Amina
Amina is now 20 years old. She moved to Lviv from Kyiv and is currently part of a foundation. Before the full-scale war began, she worked as a barista in a café in the capital, but she had plans to switch to something more peaceful. Amina jokes that she wanted to take a break from interacting with people, but she didn’t expect that her life would involve even more of it later on.
On February 24, like many Ukrainians, Amina was awakened by the sounds of explosions and a phone call from her father. He later became her main motivation to join the volunteer team. Amina recalls that she barely slept for over a day, constantly reading the news. On the morning of February 25, her father decided that the entire family would leave Kyiv for a village in the region. Later, he informed them that he was going to defend Ukraine and that there was no way to dissuade him—he would return only after victory.
Amina stayed in the village for three months but longed to return to her usual rhythm of life. It was only after returning to Kyiv that she realized things would never be the same. She continued working, but due to the constant shelling of the capital, she had to spend most of her time in shelters. This, along with certain personal circumstances, led her to move to Lviv. It was there that a friend of Amina, who was already volunteering, suggested she join the foundation’s team.
She hesitated for a long time, saying she wasn’t sure she was ready for such responsibility, but the desire to help in any way she could prevailed. Amina jokes that she had dreamed of opening a shelter for the needy since childhood, so she ended up at a foundation that runs its own shelter for Ukrainians who had to leave their homes because of the war.
Now she is a PR manager, promoting the foundation on social media and among partners. Amina is one of those responsible for the foundation’s communications, constantly in contact with a large number of people, even though she had once dreamed of a quieter life. She says that she now feels she is in the right place and is happy that her work brings Ukraine closer to victory—a victory her father longed for, but whose life was, unfortunately, taken by the war.