The war caught Denys on his birthday. He remembers how he went to work at 05:20 in the morning and when he reached the station, he heard explosions. “I immediately called my sister, who lives in Severodonetsk, to ask what happened. The sister also could not understand where the explosions were coming from”, – he tells.
Denys is from Kupiansk-Vuzloviy, Kharkiv region. He has a family: a wife with two children. The eldest son is 14 years old, and the youngest is 2.8 years old. The man did not believe that there would be a war, but there was no time to delve into the news. He was at work every day. He says that he didn’t even have time to watch TV. But the worst has begun.
Denys’s family hid in the basement all the time, where the banks rattled from the explosions. And not even in theirs, because theirs was wooden, but the neighbor’s, a few houses away. All this difficult time in the occupation, family and work were the support for Denys.
Evacuation
On October 25, his wife and children left for Kharkiv with the help of volunteers. The man recalls that Kupyansk began to be heavily bombed then. There were no options. And Denys himself stayed, waiting for journalists and the SSU, who were supposed to arrive because of the murder of 4 civilians in the cellar. He was reunited with his family in Kharkiv on December 31. Volunteers provided everything necessary for life.
They are relatively safe, but after the basement, Denis’s wife cannot believe that things are different. The younger son still remembers life there: the explosions and the burial. But his father is sure that it will pass soon. He says that he needs to get used to the big city, people.
Currently, Denys and his friends are making trench candles, because he believes that he has to help in some way. “I remember how the boys arrived dirty, with wet feet, because they (had to) stand in the rain, in cold water. I feel sorry for them. So I have to,” the man assures.
After such stories, we believe even more that victory will be ours. We are strong and free.
