Concrete Sunflowers

Tag: post in english

  • Ostap on his experiences with Kraken

    Part 2: Ostap on premonitions I: Just so you know, I’m the interpreter. I can translate if it’s easier for you to speak. If you want to add anything in Ukrainian later, I’ll translate it. [translates into English] Ostap: I’ll try in English first, and we’ll see how it goes. I: If you need help,…

  • Maksym on language

    I: We tried to get some street interviews yesterday. We approached all kinds of people – young, old, men, women. Most of them turned us down. Why is that? Maksym: Eighty percent of the population in Kharkiv right now are displaced people. See them over there with the bags? [Points to a group at a…

  • Maksym on the unique position of military volunteers

    I: What meaning do flags have at the frontline? What do soldiers say if they have a flag? How do they feel if they don’t have one? Does it carry a specific meaning, or are there traditions tied to them? Maksym: I’m not sure I follow the question. I: I put a lot into that…

  • An attack on Kyiv

    Iryna: So this is our first time in Kyiv. We go there on a volunteer mission, and we exit the train station. We leave all the backpacks, all our belongings, at the train station, because we still had a few hours before we could check into our hotel room. And we’re like, “Yeah, let’s go…

  • Iryna and the bullet

    Iryna: Okay, so back in 2022 when they still had the security checkpoint in Kharkiv train station. We were going back from Balakliia, it’s like the- it was a recently liberated area. It was probably liberated within the last couple of weeks, and you could see all these different, you know, bullets on the ground,…

  • Eric on luck and religion during basic training

    Part 1: Eric on basic training Vic: Do you have anything you’re going to take for good luck? Eric: Actually, yes. I’ve this small figurine of a cat that, I’ve had it for years, just kind of in my bag as a, I don’t know, good luck thing. <laughs> Vic: Is it something from home?…

  • Eric on basic training

    Part 2: Eric on luck and religion during basic training Eric: It is, you know <laughs> fucking exhausted. Vic: Has the car situation been sorted? Eric: Fuck no. That fucking idiot is like, drunk in Ivano-Frankivsk being a fucking menace to society. I’m like, “hey, asshole, come back with my car please”. Vic: <laughs> So…

  • Iryna’s church dream

    Iryna: It’s probably the weirdest and the most strange story that has ever happened to me in my whole entire life. It was probably day three or day four of the full-scale invasion. I was super sick, super high fever, chills, I could barely go to the toilet. I lived by myself in a dormitory…

  • Chrystyna on folk heroes

    This interview took place whilst volunteering in a kitchen in Kyiv.  Part one: Chrystyna’s story Vic: Back when like Pes Patron was popular was that more for kids or? Chrystyna: Oh, no… Did you… Do you have an account on Twitter? Vic: I’ve got a Twitter, yeah. Chrystyna: So there was a, like, flash bulb,…

  • Chrystyna’s story

    This interview took place whilst volunteering in a kitchen in Kyiv.  Chrystyna [name changed] was born in the USSR in territory which is now Russia.  Her family moved to Ukraine when she was a child, and she is solely a Ukrainian citizen. TW: This story contains references to suicide. Part two: Chrystyna on folk heroes…

  • Discussion on staying safe during air raids

    Vic: Could you just say the thing you said again about how you think that maybe people are more interested in luck when they’re dealing with IEDs? Jason: Yeah. I just think the nature of the threat that IEDs pose in the wars that the US and the UK and NATO and definitely thought Iraq…

  • Jason on premonitions

    Jason: It’s big in the US military. It’s not formalized in any way, but there are stories about people driving through neighbourhoods where an IED’s been planted and they can sense that something’s off, and then deviate from what they’re gonna do in some way. And it turns out yeah there is an IED laying…

  • Jason on good luck charms in Afghanistan

    Vic: <laughs> Proceed Jason: Before my first combat tour in Afghanistan- my mom, who’s sort of, a bit of a lapsed Catholic but still semi-practicing, wanted to give me a St. Christopher medal. St. Christopher is the patron saint of travellers and soldiers, maybe, I don’t know. And she figured that two St. Christopher’s medals…

  • Jason on stories filtering into the US

    [Note: This interview took place whilst volunteering in a kitchen in Kyiv] Vic:  So that’s recording now. Hopefully it’ll pick you up, there’s definitely background noise here! But yeah, if you could tell me the characters that you’ve just mentioned? Jason: Yeah. I’m definitely not as immersed in this as the volunteers who have been…

  • Mary on Five Huts

    Mary: It was really funny today to see a bus coming from the north, coming down the main street of Sumska [in Kharkiv], and the destination on the bus was Pyatykhatska, which means “five huts”. And that’s a name of a town which obviously started off with just five huts. But it’s a thing with…

  • Olha and her café under occupation

    H: Henry, I: Iryna, O: Olha H: Does she remember my fish? [Iryna and the fish] I: [in Ukrainian to Respondent] Do you remember that fish we brought you? It was a huge fish. That was back in ’22. O: Honestly, I don’t remember that any more. So many people have passed through, so many…

  • Iryna and the fish

    Iryna: So we were in Balakliia back in 2022 and there was this local market for the local people. It wasn’t regulated or anything, so the locals would go fishing and they would sell whatever they had in that local market. I got sick and I asked Henry to go and pick up some fish…

  • Viktor the retired soldier

    V — Viktor | I — Interpreter V: At that moment, there was nothing left of the city… if you take a five-story building, just a corner of the house — that’s all that remained. Nothing else was left. I: That was in ’22, probably? Somewhere in the autumn. V: Yes, it was November. I:…

  • Bogdan on folk heroes and idiot soldiers

    Part 1: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 1 Part 2: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 2 Part 3: A smoke break with Bogdan Part 4: Bogdan on the Civilian Prisoners of War organisation V: When I talk to people from Lviv and Kyiv, they’re quite far from the front. Especially in Lviv, where you…

  • Bogdan on the Civilian Prisoners of War organisation

    Part 1: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 1 Part 2: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 2 Part 3: A smoke break with Bogdan I: Do you feel like it’s history repeating itself, like when you were a kid and you looked after him and took care of him? Now you have…

  • A smoke break with Bogdan

    Part 1: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 1 Part 2: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 2 I: [in Ukrainian] Can I have one more stick, please? I… don’t smoke— H: Khm… I: [in English] Just one. V: [laughs]. I: I love this. I quit smoking IQOS, well, quit smoking altogether… After…

  • Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 2

    Part 1: Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 1 Українською мовою: Богхан про свій час у полоні: Частина 2 B: What else is interesting from 2022 that really stuck in my memory, and now I think I probably wouldn’t do something like that again. When the road was being heavily shelled and the last…

  • Bogdan on his time in captivity: Part 1

    Trigger warning: This post contains descriptions of torture, including sexual violence. Oral interpretation provided during the interview has been omitted from the transcript for brevity, except where the interpreter provides additional cultural context or clarification. I: Vitaliy was telling me, I think… It [the city] was occupied in March, right? Or something like that? B:…

  • Jane on food culture

    Jane is a Ukrainian Youtuber. This discussion took place after she released a video on Ukrainian Easter food: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUJaCS1NgFc Українською мовою: Джейн розповідає про культуру харчування Vic: Okay, cool. Um, yeah, so, I watched your video that you sent me about like the Easter food traditions. Jane: Mhm. Vic: So it’s something that people have…

  • Brian from New Hampshire

    Brian: When I moved to Kharkiv full time, April 2024, I had brought my Springer Spaniel Annie, with me. We nicknamed her Humanitariannie, and they used to have these little billboards by the sidewalk with Patron photos warning kids about unexploded ordnance and that type of thing. So I got some great photos of my…

  • Chocolate eggs at The Phoenix

    [We had been to Roshen and bought chocolate eggs and bunnies for the children to celebrate spring] Jay: Awesome, they will be happy! Olena: They will be over the moon. So in Ukraine you will get one Kinder Surprise. Like, just one thing. You don’t get a kinder surprise plus MORE Kinder Suprises plus some…

  • Jay from The Phoenix

    Jay: Hi, my name is Jay Rivera. I’ve been volunteering in Poland and Ukraine since June 2022, and right now the project I’m working on is the Phoenix. So the Phoenix is a long term stay shelter, but primarily a reintegration centre. What we do is we look at focusing on providing families with safety,…

  • Queen Elizabeth at The Phoenix

    Vic: I have a very important question for you. Jay: Yes. Vic: Most important question of the day. Why have you got Queen Elizabeth up there? Jay: Ah, ha, ha, ha! Because she never died. So we have a volunteer named Kate, who- when we started Hope Shelter, Kate was one of our founding members,…

  • Jay’s Easter Egg hunt

    Jay: We were doing supply runs out to Mykolaiv, and Mykolaiv was under artillery bombardment. We had these Lindt eggs. So we would distribute some just to people, and then if there were like a whole gaggle of kids, we would basically tell them they have to cover their eyes for five minutes, and we’d…

  • Sofiya on life in Crimea

    [Sofiya is from Crimea.  Prior to starting the recording, we were discussing the border crossing process]. Sofiya: It depended on the officers at the border.  You would have to show your Ukrainian passport at the Ukrainian border, and then you would have to walk 3km with all your luggage, all the way to the Russian…

  • Dariia on culture

    Wider interview with Dariia: Daria from Melitopol Українською мовою: Дар’я про культуру Vic: I think, you mentioned knowing about Pes Patron? Dariia: Yes, I do know [it], but… like… because I was in occupation, we didn’t have such things there. I read about all those jokes about Pes Patron only when I went back to Ukraine.…

  • Dariia from Akimivka (Yakymivka)

    Українською мовою: Дарія з Мелітополя Vic: What part of Ukraine are you from? Dariia: Zaporizhzhia, well, Zaporizhzhia region. Closer to…. Well, not as close to Crimea. Near Azov Sea, to be precise. Melitopol, well, maybe you know? Vic: Okay. So, during that time, I guess you had a bit of an information blackout, like you couldn’t…

  • Yulia on Vitalik

    Previous: Yulia on a ghostly warning Українською мовою: Юлія розповідає про Віталіка Ivan: And what’s the second story? Yulia: My boyfriend — my ex-boyfriend — was supposed to go on a mission. We were constantly in touch, because I was very worried. At some point, he was called away. He left me with a fellow…