I was furious, thinking: 'Let everyone just give in to Putin, as long as this war ends'

February 24 is my birthday. I woke up, and I was just seething with anger that literally nobody remembered my birthday — everyone was talking about war.

Since 2017, I’ve been working in Germany with refugees. I organized integration courses for refugees from Syria.

When the first refugees from Ukraine started arriving, I was very annoyed that I had to drop everything and deal only with Ukrainians. For example, we had consultation hours, and Ukrainians would push ahead of Syrian women in line and say: “We’re from Ukraine.”

They criticized Germany, saying: “You don’t have electronic document processing, you don’t have this and that — it’s better in Ukraine.” I once snapped and said: “Yes, but you haven’t worked here a single day, haven’t paid taxes — you have no right to criticize my country.” I thought: “If the people there are like that — it’s not that they deserved it, but you can see why things happen to them the way they do.”

I decided to quit my job, because all of this didn’t sit right with me. I realized I couldn’t handle the stress. People don’t know I understand Russian. I can’t sit in the office and listen to them badmouthing and deceiving me.

Now, reflecting on it, I understand these were deeply traumatized people. People from Bucha, from Izium — when I later read about it in the news, I thought: “Lord, of course, that’s why they behaved that way.”

Also, since I have a Russian name — Yekaterina — I constantly had to justify it. When sanctions were introduced, every bank, every institution wrote to me demanding I come in and show documents, prove I’m no longer a citizen of the Russian Federation.

Shortly before the war, we bought a house in Germany and started renovating. When the war began, prices skyrocketed. For example, glass wool was manufactured in Russia and shipped through Ukraine. Window production was in Ukraine. Then butter disappeared, certain medications.

I was furious, thinking: “Just let everyone give in to Putin, as long as this war ends.”

The turning point was when in May 2022 we went with the family to the Frankfurt zoo. Frankfurt has a very large clinic that treats wounded soldiers from Ukraine. And there were Azov Regiment fighters in Azov T-shirts. They were so young — even younger than my husband and me — and so badly maimed.

When I saw them, I started crying, and they realized I was crying because of what I saw. One had no face, another had no arms or legs, but they were still so positive and kind. They started trying to comfort me. And that moment — how people who’ve suffered so terribly treat you with such kindness… I started talking to them and apologized profusely.

At that moment, I understood that I wanted this war to end — but with Ukraine winning. That the German government should stop giving in to Putin.

I started thinking about how I could help these people. I decided to teach German again. And I began to see Ukrainians from a completely different side. I started getting positive feedback from them. Although they didn’t know either that I understood Russian.

Now I mainly teach Ukrainians. For donations. We collect money for drones in Ukraine, for support of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. My husband told people about it at his workplace, and his company became a sponsor too.

My circle is entirely German, and at the start of the war, everyone was saying: “Let’s just give in to Putin — the important thing is that we can buy butter and fill up our cars cheaply again.” Many of our acquaintances said: “Why should we donate money? We don’t want to support the war.” But my worldview has changed. I say: “We’re not supporting war — we’re supporting peace.”

Germany is used to accepting refugees. When there was the war in Syria, we had exactly the same kind of news as from Ukraine — just a different country. So the attitude was: “What difference does it make which refugees come to us?”

In Germany, the Alternative for Germany party is gaining momentum. Their position is that all of this is supposedly happening because the president of Ukraine is a comedian. Nationalist and pro-war ideas are gaining traction.

Acquaintances of mine — Germans — who used to be soldiers have been going on military exercises every two weeks since the war in Ukraine started. My husband goes too. But we shouldn’t forget that without NATO, nobody can do anything.

They started showing on television what to do if war suddenly breaks out. There’s a military base not far from our city; the yellow alert level is still in effect. We’re supposed to have a three-week supply of fresh water. There was a practice siren, so we’d know where the shelters are.