Ruslan Gorbachov bought his house in Maryinka two years before the war started.

He spent over a year fixing his new home, replacing windows, doors and doing interior works. He and his wife were dreaming that they would be able to furnish it soon. The family was trying to stand on their own feet. The two children were already able to help them and they had everything to enjoy their lives.

When the war started, the whole family was hiding in the basement. They didn’t leave their home town of Maryinka in conflict-affected eastern Ukraine. There was only one day when they left their house – it was when they all went to their relative’s funeral. On that exact day a shell hit the roof of their house. The ceiling crashed down and there was a loud explosion inside.

But the Gorbachovs didn’t leave the town. Ruslan covered the big hole with plastic film. He was trying to protect the rooms from rain and snow and was waiting for warm weather to start fixing the room. Meanwhile…

Meanwhile, the family moved to the grandma’s house. There is no gas supply in Maryinka and they had to use electricity for heating. It was too expensive, but they had no other way out. When Gorbachovs received an offer from «Pope for Ukraine» Initiative to purchase a hard fuel boiler, Ruslan was happy.

— I will rearrange the heating system in the house, says Ruslan, –  I will loop it up in a part of house with no destruction and we’ll be able to live there with heating. We will be able to use our kitchen, bedroom and the bathroom. I will close up the destroyed part of the house and we’ll fix it in the summer as much as we can.

In short, there is still much work to do and it’s really difficult to carry this load on their own. But when there is someone to help, even with a kind word, everything is done much faster. Especially when you have the help in form of money or construction materials.

— We are so thankful to you for the boiler and for the fire wood, –says Ruslan. – We will return to our house and it will be alive again. When you own a house, you always need to fix something around the house… But when you live in somebody else’s home, you can only think about your own home. It doesn’t help to remove the destructions. It feels even worse because when you come to your abandoned house and you can see that there is more dust and garbage every time.We thank the Pope for the provided help. We wouldn’t be able to manage all these destructions on our own. We thank everyone who is helping!

Gennady NOVIKOV, Emmanuel Association