The plan for the day was to make the minibus ready for usage - and to pick 6 people up from the border crossing on the highway between Lviv and Rzsezsow. Those 6 persons were at a bus travelling all through Ukraine, so they would spend at least 12 hours to get to the border.
First we delivered it to a local garage, then we went to some local administration office for getting the registration fixed, and we also need insurance. No luck with the bureaucrazy. The vehicle identification papers were lost, the vehicle was overdue to technical control, eventually we concluded we had no chance to drive this car legally nor to obtain insurance for it. After it's fixed, it will be given to the Ukrainian army. Time passed quite fast, soon it was already getting dark.
We decided to search for a new minibus. JJ was searching, but it was really difficult, he found some overpriced caravelles and some at the other side of Poland, but when hitting "reload" they were already sold. Eventually he had luck, a 9-seat T4 for just 10 kPLN "just" 300 km away, so few minutes later we had reserved it, and spent the rest of the day driving to pick it up. It seemed perfect except for some corrosion and some few minor issues when we picked it up. All the conversation was in Polish, so I didn't understand much, but apparently the car has a dual fuel system, it can run both on petrol and LPG. Unfortunately, as soon as I tested the button for switching fuel system, the engine started misbehaving, idling with varying and very high RPM on petrol, and on too low RPM on gas (meaning the engine would stop every time I pressed the clutch for more than a second on gas, and that driving slowly was difficult when driving on petrol).
It had already passed midnight when the deal was done and we had topped up the two fuel tanks, and we had like 3.5 hours driving to get to the border point. The people we were to pick up were late, so we had time to sleep on the way - but since we hadn't brought sleeping bags with us I could only sleep for an hour or so before starting to freeze. Monday turned into Tuesday and the sun came up, but for me the Tuesday effort felt like just a continuation of Monday. I'll anyway write a separate post from when we arrived at the border.
I looked through the photos for the day and realized that this is the only one I have:
While doing volunteer work like this, I wind up asking myself what the purpose is and if my contribution is really useful for anything. It feels like I'm most of all wasting time. What have we done so far ... spending quite some time and fuel transporting two thousands of sleeping bags internally in Poland. This work could have been done much more efficient by someone using a bigger truck and perhaps driving the boxes directly into Ukraine (without opening them). And we've picked up some people from the border - basically just acting like free taxi drivers. That's not exactly saving lives - and with the current fuel prices (not to forget that the more fuel we use, the higher prices, and hence more income for Russia) it would make more sense to escort the refugees to the nearest train station and then ensure that someone would receive them in the other end. But seeing the situation and thinking deeper - yes, indeed the work we are doing is really important. The refugees are most of all single mothers, carrying as much luggage as they can handle, and then in addition having one or more children to handle. Dependent on the age, personality and number of children this may by itself be challenging even on an ordinary day. Now they are also stressed, shocked, upset, and without a clear plan on what to do further, even no idea on where they are going to sleep for the upcoming night. Some of them are traumatized from their war experiences, some of them may even have lost their loved ones. The transport itself is perhaps not the most important - perhaps the most important is to reduce the amount of things they need to worry about. We pick them up from the border, carry their luggage, search for someone that can host them, deliver them and carry their luggage, allowing the mothers to do their most important job; caring for their children.
Some of the people we see are joyful and happy for the aid they are getting - but of course, the very most of them are in a difficult situation. My worst impression so far was the sight of a mother and a child - the child crying and the mother absolutely unable to give the child the comfort it needed - the mother was tearful and in agony herself.
The first caravelle is ready from the service now and will probably be useful - but probably only for the Ukrainian military. Given what I just said, our transportation mission on the Polish side of the border is not only about transportation - it's just as much about giving the refugees some comfort and time to relax, it may be hard when sitting in a wreck of a minibus with windows that are painted black and driven by two random guys. I wrote earlier that it feels like a prisoner transport - so in my dreams it will be used to transport POWs away from the front line and into safety, now that's also a way of saving lives.
Two of the people donated had some strings attached, they only wanted to contribute to humanitarian aid, not military aid. Or was it specifically lethal military aid they didn't want to contribute with? The line between pure humanitarian aid and military aid may be a bit blurred sometimes - quite some of the food, sleeping bags, etc that we send over across the border will most likely be used by the military. We may shrug on it as we've already choosen a side in the conflict - but the humanitarian mission per se is strictly to save lives and reduce suffering without taking a side in the conflict. It's also important that cars labeled with "humanitarian aid" doesn't contain military equipment or even supplies for the military - once we put supplies for the military in such cars, we cannot complain that they are being targetted by the enemy. But at the other hand, the soldiers are also humans - people that may have children, parents and friends, so why shouldn't they also deserve food and a sleeping bag?
We really hope this engine problem with the second caravelle is trivial and will be fixed tomorrow. We have the decals ready for labelling it as humanitarian aid. With me as the driver, it won't cross the border (as it may be dangerous entering Ukraine and/or trying to leave Ukraine now with a passport containing Russian visas and a fresh exit stamp) - but eventually the plan of JJ is to use it across the border. Now, if it will be used for picking up refugees from relatively deep inside Ukraine, it may very well be that this contribution will even save lives.