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«When we look up at the sky, I point to a star: “Your daddy is there, he is protecting us from there»

In September 2023, during the Russian “Shahed” attack on Lviv, when, among other things, warehouses with Caritas-Spes humanitarian aid were destroyed, Petro Burban, a father of three, was killed. The memory of him and the good he gave, as well as people's support and desire to realize her husband's dreams, keep her going today and give her strength, says his wife Natalia.

“He did not go to the front line, but he died from the war...”

In the first months of the full-scale war, he volunteered to join the Armed Forces. “I was very worried, I told him to think logically: you have three children, you have never been in the army,” Natalia recalls. But her Petro could not do otherwise. He believed that when an enemy came to your land and wanted to destroy your country and your family, you had to take up arms to protect everything that was dear and important to you. But he was turned away from Yavoriv, where volunteer units were being formed to go to the front, to serve in a local military unit. The argument was his three small children. “He was in the terrorist defense. And at the same time he was volunteering: he was looking for ammunition for our defenders, transporting food, water, and medicine to the guys on the front line,” the woman says. ”I remember when the war started, we read reports that Russian troops were marching on Kyiv, saw photos and videos of these tank columns... And we couldn't believe that this was happening today, in the twenty-first century. And then, when the news came out of Bucha, Borodyanka, Chernihiv region... It was a horror the world had never seen. And I remembered how my grandfather, who fought in World War II, was a German prisoner of war, went through the path of an overseas worker, and said: “I have never met such cruel people as the Russians anywhere else. Even the Germans treated us prisoners more humanely than the Russians...”

...Natalia recalls the story of her meeting with her future husband with a smile. One day she arrived at a car wash, and she didn't know how to deal with the different hoses. A guy who worked there volunteered to help wash the car. And that meeting was fateful. Love, marriage, and a shared great desire to raise a family. Natalia says: “Petro was a man you could rely on for everything. He was caring, hardworking, and very fond of children. Their daughter Vasylyna is now 8 years old, and their sons Mykhailo and Ivan are 6 and 3. “Petro wanted us to have a fourth child. We both came from families with four children... Our children adored their father. He played with them, took care of them, and talked to them about various topics. Today, the boys ask: Mom, what kind of car is this, or what brand of car? After all, Dad knew everything, he told them about it. I say: go online, look it up on Google, on YouTube, because I don't know much about it. And they did...”

Petro resigned from the Armed Forces and got a job as a warehouse guard in September last year. The first day he started work was fatal for him. The worst day in the family's life...

“The night the air raid started, he called me at 4 o'clock and said: 'Natalia, hide in the corridor, because the chessmen are flying. And I was so exhausted... I said, “Let's not hide anywhere. As long as the war has been going on, there hasn't been anything so dangerous“. I could tell by his voice that he was offended: what do you mean, you won't go to a safer place? But I lay down and couldn't fall asleep. I hear sounds like motorcycles driving through our neighborhood. I open the window and see a triangle above the house: that's what a shahed looks like. I call my husband: “Petro, I'm telling you, the shaheds are coming. I hear the sounds of air defense - they didn't shoot them down, then new sounds of shots - they didn't shoot them down again. I say: they are flying to the city. “I hear it,” he replies. “And this sound that ends outside my window - it continues in the phone. And I hear the sound of that shahed, and the explosion, and my husband starts screaming... The conversation is cut off, but the phone connection is not cut off. I heard everything... The shahed pierced the thick walls of the warehouse, the ceiling, and the blast wave brought down the wall. There were three people under that wall: a guy, a woman and my husband... Those two were heard calling for help, but my husband was not, because he fell head first in the other direction. He was only 4 meters further away, but the rescuers did not hear him. I dialed an ambulance, called the police... I shouted into the phone: there is a man under the rubble in the warehouses. I waited for a very long time for a response. He could have been saved. Later it turned out that he had no other injuries than strangulation. Those two people were rescued in 40 minutes, they were not injured. But Petro was not seen... I found him myself 5 hours later... The operator did not pass on my requests to the rescue services. They are still investigating why. The criminal case is still ongoing...

You understand what kind of life path a person has. He didn't go to the front line, but he died from the war... on his first day at work. You can't influence a person's fate, you can't change what is going to happen to them.”

 “Even under constant threats, you feel that this is your home”

Her children do not let her give up today, Natalia admits. She has to rely only on herself: she has no grandparents. Natalia's mother died six months before Petro's death: complications from covid. Her husband's entire family is in Germany. They invited her and her children to live with them. She did not agree. She said that she needed to see her life abroad, to feel that it was her own. “We are happy here. Even under rockets, under constant threats, you feel that this is your home. Why should I leave my home? I read stories about Kharkiv... There are arrivals every day. But still, people live, the city lives, cleans up the destruction. And we are here in Lviv, in the rear, as it were. Although, of course, every time I get anxious, I worry a lot. We live in the Sykhiv neighborhood, rockets are flying over us - if we don't see them, we always hear them. When a rocket flies, the whole house vibrates. I am not afraid of death as such. I am worried that if I die, my children will be left alone... I think about the man whose family was killed on Pryvokzalna Street... (Yaroslav Bazylevych lost his wife and three daughters in the attack by Russian “daggers” on Lviv on September 4, 2024). He's all alone. It's unbearable. My husband is dead. But i have our children. They are my support now and my incentive to live on.”

Her life, Natalia says, is filled with faith and “airy hopes that all this horror of war will soon end. And that there will be some confidence in the future, an opportunity to raise children. “Vasylynka has her mother's character. She is stubborn, just like me (laughs). I get angry, sometimes she is so naughty. And then I remember what I used to be like... And the boys are like «tattoos». Ivasyk, especially, is a daddy's boy. He knows what he wants, and all his friends come to him. He is very sociable. My husband was like that. Mykhailo is very responsible: he wakes up first and wakes everyone else up. The boys go to kindergarten, and my daughter goes to school. Vasylynka likes to draw, Mykhailo and Ivanko are fond of Lego, cars... My husband and I dreamed that we would go to the sea with our children. I would like to take them there, but it's not realistic yet. I bought an inflatable pool for my children with the money I received from the mayor's office as a help after my husband's death. Now we have a swimming pool in the village in the summer. We go to the village often to take a break from the sound of air raids. We have a house there, a small garden... When Lviv was shelled in early September this year, we were at home, in the city. The children were very scared. We were sitting in the corridor, praying, and the shelling was so powerful, as if it was behind the neighboring house. We thought it was nearby, but it turned out to be in the center. From the announcement of the alarm to the arrival, a minute passes if the “daggers” are flying.

“I am grateful to every family who opened their hearts to our people”

Thanks to the support of the Ukrainian-Polish project “Family to Family”, Natalia was able to buy her children the necessary things: clothes, shoes, and food. “I stockpiled food to be calm. Since we have no father, there is no one to take care of us. I also used the money to repair our house. We started this renovation with my husband. Petro dreamed that we would renovate the house, that everything would be comfortable for us, that I would have a new kitchen. Today, I am trying to fulfill his dream to complete the renovation. Although it is not easy. But I'm doing my best, and I'm laying the tiles myself a little bit, remembering how Petro used to do it...”

Natalia admits that sometimes she is so tired that she wants to “just die... for a day” to rest. “The children are small, very emotional, and need attention. I am completely responsible for their upbringing today. The kindergarten helps out. It's good that the Lviv educational authorities met us halfway, and they arranged a kindergarten not far from home. It relieved me a bit, and after my husband's death I could take care of some things. The teachers are responsive, they always meet us halfway, they understand that there are different situations.

I feel support from many people. From my husband's friends. I didn't know how many friends my husband had until he died... A sea of people - everyone came up to me to say a few kind words. My husband... He was just a simple guy, he was not an official, not a star. And only after the funeral I realized that he was valuable not only to me, but also to many others. For everyone who came to pay their last respects to him.”

Natalia is very grateful to the Polish families who responded to Ukrainian misfortune and need from the very beginning of the war. To everyone who joined the Family to Family project. “It is important that people open their hearts to the hearts of others. Every contribution is counted by God. God will reward everyone for theirs,” she said, ”Every person, every family that opened their hearts to our people. I am very grateful to the Caritas community for responding.”

When asked what she dreams of most, Natalia answers: a free Ukraine. “I never thought about how important this is before. Because all the little things in life can be solved... If you don't have clothes, your neighbor will help you, if you don't have anything to eat, he will lend you bread. But without freedom, without the state, these little children will have no future. And you don't understand this until you find yourself in the situation that all our people are in today... We lived in independent Ukraine for 30 years without realizing how important it is to be the master of your own home. We are hardworking, we will overcome everything. We will plant flowers, bake bread. We will sew clothes - I am a dressmaker myself, so I know that I will find a use for my skills. We will rebuild everything, build new houses and cities... But if we do not defeat the enemy on the battlefield, this problem will be left to our children. Our heroes are buried on the Field of Mars in Lviv... We used to go there often with our children when my husband was alive. Now I go there with my children alone. Children should know the price of our freedom. To know that the price is very high and very bitter.”

***

On the power of prayer

“Once I was walking through the city, to the store. I was thinking about my children, kindergarten, school,” Natalia says, ”and for some reason, at that moment I thought: I need to pray for the guys on the front line so that the enemy doesn't see them. This is, you know, the need of the soul... I cannot explain it. I prayed - until I reached the mountain, I said “Mother of God, virgin...” several times, and then went about my business. And two days later, I scroll through my Facebook feed - the soldier writes. He says: there was a situation when 15 of them were near the enemy. And they had almost no weapons to shoot back. The enemy saw them, he writes, and fired - to the left, to the right, in front of us, behind us... It must have been someone's prayer - mothers, wives, sisters, daughters - that saved us. That's what he wrote. And I compared the time he was talking about. And this is the time when I decided to pray while going about my business. To ask in prayer that our defenders would be invisible to the enemy. That they would stay alive.

If you think of praying, do it. Because God reads our every prayer...

...We pray every night with the kids. For the military, for prisoners of war, for the offended, the disadvantaged, the displaced. For the peace of our dad's soul. When we look at the sky, I point to a star and say: “See? Your dad is there. He is protecting us from there.”

14 October 2024
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