New York Times: 25 years after Chernobyl, a village persists
Redkovka, Ukraine, bears little resemblance to the place it was 25 years ago. Its stores, its school, its factory, and its homes — all are gone, or dramatically changed, as a result of the 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl, about 22 miles away. The church, though, remains. Every day, its 74-year-old caretaker, Lida Masanovitz, wakes up at dawn to begin her chores. When the freelance photographer Diana Markosian visited her in March, she woke up early, too, watching Ms. Masanovitz make breakfast, manage the farm and tend to the church. Most of Redkovka’s residents — about 1,000 people — resettled after the disaster. But the five families there today, including Ms. Masanovitz and her husband, Mikhail, 73, refused. “This was home for them,” Ms. Markosian said. “This was where they grew up.” Read the story here.