the old lady threw at the drone?
Amy: Pickled tomatoes.
Vic: Where did you hear that it was tomatoes?
Amy: In an interview she did.
Vic: You think there was actually a specific woman that actually did it and they interviewed her?
Amy: <laughs> That’s- yeah that’s what I read!
Vic: You’re a pickle jar truther. You believe in it.
Amy: Yeah, I believe. I do believe, yeah. It gives me faith that we can all throw something at drones.
Vic: <laughs> But you said that you looked at a drone, and you considered.
Amy: Yeah, well, I mean, in Kharkiv, it occurred to me because when that story came out at the start of the war, it was very inspirational. It matched the vibe of the time, where it was all very much uh, Ukrainians are like the scrappy underdog. You know, there were endless videos of, you know, tractors towing tanks and old ladies giving sunflower seeds to soldiers and saying “oh, put this in your pocket so when you die you actually grow into something useful”. So it matched that vibe, didn’t it? You know, “Oh there’s a babushka on her balcony and she just lobs a jar of pickled tomatoes at a drone”.
But then it only occurred to me the other day, four years into the war, when I was watching drones fly over my apartment. There’s absolutely no way that you could physically do that. They’re way too high. And if it’s close enough that you can throw something at it, then it’s about to crash into your apartment and kill you. So uh, <laughs>. Probably not true, but I like to believe, I still like to believe in the- I appreciate the symbology of it. If it gives you hope, why not?
Vic: So were you in Ukraine when you started seeing these stories, or was it before you came to Ukraine?
Amy: I came to Ukraine in the first week of the war, so some stories were already popping up. I think within a day of the full-scale invasion, they were already popping up. And it did actually affect my inspiration to come here, because, you know, there were videos of entire villages getting together to make Molotov cocktails and that kind of thing. And, you know, Ukraine was fantastic, the social media aspect of it. It gave this impression that it was all very, you know, “we are going to fight to the last man, come and join us”. And Zelensky himself, you know, the whole, “I don’t need weapons- I don’t need evac, I need weapons”. Yeah, it was a big reason for a lot of people came here. So yeah, as I was sort of travelling across Europe to get here, you’re seeing that online and it just compounded that it was the right choice.
Vic: Do you think it contributed to other people coming to volunteer?
Amy: Yeah, 100%. Especially people that sort of um, enjoy the military heroic stories. People that have grown up on these like semi-legends from World War I and World War II. I think they saw, I think they saw like something similar in the memes that were coming out of Ukraine and they thought they wanted to be a part of it, whether or not they were qualified. They still came here, didn’t they? <laughs>
Vic: Do you ever see stories of like witchcraft? Like some people were telling me about, “oh, there’s witches in the Carpathian mountains and they’re casting spells” and apparently with the Kursk incursion there were witches contributing to that.
Amy: Personally I’ve not met any witches. <laughs> No. I used to live in the Carpathians before the war, and I did not meet any witches, but I met a lot of shepherds. I don’t know if they’re contributing but…
Vic: Cool.
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