Mariam, ESC volunteer from Georgia

World history is dirty, sad and unfair. Smaller countries which have bigger neighbours with an aggressive attitude towards them face even harder challenges. 

I’m Mariam, a girl from Georgia. My homeland has one of the worst relationships with Russia. They keep betraying us, killing our people, taking territories which belong to our tiny country. The only thing we can do is just accept it. There’s no one who can help our people to sleep in peace, without being afraid that they will wake up behind the “border”. We have experienced several times what’s going on now in Ukraine and we are one of those people who can honestly share what Ukrainian people are going through now.

Who expected that someone would start these kinds of terrible actions in this century? Who expected that such an amount of people had to leave their homes, lovely people, their pets and run as far as possible to survive? Who expected to flee  from the dirty hands of hungry animals who are hunting innocent kids, men and women? Kids, men and women who are just trying to protect their homeland. But here we are, watching this terrible reality. Now we know what to expect and we just do what we can to help. I’m happy to be here now and to have the chance to help these people the  best I can, along with my lovely friends.

The first time we wanted to do something, we went to one of the big stadiums in Krakow. We wanted to see what we could do, we brought some stuff and asked people if they needed help. Then everything started. All of a sudden, we were collecting food, clothes and some other useful things which were given by people from Krakow and from outside the city. I saw for hours and days people who were bringing everything they had at home. An old lady brought half a package of coffee, and sugar, because that’s what she had. Parents gave away the clothes of their children, big companies helped with their products. Each of us together built a bridge of hope for Ukrainian people who could finally be safe here.

After a few days, refugees started arriving at the main train station of Krakow. I went there with my friends. From one side, we had little knowledge of Polish, on the other side we had the great hope that despite this we could help them. We did it indeed! We watched hundreds of people, who had no place to go, no food to eat and no clothes to keep warm in Winter weather. Thanks to many kind people, everything they needed was waiting for them here. With my friend Amelie, I decided to do something which didn’t need that much language skills. So we grabbed boxes full of candies, fruit and drinks and went with kids to make them a little bit happier. I will never forget those eyes full of tears and fear. Eyes that have seen more than any of us probably, those smiles which were giving us hope that everything would be better. The first few days in the train station were very chaotic, no one knew what to do, but day by day everything went better and the whole system began to work. After that, I went to a warehouse. Here clothes were sorted. They were donated from almost all over the world. We contributed to prepare everything that was needed to open a big store, Szafa Dobra, for refugees who needed them. I was surprised to see the amount of donations we were receiving. At some point they had to stop it! Soon we opened and refugees were welcome to take whatever they needed. 

The first few days at Szafa Dobra, I worked at the warehouse, then in the shop area. After all, I decided that I had to do what I was better at. I decided to spend time with children at the kids corner and play with them, while their parents were busy in the store. I listened to some stories from them and I was happy to catch some words and understand at least a bit. I wasn’t happy with what I was hearing. Those stories made me angry with the whole world, with people who are doing these unfair, unexplainable things, and with people who were just watching everything from their warm sofas and doing nothing against it. To people who are not taking action, keep in mind that if you keep doing nothing,  they’ll come for you and no one will be there to protect you. I’m actually thankful and happy, since people around me were doing everything they could, and I’m deeply sure that soon the world will be a better place to live, because of them. 

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