October 2025

I started my mid-October update by saying that I was writing it in Poland on my way to Ukraine. Now I am starting the October post by saying that I wrote this post in Poland, on my way to the UK, from Ukraine. In the 2 weeks in between the updates I managed to do 80 hours of volunteering, which is amazing. It’s like having 2 part-time jobs or more, considering that I am going to different locations, 7 in total to be precise: Lviv Volunteer Kitchen, Domvika animal shelter, camo netting at by_porokhova, camo netting at the library, art healing with children, train station to offer support to the internally displaced people, and another one [not talking about in online].

The cat on the right is called Forum. A Ukrainian poet who couldn’t attend the book forum at the library as he did every year, as he was deployed in Kharkiv, sent a rescue cat instead. A 5-month-old kitten, he was named by the soldier who missed the event. Forum is now living comfortably at the library with plenty of toys, food, and attention. He is a sweetheart, so cute and friendly, and he is great with kids.

I bought this small gift, some English Breakfast tea, for a British soldier who is recovering in hospital from a serious injury. He was wonderful and next time I am going to Ukraine I will bring something for him. He is one of 2 soldiers I had the opportunity to visit in this period and what a privilege has been. I have a surprise for the second soldier too.

For the first time I went to the Field of Mars to visit a specific grave. I went alone, as the friend I asked wanted to go by themselves, and in the end it was better. This is Oleh’s grave. His birthday would have been on the 19th and I saw him being remembered on his birthday. A few days later I went to bring flowers.

Oleh said:

We don’t need peace. We need victory. Because peace was once there and it didn’t work. Therefore, we need victory.

He was born in Lviv, in 2001, and he worked in IT. He was an AR developer and 3D artist. He has participated in hackathons from Meta and he won an important one. While deployed in the Zaporizhzhia direction [where Volya is from], he used an old project as an entry for a contest and won $800, which he spent on equipment. Oleh joined the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade on 27 February 2022.
On 13 January 2023 he received a shrapnel wound near Bakhmut. By April he was back in his unit. In May 2023 he began to develop an application that would facilitate the work of Ukrainian snipers, but, unfortunately, he did not have time to finish it. On 7 June 2023 he died near Bakhmut. Oleh was posthumously awarded the Order of Courage III degree on 11 August, same year.

The special exhibition my friends organised at the Territory of Terror museum, on Olenivka, is still going on, so I went to see it.

I was at the Veteran’s Market and got really lovely bread. This market is twice a month and only veterans or families of fallen heroes can sell there. There are more small businesses than places, as it is a very small market, so the items on offer differ.

I went to the Lviv Opera with a friend and her friend. We saw ballet and it was lovely. After that we went for dinner, and we were the last ones to leave the restaurant.
We saw Night of Walpurgis and Pahita, two 1-act ballet performances.

I bought a Leocard, it is for public transport, very convenient and it means I use my bank card less.

This is a special tea, sold in small packets. It is liquid and it only needs hot water. I liked it very much and got some for the volunteers at the camo netting on my last day there.

As other volunteers were talking about going to the train station to help with the internally displaced people and I already did that before, I joined them. I knew where the meeting place was and I also know the station, as I’ve travelled from there many times. It was lovely to see some of the volunteers that do mainly that.

This is a church, during the 7 o’clock sermon, on a weekday.

Generators are out, again. russia attacks civilian infrastructure and blackouts are again happening. I can’t say that this impacted me a lot, as I was out for most of the day and most evenings anyway. But, of course, I was alone and staying in a hotel and eating out most days, for a family with children the situation is obviously more difficult.

I was taken to the border by a lovely fellow volunteer, and they had their cat with them. So, I spent all the 80 km to the border with the kitty on my lap. Naturally, I highly recommend travelling like this.

1. Net frame made for the exhibition in Edinburgh Central Library [picture from the exhibition]. 2. Carlisle for the night, on the way to Edinburgh. 3. Stop at Gretna Green before driving to Edinburgh. 4. The Kelpies at night, a trip after the first day of the exhibition. 5. Returning home. 6. Booked my trip to Ukraine. 7. My new mirror, in the porch. 8. Trench ready. 9. Conservatory foundation is done. 10. Volya sleeping. 11. Candlelight concert: Hans Zimmer. My favourite was Dunkirk. 12. Volya hid in a small cupboard. 13. Volya under the table. 14. Preparing the place to pour the concrete slab. 15. Cake, received by post. 16. The marshrutka from the border to Lviv. 17. Eternal glory to the heroes, the moment of silence. 18. Lviv, on my way to the camo netting place. 19. 7 hours of doing camo nets. 20. Another camo netting, more volunteering. 21. Olevinka massacre, remembered. 22. Cat on my lap. A death white cat which is a wonderful kitty, well worth adopting. 23. Working in the kitchen. 24. Painting baubles. 25. New vegan restaurant in Lviv: Organica. 26. Ballet with 2 friends. 27. Visit to a soldier injured on the frontlines in Ukraine. 28. Birthday party for an injured British soldier fighting in Ukraine. 29. I met Forum, a cat with a lovely story. 30. Olenivka exhibition. 31. Last day in Lviv.

This is a very special book. The author of this book is volunteering in Ukraine, and he kindly loaned me the book to read it while I was in Ukraine. He is an American who had volunteered after 9/11 at ground zero and has been to Pakistan to see the Afghani refugees at a time when it was risky for a journalist to be there. I am very grateful that he gave me this special copy, only 1 of 25 in this edition. I loved the book, it is so much like the author, kind and with a flair for storytelling.

Books in October:
The Years of the Wizard by Rachel Morris – 4.5 stars
The letter no one would read by Andrew Penny – 5 stars