Pavlopol — one of those villages in the Donetsk region, which was unlucky to be in the so-called «grey zone» — the territory between positions of combatants. It is considered to be released, but in practice Ukrainian government has nothing to do with it. Elena Ivanenko — Pavlopol’s resident told the Informator.lg.ua about a life «between the hammer and the anvil».

Pastandpresent

Ihave been living in Pavlopol since 1979. Last year was the 35^th anniversary of my Pavlopol residency. Last year we celebrated the 35^th anniversary of our school and prepared a presentation with children: “Nashe budushee – Nashe maybutne” (our future in Russian and in Ukrainian). We presented a part of village’s history. There is a river Kalmius in the village, it is not deep, but in 1966 a storage pond was build there with a fish section. Starlets were reared there, which were sold to Moscow. A bridge was built to connect Pavlopol and Telmanovo region. Children from Telmanovo region and Orlovskoe village studied in Pavlopol. A kindergarten “Malysh” was build in 1968 along with a school, house of culture, library, village council’s building, cinema, two stores, post office, saving bank, sewing workshop, hairdressing salon …

The fish section was destroyed by bombing, just as the bridge, which was hit in 2014. Children from Orlovskoe village lost an opportunity to go to school. Parents had to send them to Mariupol and rent flats there. Our library hasn’t worked since January 1^st. There are no stores left. Thereareno “shopsonwheels”. Tradehasabsolutelystopped. There is no public transport, because of the admission system on the demarcation line, where buses had to wait for hours. People couldn’t get to job, to plants in Mariupol. Separate permits are needed for a person and a car. There were cases when people didn’t have permits for their cars and had to go by foot 2,5 km to the bus station to get to Mariupol to buy some food or get a pension. That is how we live. On January 19^th after a massive shelling people decided to leave the village, but all cars were turned back, even with small children. Only after the OSCE’s penetration on January 21^st, a column of 21 car managed to leave the village under the fire, escorted by the OSCE. Beforethatdayeveryonewasturnedback. Where? To the place under a fire.

A life from six to eight

A school in the village hasn’t worked since February. Some parents sent children to other school in 12 km. Pupils of 9^th grade are going there by bicycles. Becausetheywanttogeteducation. Parentsdrivesmallkidsbycars. Others left Pavlopol. About 200 people have stayed in Pavlopol out of 600. Others became IDPs, went to Mariupol, because they can find a job there. But parents asked to keep the school open, they hope to come back. But now it is a “grey zone”, abandoned “grey zone”. We have permits for a time period from 6 AM till 8 PM. It means that we cannot get sick or die from 8 PM till 6 AM, because the police or emergency wouldn’t come here. When people tried to register “death” notice they had to drive dead bodies in small carts. Can you imagine how terrible it is? When you keep a dead body till the evening, because the closest police from Mariupol can drive only to Volnovaha which is 75 km away from us – and only there you can testify death.

In between …

Today the village was shelled, a mine hit a house and a fire started. The head of the village addressed both sides, because we live between them, but any fire-truck came. There is no water in the village, a pump has also burnt. People came and saw ashes. We don’t even have a drinking water. When we need something to get repaired, we ask permission from both sides, ask them to stop fire. The last military unit, which we have seen, was Azov, they came, released our village, hang a flag and went away. We have no electricity for 16 days in February, and people mobilized themselves and repaired power lines. There was a massive shelling on January 12^th — many houses and a gas line were damaged. We are still waiting for the gas service, wounded pipes with rubber and wires and keep waiting.

Alive or dead?

Thereisaparable. Chinese mandarin gave people wise pieces of advice, but at some point of time people stopped coming, because he asked for too much money. Whenheaskedwhypeoplestoppedcoming? He was told that there was a wise man, who lived on the edge of a village and gives advice for free. Mandarindecidedtopunishthatwiseman. He decided to go to him, clutch a butterfly in his arms and ask: alive or dead? “If he says “alive” – I will squash is and he’ll lose; if he says “dead” – I will open my arms and the butterfly will fly away”. He came to the wise man and asked: “Alive or dead?” the wise man answered: “Everything is in your hands”. We live and believe that everything is in our hands. But if there will be no help and no one notice us, then – everything will be dead.

Denis Matsola for the Informator.lg.ua

Materials are prepared according to a “round table” “Invisible cities and villages. Life in frontline settlements” which took place in Kiev on May 22d.