You're reading: A family divided by war

Natalya and Alexei Zorin are brother and sister. They both were born and raised in Mariupol.

Being children, the guys took very serious the words of their father when he told them to stick together so they wouldn’t get lost in this turbulent world.

Natalya and Alexei have always been friends, and remain so now, when they’re more than 30 years old. Alexei lives in Russia’s Rostov-on-Don, where he had moved after graduating secondary school.

Natalya stayed in Mariupol.

But the two had no problems with meeting each other as often as they wanted since the distance between them was just 180 kilometers. They had no problems until the spring of 2014

Now the distance has increased almost 19 times. They have to cross over the distance of 1,500 kilometers long – a minimum distance from Mariupol to Rostov if you want to bypass the occupied territories.

“Now Lviv has become closer to Mariupol than Rostov,” says Kiryl, husband of Natalya.

Natalya has never seen her niece, a daughter of Alexei, 10 months old Sasha, which hurts her badly. The situation is not less hard for Alexei to cope with.

“It’s a catastrophe that I haven’t seen my sister for so long. But at least we are lucky to have the enemy Western technologies like Skype that makes the communication easier. Otherwise we would have to stand in a queue at some trunk-call office, shout into the receiver and keep on putting coins in a phone,” says Alexei.

Their biographies look pretty much similar. They both have studied economics and worked for state agencies as the auditors. The two quit their jobs for pretty similar reasons.

“As a woman of honor I quit my job when I felt that my bosses wanted to use me as a chastener or a blackmailer. Like, I had to do the audition just to tame the obstinate ones… I was not surprised at all when the local authorities cringed before the thugs from the Donetsk People’s Republic, so rotten had been the whole system,” Natalya says.

As for Alexei, these are his impressions of Russian society: “I wanted to be useful to society. But I failed. The bosses demanded from their subordinates not the eagerness, knowledge and skills. They demanded just the loyalty,nothing more… Well, a lot of people liked it. So I was not surprised when they supported all this imperial madness. They like not to bear any responsibility, they are happy not to think for themselves, doing just what they are told to do. They are ready to follow the leader wherever he may lead them.”

Alexei says he doesn’t believe in Russia any more. He calls it a “blind alley.” At the same time, he pins hopes on Ukraine. Despite all the problems the country experiences, he thinks that “Ukraine is a possible outlet.”

Kiryl, husband of Natalya, says that a lot of people he works with at the Mariupol seaport pin their hopes… on Russian President Vladimir Putin, “a good wizard who is going to come and solve all their problem.”

Though the problems they are going through – decrease of cargo traffic – are the direct consequence of Putin’s interference in Ukrainian affairs. And the current problems will look like small potatoes if they happen to live in a breakaway territory. The seaport will be closed. They will just lose their jobs. Kiryl says they still dismiss: “Ah, come on! Putin will work it out somehow! He won’t let us alone!?

Natalya and Kiryl are afraid of the possible capture of Mariupol.

They have prepared everything necessary for the instant escape.

Ilya, their 4-year-old son, already knows what the war is like. The family left the city before for some time because of the attack.

Ilya could hear the shelling. Some refugees from Donetsk lived in their house. In kindergarten he was given a special card with his blood group and an instruction in case of attack. The boy often passed through the checkpoints and happened to like to greet soldiers with a motto “Glory to Ukraine!” Therefore, says Kiryl smiling, it’s better not to pass the separatist checkpoints for him.

Alexei and hisfamily are also ready to leave Rostov for Ukraine, because the vast majority of Russians have caught the virus of imperial insanity, as Alexei puts it. And it’s hard for a man to live amidst all this. Alex also feels a certain guilt and keeps on convincing his friends in Rostov: “We should be ashamed. Well, how’s all this happened? This nightmare has become true by the silent consent of all… However, I believe that it will end – and we will all meet in a peaceful Ukraine.”

Natalya, Alexei and Kiryl are fond of kitesurfing over the water. They used to have a big mixed company of Ukrainians and Russians. Natalya says that many of their Russians friends call them now to apologize for the Russian aggression against Ukraine. They cannot get together in their favorite place near Mariupol because it’s shelled. But Natalya is happy that their past flights over the water help them to overcome the war between their countries.