Ukraine letter: ‘People are tired but they want to help each other and finish this war’

Last week in Odesa was “loud”, as Ukrainians describe spells of heavy bombing, but nightly Russian attacks did not make singer Maryna Shulha regret coming back to this Black Sea port from her adopted home of Ireland.

Refugee status severely restricts Shulha’s travel outside Ireland, so she is cramming a lot into her short trip – preparing for a final concert in Odesa to complete her music degree, catching up with friends and family who have stayed during the war, and raising money for people and animals caught up in the disastrous flooding of the nearby Kherson region.

In a few days she will return to Ireland, where she divides her time between Ennis and Dublin and regularly performs on Grafton Street and in her favourite busking venue of Bray, where the seaside setting and relaxed air remind her of Odesa.

“I came back now to finish my education and I don’t worry too much about the bombings. I decided that what will be, will be,” says Shulha (26), who moved from the northern city of Shostka to Odesa to study economics before switching her focus to music.

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She fled to Dublin soon after Russia launched its all-out invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, before moving with her boyfriend to Ennis to trim living costs and be closer to friends.

Her main audience is in and around the capital, however, so she returns regularly to Dublin to perform with other musicians and to teach singing classes, while building up her repertoire and reputation on the private party and events scene.

When all this started, people began to be more together…Now there’s more connection between people

—  Maryna Shulha

“I went to Ireland because I spoke some English and knew that Ireland had some problems like Ukraine – the war with Britain - so I felt some connection,” Shulha says, drawing a parallel that is often noted here between Anglo-Irish history and Russia’s long domination of her homeland.

“In Ukraine we really like to speak to each other, we’re very communicative, and I think Irish people are similar. They like to have fun and are more easy-going than in some other countries. Though sometimes they’re too relaxed!” she says with a laugh.

“We don’t want to use or exploit Ireland,” she says, emphasising her gratitude for State benefits but also her determination to pay her way: “I’m healthy and I don’t want to be dependent.”

Shulha’s generation has grown up during a period of historic upheaval for Ukraine. In winter 2004-2005 the peaceful Orange Revolution defeated a bid to rig presidential elections in favour of Kremlin-friendly candidate Viktor Yanukovich. Nine years later the Maidan Revolution drove him from power after his security forces killed more than 100 protesters, and Russia gave him sanctuary as it seized Crimea and fomented conflict in eastern Ukraine.

Post-Maidan Ukraine’s rapid integration with the West and drive to join the European Union and Nato were intolerable for an increasingly dictatorial and imperialist Russia, which attacked its neighbour with full force nearly 16 months ago and now claims sovereignty over five of its regions.

The invasion has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced millions and reduced several towns and cities to ruins, but it has also strengthened Ukraine’s national identity and galvanised its people – at home and abroad – to do what they can for their compatriots and the war effort.

“These historic events make us stronger and more human. They make us try to understand each other better and be more supportive and helpful,” says Shulha. “When all this started, people began to be more together…Now there’s more connection between people.”

She returned to Ukraine shortly after the destruction of a huge Russian-occupied dam on the Dnipro river flooded a swathe of Kherson region to the east of Odesa and drove thousands of people from their homes.

Ukrainians responded in what is now their customary way, by joining the relief effort and making donations to volunteer groups that raced to affected areas near the front line.

Shulha collected money to help people and animals made homeless by the disaster, in a fundraising drive backed by Irish singer Stella Bass, while preparing for her final university concert in a city where missile and drone attacks were making sleep elusive.

“People are tired but they want to help each other and finish this war. Everyone is trying to be useful, they live and keep going,” Shulha says in a café where sleep-deprived Odesans are enjoying the warm sunshine and a precious interlude between air raid sirens. “I miss the relaxed life of Odesa. I feel at home here, and in Ireland I feel like a refugee.”