Ivan Baidak

And I sat on the shore of the lake, and my thoughts were clear, and a light wind flirted with me, and I could argue with it with my freedom. For the first time in many years, I felt truly free, my heart was free of worries, I was not dependent on anyone, and I was not obligated to anyone. My most difficult choice of the day was choosing where to dine and wine to celebrate life with.

This is roughly how my notes would sound if I really came here for a literary residency. But there is a war in my country. And they call me a refugee. Therefore, everything is different.
I haven’t had a day off since February 24.

In a parallel life, I could be in Mariupol. It’s been a month since we’ve been hiding in the basement. There are nine of us here. My sister and I, our neighbors and their families. There were more of us, but a neighbor tried to bring us water and came under artillery fire. Didn’t come back. Someone said that they saw his body being thrown into a mass grave.
People survive here, these are real hunger games.

Today I found out that my close friend is going to the front. At our last meeting, we talked a lot about the war, and wondered whether it could really start. And in a few days, we were supposed to meet again, but he got sick. We were both very upset then, and now I am even more upset.

Where and when will our next meeting take place? Under what conditions, what will our conversations be like?

The girl did not leave the city, because she was taking care of her mother, who was bedridden. An occupier settled in her house. During the week, he constantly raped the girl, and then said that he was in love with her and wanted to take her away.

And you watch these scary videos to the prophetic song by “Odyn v Canoe” (“One in a Canoe”), where rockets are flying, cities are being destroyed, houses are being destroyed, homes are being destroyed. All life is being destroyed.
You imagine people who pack their backpacks in a rush and go somewhere, leaving everything behind.
Do they lock the door? Do they manage to turn off the water? What are they thinking about, are they hoping to return? How big is the price of loss?

The lost generation meant the youth in the interwar period, for whom the war cut off their dreams and deprived them of prospects, left them no choice, gave them no opportunity to hide, leaving behind only longing and hopelessness…

Life in Lviv has radically changed. Lviv became a home front city in the history of this war. Life on the home front. Life during the war. Where it is relatively safer, where people have to live despite the feeling of guilt, although in fact their participation in the war is also very important – full support of the front: food, logistics, shelter for the wounded, smiles for which our soldiers fight.

February 24. 02:34 (written a few hours before the invasion, caused by insomnia, expressed in, hopefully, prophetic words)

Exemplary team-studio of choreographic art “Aelita”.

Director: Oleksandra Tkachenko and choreographer Mykola Havryliuk

We are so immersed in history, especially when it is the story of our lives. I lived for a long time with Martin Pollak’s book – “Woman without a Tomb”, a story about the writer’s family, his grandfather and his many siblings, their connections and destinies. Sometimes they are too strange and confusing, very often lost and forgotten. It was after this book that I didn’t want to get lost, I wanted to know more about myself…