“Lyman was beautiful . We thank Westport for helping us rebuild. We will make it even more beautiful, with the help of our new friends.”
The mayor of Lyman — the devastated Ukrainian town that Westport has adopted, and is raising vital funds for — gave that heartfelt message to Brian Mayer this morning.
This “Lyman” sign is one of the few spots in our sister city left untouched.
As bombs exploded not far away, Brian — the Westporter who co-founded Ukraine Aid International — relayed the mayor’s Christmas Eve message to our town.
Brian’s photos and videos are harrowing, and heart-wrenching. A school was heavily bombed. Apartment buildings and homes lack roofs, windows, even walls. A new play area that residents proudly built was destroyed almost as soon as it opened.
A school in Lyman, where 950 students once studied and played.
The mayor gave Brian and Liz Olegov — a founder of the Alex21 group that partners with UAI and Westport to deliver immediate aid to our new sister city — a tour of Lyman (pronounced LEE-mon).
The need to rebuild apartments and homes is enormous. Assessments have been made as to which can be saved. Brian and Liz can deliver building materials — tarps, plywood and more — so that the salvageable buildings can survive the winter. Full reconstruction will begin in spring.
An apartment building in Lyman. The key right now is to make sure structures like this last through the winter.
Westport has set a goal of raising $250,000 by Christmas Day — tomorrow. That will provide real, immediate,, on-the-ground help — roofs, warmth, water, electricity, communication — for our sister city that was attacked, occupied, ravaged, and now ignored by the rest of the world.
In just 5 days, we’ve raised nearly $160,000. We need another $90,000 by tomorrow night.
Westport: We can do this. Lyman needs us. It could not be easier to donate to the non-profit organization. Just click here. Click the “I want to support” box; then select “Support for the City of Lyman.” Scroll down on that page for other donation options (mail, wire transfer and Venmo.) You can also donate directly, via Stripe (click here).
The gratitude of the people in Lyman — even before the first truck arrives with building supplies, generators and a truck to haul away the trash and debris that has mounted for months — is palpable.
The mayor says his town feels “cared for” by Westport. A woman fetching water from a well — the only source right now — haltingly introduced herself in English to Brian and Liz, and thanked them and Westport for not forgetting them.
This woman’s husband and son are buried nearby. The lone person remaining in her apartment, she calls herself “the security guard.” Everything she owned was burned in a missile attack.
All week long, Westport has celebrated Hanukkah. Tomorrow is Christmas.
We’ve shopped for gifts, decorated our homes, cooked festive meals. We endured a day of wind and rain; now it’s cold. For most of us — despite whatever kind of difficulties we’ve had this year — life has been pretty good.
Life in Lyman is unfathomably difficult. It’s been a horrific year. Please consider a donation today or tomorrow to our new sister city.
It will be the best holiday gift you ever gave.
Every dollar makes a difference in Lyman. Thanks to the work of Ukraine Aid International and Alex21, every dollar goes directly toward immediate aid. (All photos/Brian Mayer)
President Volodymyr Zelensky’s visit to the White House and speech before Congress yesterday reminded Americans that Ukraine’s war against Russian occupation continues, even as media attention has waned.
Westporters don’t need that reminder.
Since we announced our “Building Bridges” campaign with our new sister city of Lyman on Monday, residents (and their families and friends) have raised $105,909. That’s an outstanding outpouring of generosity!
We need less than $145,000 more to reach our goal of $250,000. That will provide 150 homes ruined during the Russian occupation with new roofs, windows and more — plus a generator for every one. And a water filtration system for the entire devastated town.
We hope to reach that goal by Christmas (Sunday). Thanks to our partnership with Ukraine Aid International — a non-profit founded by Westporters Brian and Marshall Mayer — all material can be delivered 3 days later.
Pleaseclick here. Click the “I want to support” box; then select “Support for the City of Lyman.” Scroll down on that page for other tax-deductible donation options (mail, wire transfer and Venmo). You can also donate directly, via Stripe (click here).
Support for the effort comes from Rabbi Michael Friedman of Temple Israel. He says:
“We are all inundated with requests for charitable contributions at this season of the year. Yet a personal call to help specific people in a specific city — even if it is very far away — gives our heartstrings a special tug. What a fabulous way to directly aid fellow human beings in dire need.”
At least once a week, someone asks “06880”: What’s up with the Amazon Fresh store that was supposed to replace Barnes & Noble? Nothing has happened there for months.
We’re not the only town left in — literally — the dark.
An answer comes from The Real Deal. The New York real estate website says that since September, Amazon has not opened a new Fresh store. At least 7 locations appear to be completely built out, but unopened. Another 26 locations are like ours, with development halted.
There are “zombie stores” in several states.
The Real Deal explains:
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It’s cheaper for the company to keep the stores in place while not operating, rather than ditch the stores altogether. While the company is on the hook for rent, maintenance and taxes, shutting down a store could also force Amazon to pay a fee for a lease withdrawal or severance to hired employees.
Click here for the full story. In the meantime, if you want to give Amazon money for groceries, go to Whole Foods. They have not yet closed that part of their operations yet. (Hat tip: John McCarthy)
Yesterday’s innovative “Holiday Card” — actually, a series of large images projected on the front of Saugatuck Congregational Church, thanks to the AV team of Craig Patton and Mark Mathias — was even more stunning that anyone expected.
(Photo/Richard Hyman)
The show will be repeated tonight and tomorrow (weather permitting), from 5 to 8 p.m. The best viewing spot is probably the Colonial Green parking lot, across the street.
Jarret Liotta has many memories from his time in Los Angeles. Once, he attended a Passover Seder with Mel Brooks. The 1983 Staples High graduate quipped, “I didn’t know you were Jewish!”
Now — as Hanukkah collides with Christmas — Liotta is “proud to re-present a shot, low-quality video” he made back in those days.
He thinks Mel Brooks would have appreciated it.
Liotta’s latest film, “Small Town Movie,” is “a light comedy that explores racism, gun violence and the cancel culture.”
He calls this Christmas vs. Hanukkah piece “probably more controversial.”
The Westport Police have released arrest reports for the December 14-21 period.
Five people were detained in custody. The charges for each:
Conspiracy to commit larceny, interfering with a police officer, assault on public safety personnel.
Reckless driving, disobeying the signal of an officer, operating a motor vehicle with a suspended license, larceny of a motor vehicle, possession of a controlled substance, possession with intent to sell a controlled substance.
Possession of burglar tools, conspiracy to commit larceny, criminal attempt to commit larceny, disobeying the signal of an officer, misuse of plates, reckless driving, failure to signal properly.
Manufacture or possession of burglar tools, conspiracy to commit larceny, attempt to commit larceny.
The following citations were issued:
Traveling unreasonably fast: 12
Operating a motor vehicle under suspension: 5
Operating an unregistered motor vehicle: 5
Violation of any traffic commission regulation: 4
Stop sign violation: 3
Failure to drive in the proper lane: 3
Insurance coverage fails minimum requirements: 2
Disorderly conduct: 1
Traveling too fast for conditions:1
Cell phone, 1st offense: 1
Failure to yield to a pedestrian: 1
Tinting windows: 1
Failure to keep plates readable: 1
Misuse of plates: 1
Failure to display lights: 1
One citation was issued last week for overly tinted windows.
The photo above provides a great segue to this item: Wheels2U is growing every day. Last month, the door-to-door ride service provided rides for over 2,300 people directly from their homes and offices, to and from the train station.
The service will take 2 brief holidays — December 26 and January 2 — before resuming full steam ahead.
For more information about Wheels2U, click here. For more information about the Westport Transit District’s services for the elderly and people with disabilities, click here.
And finally … on this day in 1808, Ludwig van Beethoven conducted and performed in Vienna, with the premiere of his 5th and 6th Symphonies, 4th Piano Concerto and Choral Fantasy.
Since Monday morning, “06880” readers have responded to a plea to help rebuild Westport’s newest sister city: Lyman, Ukraine.
For many years after World War II, our town sent aid — money, clothes, blankets, Christmas gifts — to Marigny-le-Louzon, France.
They never forgot. And now that the Normandy village is thriving, they’re joining us in an effort to help another devastated, overlooked place on our planet.
Working with Ukraine Aid International — a non-profit founded by Westporters Brian and Marshall Mayer — we’re raising $250,000.
By Christmas.
That will provide building supplies for 150 ruined homes that need roofs, windows and other reconstruction. It will give generators to all those houses too. Plus a water filtration system for Lyman.
Thanks to UAI’s partner on the ground, Alex21 for Ukraine, it can all be delivered within 3 days.
This was once a family’s home in Lyman…
Notice that I said above “we’re raising $250,000.” I didn’t say “trying to…” In our first 2 days, we raised over $85,000.
Westport: We will do this.
But we need your help. Just click here. Click the “I want to support” box; then select “Support for the City of Lyman.” Scroll down on that page for other tax-deductible donation options (mail, wire transfer and Venmo). You can also donate directly, via Stripe (click here).
if every man, woman and child in Westport donates $10, we’ll get beyond that $250,000 mark. If you can afford it, please contribute for those who can’t.
Join our list of Unsung Heroes.
It began more than 75 years ago, in Marigny, France. Now Lyman, Ukraine needs a new set of heroes.
Westport’s drive to raise $250,000 for our new sister city in Lyman, Ukraine now has a logo.
Miggs Burroughs — the native Westporter/graphic artist/creator of lenticular exhibits at the downtown and train station pedestrian tunnels/designer of the Westport town flag/Westport Artists’ Collective co-founder — has once again donated his talents for a great cause.
His design — in Ukraine’s famous blue and yellow colors — shows Lyman nestled under the bridge being built by both Westport and Marigny-le-Louzon, the French town we adopted after World War II, and helped rebuild. They’re joining us now, to aid another devastated place.
Our goal is to raise $250,000 — by Christmas. That would provide materials to build 150 homes, with a generator for every one, plus a water filtration system for the Donetsk region town. Thanks to our partner on the ground, it can all be delivered within 3 days.
As of last night — 2 days after announcing our drive — we had over $85,000. Just $165,000 left to raise!
To help, click here. Click the “I want to support” box; then select “Support for the City of Lyman.” Scroll down on that page for other donation options (mail, wire transfer and Venmo.) You can also donate directly, via Stripe (click here).
Ukraine Aid International is a non-profit organization. It was co-founded by Westporters Brian and Marshall Mayer. Click here for more information on our sister city, Lyman.
Tonight, Saugatuck Congregational Church unveils a big gift for the community.
That’s not an exaggeration. It’s a giant video Christmas card.
From 5 to 8 p.m. today (Wednesday), Craig Patton and Mark Mathias — creators of the “card,” and leaders of the church’s audio-visual team — will be on the Great Lawn on the Post Road near Myrtle Avenue, projecting a video greeting on the front of the building. It will be augmented by an audio broadcast on 89.3 FM.
Look for the enormous holiday card on the front of the Saugatuck Church as you drive by. Better yet, stop and share some holiday cheer with Craig and Mark.
If the weather allows, the greeting card will be presented again tomorrow (Thursday) and Friday, also from 5 to 8 p.m.
On Sunday, Westport Troop 100 held an Eagle Court of Honor at VFW Post 399. They presented Eagle Scout awards, and celebrated the outstanding achievement of 4 Scouts:
2021 Staples High School graduate PJ Shaum, who coordinated a musical instruments drive for Bridgeport Schools’ Music program.
Purdue Polytechnic University freshman Maxim Zotkin Williams, who created an outdoor picnic area for St. Mary’s Holy Assumption Church in Stamford.
Staples High School senior and fencing team captain Gleb Syomichev, who helped clean and repaint the parking lot at VFW Post 399.
Staples High senior and fencing team member Jack Martens, who helped to clean up and paint the kitchen at VFW Post 399.
Troop 100 has a 54-year history in Westport — and, now, 90 Eagle Scouts. Congratulations to all!
Troop 100 Eagle Scouts, clockwise from top left: PJ Shaum, Maxim Zotkin Williams, Jack Martens, Gleb Syomichev,
Staples High School Class of 2013 graduate Shira Helena Gitlin is directing a new production of “Indecent,” by Massachusetts’ Concord Players.
Shira was involved with another Players group — the Staples ones — on the tech side, in high school. They also sang with the Orphenians. Shira is now building a career as a theater maker, in the Boston area.
Click here for a video about “Indecent.” They talk about its relevance today, beginning at 5:01.
As of last night, over $73,000 had been donated. That’s nearly 1/3 of the way to repair 150 homes destroyed by Russian forces, give generators to all, and provide a water filtration system to the town.
Thanks to a partnership with Brian and Marshall Mayer — the Westporters who founded the non-profit Ukraine Aid International — the supplies can be delivered to the desperate town within 3 days.
As noted yesterday, the goal of $250,000 — by Christmas — is certainly reachable. It’s only $10 for every resident of Westport.
Of course, not everyone can afford that. If you can, please consider a donation for those who cannot.
To donate to the non-profit, just click here. Click the “I want to support” box; then select “Support for the City of Lyman.” Scroll down on that page for other donation options (mail, wire transfer and Venmo.) You can also donate directly, via Stripe (click here).
“06880” reader Jamie Klein has a great idea. She sent yesterday’s story to neighbors and friends, with this note:
This is one example of what is special about living in this town. What a great gift for someone in your family, or as a thoughtful hostess gift for one of the parties you may be attending.
As we enter the holiday season the message of miracles and hope are a theme across all faiths, and from our small place on this earth, we can make a miracle happen.
Thanks for all who have contributed to help rebuild Lyman, and all who will do so. Let’s double that $73,000 by tonight!
Christmas in Lyman. 150 out of 240 homes have been destroyed — including this one.
Meanwhile, another local drive for Ukrainian aid bore fantastic fruit.
When Mark Yurkiw learned there was space in a container leaving in 10 days, he acted fast.
He put out the word on “06880.” In just over a week, readers delivered 8 whole house generators, 8 gas chain saws, 8 phone power banks, 20 sleeping bags, 20 flashlights, 2 kerosene heaters, plus boxes of rechargeable batteries, winter blankets, pillows, and children’s warm winter clothing, to his door.
All those items are now on their way to that embattled nation. Each one can help change lives.
“Thank you, Westport!” Mark says. “It takes a village.”
Ukrainians Ross Voytovych (now of Ridgefield) and Dima Dovgan (Redding) move equipment to be loaded on to a tractor trailer.
It will be lit tomorrow (Wednesday, December 21) at 5:30 p.m., in front of Anthropologie on the Post Road at Church Lane. The entire community is invited, with jelly doughnuts and chocolate gelt for all.
Bill Mitchell of Mitchells — long involved in interfaith efforts — will have the honor of lighting the candles.
This menorah and lighting is a joint effort of Beit Chaverim, Chabad of Westport, Temple Israel, and The Conservative Synagogue.
The downtown menorah, in 2020. (Photo/Arlene Yolles)
Who knew so many Westporters read the New York Post?
A dozen or so readers sent links yesterday to the tabloid’s story that began:
A former New York University director of finance allegedly siphoned $3.5 million meant for minority and women-owned businesses and blew some of the cash on herself — including on an $80,000 pool for her Connecticut home, prosecutors said Monday.
Cindy Tappe, 57, was charged with diverting funds from New York State Education Department grants into shell companies that she created over a six-year scheme that was discovered in 2018, when she left NYU, according to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
Some of the embezzled money went to expenses related to the grants or employee reimbursements — but at least $660,000 ended up in Tappe’s own pockets, according to the indictment.
She allegedly spent the dough on personal expenses, including the pool and renovations on her her home in Westport, Connecticut.
The scam started with a $23 million grant awarded to NYU’s Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and Transformation, where Tappe worked, with the cash meant to go to state programs to help special education students and those learning English.
The good news is: Staples High School has two All-State first team selections — out of only 26 in all of Connecticut. Congratulations, Caleb Smith and Tyler Clark!
The interesting twist: They’re longtime friends — and grew up on the same small street.
There are only 9 homes on Twin Falls Lane. So more than 20% of them are the homes of All-State football players!
PS: Congrats too to James Hillhouse, who made the All-LL/L (large schools) all-state squad.
(From left): Tyler Clark, Caleb Smith, James Hillhouse.
All you ever wanted to know about white oaks is now on a video starring Westport Tree Board member Dick Stein.
Produced by fellow member Frank Rosen, the 8-minute piece covers their distinguishing features, history in Westport (the Bedford family helped with acorns), and more.
It was filmed in familiar places, like Sherwood Island State Park. Click below to learn about those ubiquitous (and handsome) species.
Speaking of Hanukkah etc. … The Jazz at the Post folks say: “It’s that time of year again. Why have our favorite holiday tunes been relegated to lifeless background music, advertising jingles or Muzak?
“In the hands of inspired musicians, the holiday repertoire makes for a fine opportunity for a night of hard swinging jazz.
“Name your holiday: Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, even Festivus (for the rest of us) — we got it covered!”
This Thursday (December 22), Jazz at the Post (VFW Joseph J. Clinton Post 399) hosts a “Holiday Swingfest.” The lineup includes pianist Dave Childs, drummer Greg Burrows, bassist Joe Fitzgerald, and saxophonist Greg “The Jazz Rabbi” Wall.
“Special guests and elves are sure to drop by” too, they say.
Shows are 7:30 and 8:45 p.m., with dinner beginning at 7:30. Reservations are highly recommended: JazzatthePost@gmail.com.
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And speaking (still) of the holidays:
Cecily Anderson is a talented art teacher.
How talented? Check out this great holiday installation piece. It’s drawing stares — and raves — at its pop-up location, right there at BMS. (Hat tip: Kerry Long)
This could be the most important community-building post “06880” has ever published.
For the comfortable, sometimes contentious town of Westport. And — far more importantly — for the devastated, frozen yet determined town of Lyman, Ukraine.
An important railway juncture in the Donetsk region, Lyman was occupied by Russian troops from May 24 through October 1. When the forces fled, they left behind unfathomable destruction.
Over 150 of the 240 homes were demolished. Three hundred families have no roofs. The entire town lacks electricity, heat and running water. Nearly every school is gone.
One of the many schools completely destroyed in Lyman.
Lyman does not get the publicity of other towns and cities. You have never heard of it.
But Brian Mayer has.
The young Westporter — a 2002 Bedford Middle and 2006 Hopkins School graduate — put his New York tech career on hold this year to help Ukraine. He and his brother Marshall (Staples ’09) founded an organization — Ukraine Aid International — and personally raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for humanitarian help and medical supplies.
He traveled overseas, and teamed up with the on-the-ground group Alex21 for Ukraine, founded by Liz Olegov and Richard von Groeling, to ensure aid got where it was most needed. Liz and Richard traveled several times to Lyman.
UAI invited Liz and Richard to Westport. They met 1st Selectwoman Jen Tooker, and introduced the idea of a “sister city relationship.” She knew the concept well.
In the years after World War II, Westport helped rebuild the French town of Marigny-le-Lezon. For many years we sent money, supplies, food and Christmas gifts to our Normandy “sister city.”
They never forgot us. Last spring, they named a room in their town hall for a Staples High School French teacher who was a driving force behind the relationship. In the aftermath, they wondered if our 2 towns — Westport and Marigny — might join together now to help rebuild a third, in Ukraine.
Today, we announce a project to do just that.
On Friday, Tooker and I joined a Zoom call with Brian, Marshall, Liz and Richard; 3 members of a Westport group working on this Ukraine “sister city” project, and 2 officials from Lyman (pronounced LEE-mon).
Using Starlink — the only reliable communication service, after a missile strike just hours earlier — Mayor Alexander Victoravich Zuravlov described the urgent needs of his community: Plywood, roofs, and other housing material. Generators. Medication. Starlinks. Tractors. Trash and debris removal equipment.
Ruslan Goriachenko, chief of the Ukrainian national police human rights department, added more needs: police and fire trucks.
Westport, Ukraine and aid organization participants in Friday’s Zoom call.
It was one of the most powerful conversations I’ve ever been part of.
When it was over, the Westporters stayed on the line. Stunned by the needs in Lyman, yet empowered by the opportunity given us, we asked Brian, Liz and Richard to prioritize their needs.
They said: Building and construction materials to fix windows, roofs and entire houses. Wood-burning stoves. Generators. And a large water filtration system.
How much would that cost? $250,000, they said, would cover every home and apartment building in Lyman that needed it.
And, they promised, they could deliver it all within 3 days.
So that’s the challenge, Westport. Let’s raise $250,000 by Christmas Day. That will provide real, immediate,, on-the-ground help — roofs, warmth, water, electricity, communication — for an entire town that has been attacked, occupied, ravaged, and now ignored by the rest of the world.
It’s not impossible. It’s imperative.
We’ve done it before. We helped Marigny (and they will join us soon in this effort).
Every family, every resident, every organization, school and religious group in town can help. It’s just $10 for every Westport resident.
And it could not be easier to donate to the non-profit organization. Just click here. Click the “I want to support” box; then select “Support for the City of Lyman.” Scroll down on that page for other donation options (mail, wire transfer and Venmo.) You can also donate directly, via Stripe (click here).
Your donation will be direct. Your impact will be immediate. This is a Westport-generated project — and it’s Westport run, with the support of our 1st Selectwoman, “06880” and Brian Mayer — but its really universal. Please spread this appeal to your friends and relatives everywhere, via links and social media.
Hope survives in Lyman.
It takes a village to help a village. As 1st Selectwoman Tooker says: “I was so honored to meet with these brave Ukrainian leaders. Their courage and love for their country and people is beyond inspiring. This is a wonderful opportunity for Westporters to make a tangible difference.”
This is just the start. We promised the mayor of Lyman that we will be there for them for a long time — just as we were for Marigny.
But we’re starting now. We’re starting quickly. And we’re starting big.
There’s no better time than the holiday season. We have so much, and Lyman has so little. Thanks for clicking here, Westport.
Apartment building in Lyman.
PS: If I didn’t appreciate what we have here, and what they lack there, I sure do now.
During the Zoom call, I sat in my warm, well-lit home office, a hot cup of coffee on my desk. As the mayor told his counterpart here about conditions in Lyman, she listened with sorrow.
Toward the end of the meeting, our 1st Selectwoman held up a sign. “We Stand With Ukraine,” it said.
The reaction was immediate. We hardly needed an interpreter to understand what the Ukrainians said: “Thank you for not forgetting us. You have boosted our morale today!”
1st Selectwoman Jen Tooker with her Ukraine sign.
Jen Tooker’s sign lifted 2 men’s spirits.
Now, our $250,000 — raised by Christmas — will do much more. It will give 13,000 men, women and children shelter, warmth and water.
And the knowledge that they have 25,000 new friends, halfway across this fragile globe.
Slava Ukraini! Slava Lyman!
Christmas in Lyman. More scenes of the town are below.
In April, “06880” reported on Westport native Brian Mayer’s work in Poland.
iThe New York tech executive was there, helping deliver supplies for Ukrainian refugees, and the army.
He’s still at it. Here’s his latest report:
I’m writing to you from one of the countless border crossing lines I’ve waited on in the last 2 weeks. I’m on my way to pick up several more suitcases of specialty medicine from Sauveteurs Sans Frontières. Then I’ll take it back to Ukraine for onward delivery to the east. I’ve gotten pretty good at these crossings, and it helps to have priority access when laden with humanitarian aid. My record cross time so far is 28 minutes. But you don’t want to hear about border logistics.
Stalin said that one death is a tragedy, and a million deaths is a statistic. I thought about this the other day when driving through Ivano-Frankivsk. Traffic ground to a halt for a funeral procession: A hearse was led by a priest and a coterie of singing babushkas, with a young widow draped in black and two dozen family and friends in tow. It was simple but mournful, routine in any other place. But this isn’t any other place.
This scene is repeated thousands of times in every town and small village, every day across Ukraine right now. Wives are becoming widows and children are becoming orphans. People are going back to work to find desks of coworkers empty; so many poker nights are now short a player. And all for the sake of a completely unnecessary war, and a 19th century imperial fantasy in the deranged head of one wrinkly old crackpot in Moscow.
I realized talking to my new friends here that the initial anger and shock that we all felt in the first couple weeks of this war has faded into the background. Anger and frustration are not productive emotions. You learn quickly that it doesn’t help make queues go faster or prices go down or gas become available or goods reach their intended destinations quicker.
Everything on the ground is harder than it should be, but you suffer it because you must, and there is no other option. You push forward because your anger has yielded to something more powerful and more useful: a desire to win, at all costs. A recent column said it best: Putin has to lose. There is no other option.
This is why so few expats I’ve worked with on the border have been able to stay away, even as some have taken much needed breaks back home in Europe or Canada or wherever they are from.
Many have pushed harder and deeper into Ukraine, taking on more and more dangerous missions, following the urgency: families that need evacuation, orphanages that need resettlement, soldiers that need medical care, children that need cancer treatment, villages and towns that need food, soap, toothbrushes, underwear and medicine, all before the Russians close in and martial law is imposed.
Brian Mayer
I am thankful I have a day job, which keeps me grounded and in a routine. After all, I have to be at a high speed WiFi connection at 4 p.m. Ukraine time every day. If I didn’t, I could see myself being pulled further east, as the demands from the front lines are impossible to ignore. ‘
Many of my new friends here quit their day jobs as receptionists and roofers and bricklayers and students and are now routinely dodging rocket strikes while shuttling crucial supplies across the pockmarked landscape. One of my new driver friends told me their joke: “In the UK, you drive on the left. In Europe, you drive on the right. In the Ukraine, you drive on the part of the road that’s still there.”
I’m closely watching how this war is affecting the expats here. There are no psychological services available for volunteers and aid workers, and certainly nothing to prepare many in civilian life for talking to rape victims or seeing corpses or having friends murdered.
When a volunteer Irish soldier showed me a picture of his mates and a Ukrainian family they rescued, then told me “10 minutes later everyone in this photo was dead,” and proceeded to tell me in excruciating detail what it was like to wear the same pair of underwear for two weeks and fight in the trenches with no food, because humanitarian groups consider feeding soldiers to be outside their purview — you don’t really have an outlet for hearing these sorts of stories, let alone experiencing them firsthand.
This is also the reason why everyone’s anger is pointed not at the Russians — after all, we are united in our common purpose against them and, as discussed, this anger is not productive — but at the governments and NGOs on our side that don’t seem to understand the reality on the ground. The governments continue to make humanitarian border crossings a nightmare, holding up trucks for days, especially the empty trucks going back to Poland to pick up more supplies.
Fuel price caps and various other regulations have worsened diesel shortages, and this whole supply effort runs on diesel. NGOs talk about donations going to “humanitarian purposes only” as if it is possible to separate civilian needs from the war effort. Humanitarian aid is useless if the Russians have cut off supply lines. Medicine is useless if the recipients are killed. Most importantly, soldiers are people too, and they need to eat and brush their teeth and have clean socks and underwear. Where is the help for them? And how can we possibly be expected to win this war without it?
I am also shocked by the failure of last mile logistics from NGOs here. I’ve now been at the warehouses of at least 4 major internatonal NGOs in Poland, all with the same general pattern: a supply drop of hundreds of pallets of humanitarian aid in a warehouse given to a project manager with absolutely no budget or even a plan for getting the supplies into Ukraine.
These poor project managers, many of them first timers, are being asked to move hundreds of pallets without trucks or forklifts or money or local contacts or translators, and many of them are even forbidden from crossing the border. How are these goods supposed to make it into Ukraine, let alone to the front lines where they are needed the most?
The truth is, that task is left to the volunteer drivers working here who are risking their lives every day to bring supplies to the front. They will receive no parade back home, no medals or recognition for their work, and certainly no accolades from the Ukrainian government. They’re paying for their own gas and lodging.
Aid convoys have been bombed and volunteers have been killed, and they will receive no military honors or benefits for their families back home. And many of these volunteers are expats who don’t need to be here. They are here because they see this war for what it is: a fight for our civilization and our values. And though diesel fuels their cars, it is duty that drives them to the front.
That is why we need your help more than ever, to cover food, medicine, and most importantly, diesel!
We just established our US aid umbrella, Ukraine Aid International, which means we can now take tax deductible contributions. Please Venmo @ukraineaidinternational or send tax deductible contributions to: Ukraine Aid International, 88 Partrick Road, Westport, CT 06880.
Thank you for all your support. (Hat tip: Nancy Diamond)
Click here to help support “06880” via credit card or PayPal. Any amount is welcome, appreciated — and tax-deductible! Reader contributions keep this blog going. (Alternate methods: Please send a check to “06880”: PO Box 744, Westport, CT 06881. Or use Venmo: @blog06880. Or Zelle: dwoog@optonline.net. Thanks!)
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We need less than $145,000 more to reach our goal of $250,000. That will provide 150 homes ruined during the Russian occupation with new roofs, windows and more — plus a generator for every one. And a water filtration system for the entire devastated town.
UAI invited Liz and Richard to Westport. They met 1st Selectwoman Jen Tooker, and introduced the idea of a “sister city relationship.” She knew the concept well.
