Ksenia

“The first couple of days that it was happening I could feel everything. It felt real, it felt like heartbreak. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep, I refused to go to bed at night, I couldn’t do much. I cried a lot obviously. It was really sad, but it felt right to understand and feel what was going on, but it’s very hard going on with everyday life, doing the things you would normally do, it doesn’t feel normal. It feels stupid. I find it really difficult to do anything that resembles my privilege life here.

I live above a public pool and there are children splashing around and laughing and the first couple of days I was resentful, like, how can you be having fun? How can the world just go on? It feels so unfair. Then my mind just went ‘nup, too hard’ and I woke up one day and was like okay back to work . My mind just decided it was too hard to process this so we’ll just go back to the comfortable everyday stuff, and I hated that because I don’t want to not feel it, it felt numb.

So coming here to the protests, even for an hour feels…you can process it a bit more. I don’t have to put it to the back of my mind when I’m here. This is a safe space to not have to function for an hour and to put all my energy into the rally.  It’s the only thing that feels right.”

Ksenia, 30, moved to Australia from Kyiv with her family when she was 4 and has since visited and holidayed frequently to visit friends and family. Photographed during a protest for Ukraine at Martin Place.

Maksym & Kateryna

“It's helplessness.

The first emotion is being helpless. We can do nearly nothing from here. Just share news and check information and send some money to volunteers for buying medicines, ammunition and so on. It will be much easier if we can do at least something. But actually here I cannot help. I cannot just hug my parents, my sister or my friends.

Then it’s the rage and probably hate because Russian could have stopped this from happening for a really long time ago, even when Putin for the first time cheated to stay President. I mean he was President for two terms and that was the largest possible number of terms in a row for any person in Russia. Then he put his man Medvedev instead of him while he took the position of Prime Minister and after one term of being Prime Minister, Putin returned to being a President and he's still President. He changed the constitution.

It's about hate and helplessness mainly.”

Maksym and Kateryna, both 25, moved to Australia from Odessa, in the South West of Ukraine, 1 months before the war began to study at Macquarie University. Photographed in their apartment in Macquarie.

Anton

“Absolutely I wish I was there. I’m meant to be there. I had a flight that was cancelled because of the war. So I should have been there already. I think about it every day and I do really wish that I was there, which is why I stopped working and am doing as much as I can to help the community. I’m working with humanitarian and military efforts. Helping our military, working with anyone coming over here from Ukraine, helping with visas and helping with people on the ground.

I keep close contact with a lot of people in Ukraine. I have a lot of family, I have a lot of friends. A lot of them stayed. Males that are under 60 years old in Ukraine are required to stay. It’s a mix of how they are dealing with what they are going through over there, but even since the 2014 revolution I’ve never experienced such unity. So the only thing that Russia has actually achieved in this is that, for those (Ukrainians) who have been uncertain about their history, about their roots, it gave them an overwhelming sense of national identity.

Since the start of the war, and I think a lot of people around Ukraine and the world will be able to say the same: every single person there is part of my family and every single city is part of my home. So when one building across the country gets hit, even though I’ve never been there it’s the same of my home being hit. It’s changed a lot of our lives, it’s now our duty to ensure that those behind this, including at the highest levels from those carrying out those orders and those staying silent, those enabling this to happen for decades, that they pay the highest price for this. Whatever that may mean.

I’m willing to do everything and anything that it takes, being here or everywhere else until Ukraine is once again free, until we get victory.”

Anton, 36, was born and raised in Kyiv before his family migrated to Australia when he was 10. He has since lived and studied in Ukraine and was part of the 2014 revolution. Photographed in Sydney’s Botanical Gardens.

Anastasia

“There’s a huge aspect of survivors guilt. Why am I here and why is my family still there? Why out of everyone did my great grandparents leave and give me the opportunity to be here? I could as easily be there right now. For my great grandmother to have walked from Ukraine to Germany on foot, taking 2 years, and during that time she gave birth without anyone around her. For her to do that, the suffering that she endured to ensure that I’m not there right now. It’s an intense thing to think about.

My mother and I have always had a strong desire to maintain our Ukrainian roots and I feel a strong need to keep that going. She gave me and my brother her Ukrainian last name, because we’re the last, and I’ll give my children that last name as well. Because of that pride she’s shared and facilitated within me I still feel a connection to that land and those people, even though I’m not there.

When it’s part of you, emotionally you feel like it’s being taken away from you.”

Anastasia, 21 has lived in Australia all her life as her great grandparents fled Ukraine during the holocaust. Photographed at Hamilton Park, Turramurra.

Oksana, Timur & Arina

“I will never forget that first day, nobody from Ukraine will. I will have that memory for the rest of my life. We woke up at almost 5am from the noise of bombs near us. So we were in such a state of shock when we realised that it has happened.

From that time, we stayed in Kyiv for 2 weeks, living underground. It was so cold and so dirty, almost the whole time there were air raids. We could hear it. Shops were all closed so it was very difficult to get food. My husband, Boris, would run up to our kitchen so he could cook and bring us back the food. It was big risk for him to run and make food because it could get hit by a bomb.

We made the decision to move West to Lviv after a bomb hit some buildings only 1km away. It was shocking how close it was, so much stress. People crying. It was horrible. Yesterday it was nearly you, today it can easily be you.

The most important thing is how to save my kids. So when I get the chance to leave I took it, but it was so stressful, I had many panic attacks. Now I feel much better since we have arrived (In Australia), but my husband is still in Ukraine, the children’s father. It was too hard to leave each other, saying goodbye, because who knows when or if we will see each other again. We are here in a safe place but he is in a country at war.

My dream is that my husband can join us here, even for 1 day, to show him this beautiful country.”

Oksana, 41, Timur, 12 and Arina, 3, are from Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine and arrived in Sydney on May 11 after fleeing their country to Poland. They moved to Australia with Vitaliy (below), Oksana’s brother-in-law. Photographed outside their temporary accommodation in Hornsby.

Vitaliy

“I was in Czech when it started. Maybe it was from the heavens that at the time it started I was staying outside of Ukraine so that I can take responsibility for the family of my brother.

I wanted to go back to Ukraine and go to the army. Truly I wanted to do this. I was so angry and I was so sad. I remember my emotions and my feelings, I just wanted to take a knife and go to the front lines. In real life I am very friendly but when I saw that news, what Russian soldiers are doing, truly I was so so so angry. But Oksana told me ‘Please try to understand me because me I am a mother of these children, you are a young man and you cannot waste your life for nothing. It will be for nothing.’

I knew I needed to make sure Oksana and the children were okay. They have no experience in making a new home in another country and so it is much harder for them.

I never imagined that I would become a refugee. No way. But it’s true. So, this is really very hard for us to understand. 21st century and these politicians just can’t have some conversation, instead there is war.

I have so much stress. It’s very hard to settle into this new life, even for me, I have experience in travelling from my past, right now I have stress because here it is so multicultural and I don’t know where I can fit in."

Vitaly, 39, is from Kyiv and moved to Australia with his brother’s family (Oksana, Timur and Arina) to ensure their safety. Photographed outside their temporary accommodation in Hornsby.

Taras

“The first day the war started, my mum called me and she was really crying. She said, ‘I really love you. It doesn't matter what would happen. Just remember, I love you because I don't know whether I would be able to talk to you tomorrow.’

I wish I could do more. I wish I could be a volunteer. I wish I could fire an arm and be a part of those brave soldiers, because really I feel inside of me, I want to resist. I don't want my country to give up. And I know that they are lacking soldiers, that we don't have as many soldiers as Russia does.

I have some friends who are soldiers, and obviously they don't give lots of information right now because they're involved in the war. So they can't shoot and write on Instagram at the same time. But I know one guy, my good friend, he died a few days ago. And the other guys who are fighting, they say that they'll never give up. So what I'm really proud of is that they are so strong and even though they understand that we are over gunned, we are overpowered by Russia, they still want to fight.

My friends, I guess they always say the same. We will win this war no matter what.”

Taras, 30, moved to Australia 2 months before the war began to work. He grew up in Turnopil before moving to Lviv, both in the West of Ukraine. Photographed in his apartment in North Sydney.

Olga

“My mum’s side is still in Karkhiv, though they managed to get 30kms south of the city after their apartment was shelled, an apartment I remember going to. It was in the city center. All the windows are completely blown out, my uncle taped them up and tried to clear some of the debris before leaving.

Imagine the city you grew up in, this beautiful historic city, getting pummeled, getting destroyed and the whole country is becoming a war zone. It’s just really hard. And what’s even harder is dealing with Russian propaganda saying everything is fake and dealing with people who have latched onto that.

Just understanding that this is happening is one thing, then that there are so many people that don’t believe that this is happening makes it even more complicated. There’s a real crisis, but when I see a video of missile hitting a building or a city getting shelled, I’ve then got to dig deeper and check if that actually happened, then when I find out that it has it’s like it hurts even more as I hope that it hasn’t, I hope that it’s fake. But it’s not.”

Olga, 32, was born in Kharkiv in North Eastern Ukraine before her immediate family migrated to Australia when she was 13. Photographed in Hyde Park

Tetiana & Anastasiia

“My sister lives in Sydney and maybe 1 month before 24 February she told me that Ukraine is in very big danger and that we need to take everything and leave. She saw this on the news and warned us. We were just very confused; we didn’t understand what she was saying. No, its impossible we don’t trust this it’s not the case, Russia cannot do it it’s impossible. So, we say no, we don’t trust. We were afraid, and we thought about it, but we can’t trust this.

I had talked to my friends about what my sister told me and they said I was crazy, they told me to go to the doctor. Then on the 24th of February, in the early morning, my friend called me and she said ‘Tania, it has happened, we are at war.’

We lived in a new apartment building. We didn’t go underground because there was no underground in new buildings. So we sat at home close to the walls, we didn’t know what to do, we only prayed. We thought that at least we are together. If a bomb comes to our home it will be fast.

We heard stories of children who went to buy bread and then come home and the whole family has died. It’s too hard like this. Children losing their parents and left alone. We cried so much about this, we never really cried before. Ukrainian people are very strong, we don’t cry, we don’t show weakness. But we cried a lot we were so scared.

If I have a choice, I will die with all my family, I don’t want to stay alive as just me.”

Tetiana, 35, and her daughter Anastasiia, 13, are from the city of Kremenchuk in Poltava region in Eastern Ukraine. They arrived in Australia on March 9 after fleeing to Romania on a 36 hour bus journey. Their local shopping mall was recently bombed, killing 18 people. Photographed near Tetiana’s sisters house in Lindfield.

Mar’yana

“I don’t want to sound like I think I’m a super woman or anything, but it would actually be easier for me to be there (in Ukraine) and to help somehow, right there with my hands. I wouldn’t be able to go to the front lines and fight or anything but do something, anything that I can.

I play in a Ukrainian music ensemble, which I started a few years ago. Playing violin helps me feel close to my country and to my culture. At every concert I can sense that the audience learns more about my country through songs written generations before, it is deeply moving. So I continue to spread the message of Ukraine through my music.

Since 24 February 2022 I initiated and run a few benefit concerts where we raised money to help civilians in Ukraine and Ukrainian army and we will run more over the next few months. The music has always helped me get through emotional periods in my life, right now I’ve never needed it more.”

Mar’yana, 44, moved to Australia 20 years ago. She grew up in Zaporizhzhya in the South West of Ukraine. Photographed in her home in French’s Forest.

Vladislav

“My niece was married on February 22nd, on the 24th the active face of the war started. On the 25th my nephew joined the Ukrainian army.

My niece and my wife’s sister avoided the Russian tanks and they managed to run away to Poland and I have since brought them here from Poland 6 weeks ago as refugees. My nephew he has to stay and fight. He is a paratrooper. I would like to be in the Ukrainian army now too.

Why Russia hates Ukraine?

Well many reasons for this. One we think is that the empire has ‘phantom pain’. You know, if I make an amputation of a leg or an arm it is often a human feeling that he wants to scratch or rub his pain. However he has no arm, he has no leg, how he feels pain here? It is called phantom pain, and the empire will have phantom pain since Ukraine’s independence.

Another reason is the empire is not strong, but it is not fully broken yet either, and so it will try to make revenge on those who breaks away from them. They cannot accept that they are being broken, and they are angry with Ukraine for this. And most of all, without Ukraine, the Russian Federation cannot be the Russian Empire.”

Vladislav, 58, was born in Odessa and studied his post-graduate in Kyiv from 1990. He first moved to Australia in 1996. Photographed in his garden in Artarmon.