Viktoria has been working on getting information about her sister, but hasn’t come up with too much as yet. In a previous post I had noted that V found information that Inna had gotten some sort of assistance from a Russian/DPR source but (a) I personally wasn’t sure how accurate that site might have been and (b) that was from the beginning of April, so any aid received would likely have been used up by now. V has been using the contacts she’s been curating on the various Mariupol channels to try to dig up information. She had me look up the street address of Inna’s occasional boyfriend, which is presumably where Inna was staying when she wasn’t at the family apartment block. V tells me that people reported that building as also showing shelling and fire damage.

Viktoria is also formulating plans to get Artem out of Ukraine. V has been chatting with someone she knows who lives in the same area as Artem and Katya 1 and who may be able to get messages to them. Viktoria hopes that Katya would agree and be able to get Artem to Rostov or some other place in Russia, at which point Viktoria would travel to Russia and bring Artem back to the US (presumably under the US “Uniting for Ukraine” program). To say that this is a plan is probably a bit generous. It’s more of a sketchy notion, with a lot of “if’s” and assumptions. If anything comes of it, I’ll let people know.

It sounds like plans for a “victory parade” in Mariupol on May 9 has been cancelled by the occupying forces. Maybe the didn’t think they could get all the rubble and bodies cleaned up in time. Or couldn’t come up with a good propaganda line for why they were marching through a city with damage to 90%+ of the buildings, with half of them beyond repair. (Granted, a lot of the Russian people are ready to believe any of the swill coming from state media, but if the lies are too outrageous, some people are going to start questioning things.) Apparently, believing their own rhetoric, the parade is being cancelled because of a fear from Ukrainian shelling. More likely the shelling of the Azovstal plant wasn’t going to stop and people were either afraid of getting hit, or that it might just look bad (more?) parading through a ruined city that was still under attack. Hard to know what, since rational thought is not involved. (Scared of shelling. In the “DNR” militants canceled the “victory parade” on May 9 – News April 28, 2022 – 0629.com.ua)

The Azov Regiment — having a little time to kill in the Azovstal bunkers, listening to the ongoing barrages — did a little calculating and figure that Russia has spent over a billion dollars (so far) trying to take Mariupol. I don’t know about the accuracy of their numbers, but it seems possible, since they’ve been trying to take the city for two months. During that two months, there has been a lot of artillery, many overflights and bombs, some precision guided missiles, and assorted infantry prowling through the city. That does cost something for sure, so maybe a billion isn’t too far off the mark. If you take into account the other costs that weren’t included in that total — food, fuel, “humanitarian” assistance, digging mass graves, relocating the population by force, etc. — even if the number cited are high, the total cost so far might still be north of a billion. (Russia spends more than $1.1B to destroy Mariupol – Azov Regiment – ukrinform.net)

I’m always a little interested in the animal stories that occasionally appear. There are some nice stories, like those about Patron, the mine-sniffing dog that’s helping in some of the de-occupied areas (Meet Patron, the dog who loves cheese and sniffs out mines in Ukraine – msn.com). Or some of the stories out of Kharkiv or Kyiv about how the animals of their zoo were successfully evacuated (Rescue under fire: Animals evacuated from ecopark near Kyiv – ukrinform.net). On the Mariupol city website was a brief article about the zoo/ecopark in Mariupol. The animals there could not be evacuated, but the staff of the zoo stayed to take care of them (How mariupol zoo survives in the besieged city – VIDEO – News April 27, 2022 – 0629.com.ua). Here’s a version of the story from the AP, along with a video – Mariupol zoo animals caught in crossfire (yahoo.com).

Of course, it’s not all nice or inspiring. I saw a post on Viber today about Black Sea dolphins washing up on shore. They don’t appear to suffer from the “typical” causes of death, such as netting. A marine biologist notes that not only are the dolphins in danger from mines and ship shelling, but the sonar also affects the dolphin’s hearing, causing disorientation. (Off the coast of Odesa region due to the Russian invaders, dolphins are dying en masse – ecologist — tsn.ua)

I’ve mentioned the Russian filtration camps a couple times. DW, a German news service (I was there looking for the zoo story), has an article about what these camps are and how they work (Russia′s humiliating ′filtration′ of civilians fleeing occupied Ukraine | Europe | News and current affairs from around the continent – DW – 28.04.2022).

Another video that shows the family apartment block. Not much though, just the end. The car is driving down the cross street, coming up on Mira Prospect where the apartments are.

Here’s a little map with the apartment circled and an arrow for the direction of the car. Not shown on the map, but if you followed Mira (“Myru Ave” on the map) to the right, you would come to the theater that was bombed. Walking, about 20 minutes or so, by bus, only about 5 minutes away.

You’ve probably heard the name on the news. Currently it’s the last Ukrainian-controlled area of Mariupol, and it’s been housing the Ukrainian forces as well as a number of civilians who have sheltered with them. Prior to all this — and, really, prior to the Coronavirus pandemic — it was easily the largest employer in the Mariupol area. One of four steel plants located in Mariupol, it was also one of the largest steel plants in Ukraine. (Its parent company, MetInvest, is probably the largest private company in Ukraine.)

It had been operating for decades, and four generations of Viktoria’s family had worked there. Viktoria worked there for 30 years, and before that, her paternal grandmother, V’s father and even her mother for a short time worked at Azovstal. Until about the end of last year, Zhenya worked there as well.

Apparently that place really is massive, both in terms of horizontal area, but also by vertical depth. According to Viktoria, some of the tunnels were open and regularly used by employees to get around the plant. Other parts were a little more restricted. Being part of the electrical crew, Zhenya spent some time in the less public tunnels. A few years back, when there was a lot of metal and wire theft happening at the plant, Zhenya was actually accosted by some of the bandits in the tunnels. And according to Viktoria, her father told her about some of the discussions he’d have at breaks with his coworkers about possible chemical labs and secret development areas the Soviets ran under the plant.

There’s been a lot of discussion about evacuations for the people sheltering at Azovstal, but nothing has come to pass so far. It was widely reported just yesterday that Putin had agreed “in principle” to an Azovstal evacuation with the UN (Putin agrees “in principle” to UN, Red Cross involvement in evacuations from Mariupol – UN chief’s spox (ukrinform.net)), but Russia is out today denying that any such plans are in the works (Russia denies agreement with UN to evacuate civilians from Mariupol’s Azovstal – News April 27, 2022 – 0629.com.ua). Meanwhile, Russian artillery continues to pound the area (Russian forces carried out 35 air strikes on Azovstal in past 24hrs, civilians injured (ukrinform.net)).

Here’s a video of some of the people hiding in the tunnels. You can probably fast-forward over a lot of it; it is mostly static shots of the people talking about the conditions and such. For non-Russian speakers (and yes, most of the people in Mariupol speak Russian — the same people the Russian attacks were supposed to be in support of), just take a look at the conditions. Compared to some other photos and videos I’ve seen, things aren’t as bad, but we still aren’t talking about anything that good either.

While seeing Mariupol getting destroyed has been hard on Viktoria, especially when she gets images of “our” apartment block, watching and reading about the events at Azovstal have been painful as well. She put in 30 years of her life at that factory. She knows and understands what a key part of the city it was, not just for her family, but for many, many of the people and families in Mariupol. I’m sure there were days when she hated going to work, but even on the worst of those days, it’s clear to me that she never would have wished for something like this.

The US finally came out with their “Uniting for Ukraine” immigration application website today. It’s the “fast-track” immigration program that was promised a while ago to allow about 100,000 Ukrainians to come to the US, provided they have a sponsor to cover their costs. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we’ll be able to take advantage of it.

While sponsorship is not a problem, the program requires that refugees coming here have a passport with which to travel. That seems to ignore the reality that a lot of people — including Katya 2 and Vanya — had to leave their homes without such documentation (for any number of reasons). While Katya and Vanya have had international passports issued to them, they aren’t in possession of them and the Ukraine government isn’t able to supply replacements at this time.

At present, it would appear that the Canadian program is going to work better. Their program does account for people not having all their documentation and is willing to work with that. Staying with us would be preferred, but getting them to Western Canada is second best; at least we and/or Viktoria would be able to visit regularly (and a US dollar may go farther in Canada than it does in the US).

The Mariupol City website has an article up comparing the occupation of Mariupol during WWII by German forces to what the Russians are doing today. It’s rather interesting, as there are some definite parallels between then and now. In some ways, the Germans come off looking better than the Russians, though when it’s a race to the bottom, is there really a “better?”

From the article, Mariupol 1941:

And Mariupol 2022:

I’ve added a visual representation of our Ukrainian family under the Family link, in the menu above. Where appropriate, I’ve shown the referenced name followed by their real name. Mostly it’s just all the Katya (which is short for Katheryn and Ekaterina — basically Catherine.) (Viktoria’s family also has a lot of Alexanders; thank goodness I don’t have to show them.)

Supposedly the Russians have taken Mariupol and Putin has called for a halt to any more efforts to take the Azovstal area and plant. Of course, that was all said yesterday, and the shelling continued, so… sure.

The war crimes and attempts to cover them up continue:

• UN representatives document dozens of executions of civilians in Bucha
• Up to 9,000 bodies of slain civilians could be buried in mass grave spotted near Mariupol
• Another mass grave of dead residents discovered in Mariupol (yeah, another one)

A more positive store from the BBC: Mariupol: Driving into the ‘apocalypse’ to save mum and dad – BBC News. For some added context, the events described in the article happened about the same time that Katya 2 and Vanya left Mariupol on foot, walking about 12 miles to a neighboring town.

Although “Mariupol” is being heard a lot these days, if your news is anything like mine, you’ve probably been hearing the name of city pronounced in a few different ways, usually wrong. I think the version I hear the most often is “MARY-opal.” The other night I heard “MARY-you-POLE.” It hurt my ears so much I sent an email to the channel (a local station) and gave them some pronunciation tips (while casually noting that my wife is from there, so, c’mon guys, get it right). Never heard back, but also haven’t heard any recent news about Mariupol on the newscast I typically watch.

In case you were wondering, it’s a four-syllable name — Mar-i-u-pol — with the emphasis on the third syllable. Proper pronunciation would be “mahr-ih-YOU-pull,” but that “ih” isn’t something that shows up much in English. So a close “Western” pronunciation is “mahr-ee-OO-pull,” without too much “ee” coming through. And it’s OK if the second and third syllables end up pushed together; most of the time it does almost sound like the city’s name only has three syllables.

Given everything that’s been happening there — some of which is only starting to be known — it seems only proper to try to pronounce the name correctly.

As noted yesterday, I had a couple videos of Mariupol to share. But first, I invite you to see again what a pleasant place Mariupol was before the Russians came. Here’s a link to some photos on the Mariupol city website; I’d posted in back in 2014, but the link still works. I’d first visited Mariupol in the late-summer/fall of 2011, so I saw many of the same things as are in those images. The apartment where I stayed was right across from that archway — the gateway to the city park — seen in that second image.

This isn’t my video, but since I posted a picture of the Mariupol port, I thought it might be nice to re-post a video of the port from 2016. It’s just advertising, but it shows what the port was (and you can see some of Mariupol in the background).

And now for some less pleasant, but important, views of the city.

From CBS, video of the theater that was bombed. An estimated 900-1000 people had been sheltering here, and about 300 are presumed to have been killed by the bombing.

From Reuters, some scenes of the city, including some views from inside the (less destroyed parts of the ) theater.

Two “pluses” to add. First, we are just about to submit Katya’s and Vanya’s applications for the Canadian emergency travel/visa program. Although is a special program and certain “normal” visa documentation is not being required, it still uses the same online form and process to make the request, so it’s been a bit of a trick to get everything in the right way. Plus the form is in English (and French), and since I’m the only native speaking in the bunch…

Second, I saw someone’s twitter post (embedded somewhere) that put the situation in Ukraine very succinctly:

It's simple: If Russia stops fighting, the war is over. If Ukraine stops fighting, Ukraine is over.