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Honoring Ukraine—Unintentionally

War refugees made to feel at home

By Vytas StoskusPublished about a year ago 4 min read
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© Vytas Stoskus, 2022

The recent Ukrainian war refugees arriving in Lithuania are getting a hero’s welcome. Lithuania, having suffered from Russian & Soviet occupations for long periods since 1795, is very supportive of Ukraine in its gallant resistance to the 2nd Russian invasion which started in February after an 8-year hiatus since they occupied Crimea in 2014.

Along with other Eastern European countries, most of which have likewise endured long & brutal Russian & Soviet aggression & repression, Lithuania has rolled out the red carpet for a people unjustly invaded by a brutal neighbor with a psychopathic leader who has a warped sense of history & does whatever he pleases both within & outside his country’s borders.

Putin’s citizens have been terrified by his recent repression to where many fear the slightest contact with someone outside Russia because it could land them in a system of gulags which appear to be under reactivation. A brain drain was also occurring as the most erudite Russians fled westward for freedom of thought, association, & self-expression. Now, that possibility has evaporated as Russia becomes ever more draconian by forbidding men of military age to leave the country so they could be drafted into the “military operation” in Ukraine. Hopefully, this measure will backfire & generate more open opposition to the government & inspire some creative sabotage. How about drone hobbyists targeting Putin & his goons?

In the old Soviet Era apartment building where I live in Kaunas, Lithuania, even before the invasion, Ukrainians were already remodeling the basement which was mostly unused other than by a couple of the tenants who kept some old junk in their storage bins, although it was more a fire hazard than a decent storage area. In fact, we’d had a fire when a homeless man had occupied the area & set fire to a mattress while smoking in the middle of the night. I awoke, smelled the smoke, & rang doorbells & pounded on doors to flush my neighbors out of the building. Another neighbor, sensing the smoke was coming from the basement, had run down there with a bucket of water & dowsed the flames before the fire department arrived.

The Ukrainians having made a decent apartment out of the basement has given the tenants of the building a fresh sense of security that a dilapidated storage area had not assured. Another advantage of their presence is the activity they have added to the huge mutual yard our building shares with several nearby buildings. The large patch of grass amongst all the trees & shrubbery periodically hosts their momentary kicks of a soccer ball which they even leave lying around day & night. It has given the area an even homier feel than was already present from a few years earlier when a group of men had started gathering under one of the trees where they would hang out for hours talking, laughing, & drinking. They’d even begun bringing their women with them & having full-fledged picnics & cookouts, & when they hung a rope swing kids had appeared to partake of the growing community’s activities.

Throughout Kaunas, wherever I interact with people, an increasingly high proportion of those I address don’t know Lithuanian & turn out to be recently arrived Ukrainian war refugees. It’s motivating me back to my old Russian language instruction books in the hope of restoring at least some of the Russian I had known 3 decades ago. Starting a new language would be too much for me, but recharging some of the old braincells lodging the remnants of the Russian I had learned may get me by because many of the Ukrainians know Russian as well.

The newly arrived Ukrainians passing through my neighborhood have their eyes blown out by the Waldorf Kindergarten “Šaltinėlis“ (a “water spring” in English). It’s 2 primary colors are a bright blue & yellow, the colors of the Ukrainian flag.

They must be jumping out of their skins thinking that this may have been done as a welcoming gesture, but I’ve spoken with one of the workers there. She maintains that the building’s colors & the Ukrainian flag’s colors being the same is strictly a coincidence. I recall it being blue & yellow when I moved into the area 8 years ago, but I wonder if there may have been a Ukrainian designer or painting crew back when the job was done about 10 years ago. In any case, it brightens the area for me & everyone else by having the bright unique paint job with the diagonal lines.

The colors coinciding with the Ukrainian flag is a pleasant serendipity that adds to the vitality & flavor of the area which is adjacent to 3 other kindergartens & a school which surround a park with fields, trees, & children’s playground equipment. The colors of the other 3 kindergartens & the school are faded pastels. Only the playground equipment & the Waldorf Kindergarten are colorful.

© Vytas Stoskus, 2022 www.stoskus.net/en/

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Thank you so much.

humanity
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About the Creator

Vytas Stoskus

Social psychologist, psychotherapist, conflict mediator; organizational, cross-cultural, creativity, unschooling catalyst; authored 3 books. Heretic . . . . can’t differentiate between my work, play, & concern for justice. www.stoskus.net

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