Yustyna: “Before I came to Medyka I had been preparing for a Vipassana retreat. I was putting all my affairs in order, to disappear for ten silent meditation days. Little did I know I wasn’t preparing for Vipassana but the War. Instead of the retreat, I went to the border to see if I could help in any way possible. I realized that was no organized help in place, so I decided to become the one who would stay and take care of the refugees. The first days were very intense. We were helping the refugees in critical situations under harsh weather conditions. I was looking around mainly for women with children. My approach was to come up to the ladies who looked the most exhausted and ask how can I help. Usually, they refused to receive any help, so I had to earn their trust for them to accept my support. I have never held so many babies in my life. Their mothers were exhausted and usually were collapsing at the moment I took the baby from their hands.
I used to be a software developer, and the way I described my job to my grandparents was that I was fixing problems. That is precisely, what I was doing in Medyka. Of course, I quit my corporate job on the third day in Medyka. There were infinite amounts of issues and I just had to do everything to find a solution. I was trying not to mess things up with my shortcomings. I think I have been doing pretty good so far.
My first real mission, besides serving tea and sandwiches, was to organize a private company to manage the trash collection. With so many people going through Medyka we had a lot of waste and the city wasn’t really taking care of it. That was also the time I met Mike who then became a catalyst for things to get better and more stable! I will be forever grateful for that. “Mike the trash guy”, you never helped me with the waste management, but I will wait for the time when we can work on that together!”
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