The war in Ukraine started more than a year ago. On February 24, 2022 lives of millions of Ukrainians were brutally disrupted by the russian invasion. Innocent lives have been lost and ruined… it is heartbreaking and devastating. We don’t know how many Ukrainians have been killed, but we do know that millions are scattered around the world as refugees. They were forced to pack their lives in one or two suitcases and leave their homes; many ended up here, in the USA. We welcome them under the general umbrella of the term “refugees” but we don’t stop to think: who are these people? We forget that every person who moved here had a normal life just over a year ago. They were university students, doctors, engineers, economists, and entrepreneurs. They made decent salaries and went on vacations, they had hopes and dreams, and they did not expect to end up in a foreign country with a language barrier, becoming just “refugees”, trying to grow into who they REALLY ARE.
The goal of this photographic series is to show the faces of Ukrainian refugees who moved to Rochester, NY. I asked them a simple question: what did you bring in that one suitcase you packed? Most said that they will disappoint me, they had to leave behind most of their material possessions and brought with them just their passport and diploma, Bible or prayer book and rosary, their children, and some clothes…
The idea for this project came to me while volunteering for RocMaidan, a local non-profit group that functions under the umbrella of the Ukrainian Cultural Center of Rochester. The group works on collecting and purchasing medical supplies for Ukrainians to save the lives of those who are wounded by the russian bombings. At the beginning of the war, the need for medical supplies was so acute that the group would send them in suitcases with people who traveled to Poland by air (to ensure fast delivery). When the members of the group ran out of their own suitcases, they called on the Rochester community to donate old suitcases to transport medical and humanitarian aid to Ukraine, and the community responded with an abundant flow of old suitcases... most were used but some were too old and too heavy to be utilized. As I was leaving the RocMaidan warehouse warehouse (generously donated by Xerox) after a day of volunteering, a line of colorful exotic suitcases caught my eye and, for some reason, all I could think of was the people who had to pack their lives into a suitcase or a backpack and leave for the unknown. My heart sank, I felt their pain, I felt the sorrow of their situation and the tragedy of this unprovoked war that has been taking millions of lives and ruining Ukraine as a country. I wanted to tell the story of Ukrainian refugees and I used the old suitcases donated by the people of Rochester as a symbol of help, as the element that connects the people who moved to Rochester and this generous community….
(For more information on RocMaidan, visit rocmaidan.org)