HOMESICK BUT ADAPTING
Desperate to start earning as soon as she arrived, Iryna took a job working at a checkout. But the teacher is now working in a herbalist shop and loving it. “It’s a peaceful place, with good karma,” she smiled.
Rather than tough out the war, “I chose the other reality” by looking for refuge in a safe country, she said.
Now nearly a year on, the couple are at last beginning to take advantage of what Vienna has to offer, visiting museums and going to their first ball after being invited by some new Austrian friends.
But it is hard to get what is happening back home out of their heads.
“I want to persuade myself that all is going well, that we are adapting, but every day I want to be home,” said Iryna.
Every morning she wakes up with her head in Ukraine. “My day begins by watching Telegram news channels. I check how Kyiv and Irpin are … and of course my relatives,” she said, showing photos of her brother in his military fatigues.
“My husband tells me, ‘Stop doing it, you need to switch.’ I understand. I work, I study, I am with my family.”
Their sons are also homesick and like to hang out with other Ukrainians. After being bullied at school, 11-year-old Denys has changed classes and is getting on better.
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