"There is a war, but life doesn't stop there"
Videos, podcasts, photos, daily summary from Ukraine
FROM UKRAINIAN FREEDOM NEWS IN LVIV: For the quickest updates, please join our Telegram Channel. And we, a team of volunteers, welcome your financial support via LvivLab.com. If you wish, please spread the word by forwarding this email to others.
"There is a war, but life doesn't stop there": interview with Lviv jazz singer
The night before the war, Wednesday 23 February, Lviv’s jazz musicians jammed at the LV Café with Ray Brown Jr, the son of legend Ella Fitzgerald. After a month of nearly no music, the musicians returned to the LV Café recently. Ukrainian Freedom News reporter Alina Lytvyniv was there at a war-time charity concert, where she spoke with jazz singer Karina Kumar.
"Music helps you to somehow survive this negative, step over it,” Karina said. “This was my first appearance [since the war started]. I was very afraid."
"From the first days of the war, none of us sat idle. Everyone volunteered.
“About two weeks after the start of the war I started to listen to the album of Clifford Brown the drummer. … I listened in a different way … My perception was sharpened. It was like I had listened to a different artist, a different album.”
“To leave Ukraine just like that … No! .. The victory will be ours … We will stay here, develop jazz music, jazz art. … We will continue to develop and send our message to people.”
Understanding Ukrainian Freedom: A Radical Sense of Liberty
Several mornings a week, our journalistic colleagues at Lviv-based media-hub Tvoe Misto (“Your City”) hold “Breakfast Background Briefings” exploring the idea of Ukrainian freedom—and examining how victory will look.
Myroslav Marynovych, vice rector of Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv and survivor of a Soviet gulag, spoke about the major differences between Ukraine and Russia:
”Russia has a strong government and a weak civil society, Ukraine vice versa – a weak government (because it was difficult to consolidate people) and a strong civil society.”
Read more: «IN THE GULAG, WE KNEW THE SOVIET UNION WOULD COLLAPSE. THE SAME WILL HAPPEN TO RUSSIA,» – DISSIDENT MYROSLAV MARYNOVYCH
Our Speak Freely Podcast: Near-Daily War Journal
Here's a near-daily audio war-journal from Lviv, Ukraine. The goal is to share with the world real conversations between two friends, a Ukrainian bartender and an American journalist, from this nation under existential threat. **Explicit language: We seek to share the sort of real conversations that happen now.**
10 April Situation Summary
By Pavlo Vitenko, Ukrainian Freedom News
UKRAINE: Russian troops are conducting an offensive in the Donbas and continue shelling Kharkiv. Explosions in Mykolayiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions.
«We are all together – every Ukrainian, every Ukrainian, who on February 24 and forever choose courage. Choose Ukraine. Choose freedom and future,» – said Zelenskiy.
WORLD: Israel has opened a humanitarian air bridge to help Ukraine. In the near future, six planes will deliver medicine, medical equipment, and food to Ukraine. The first 10 tons of drugs have already been delivered.
On April 9, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson arrived in Kyiv, where he announced assistance to Ukraine and new sanctions against Russia.
During a walk through Kyiv, a passerby approached the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson and presented them with ceramic roosters. The same rooster was standing in the kitchen cupboard, which survived in a high-rise building destroyed by Russian troops in the village of Borodyanka, Kyiv region.
Donetsk region
There are active hostilities along the line of contact. The enemy tried to advance near Marinka, but the Ukrainian military repulsed the offensive.
Continue reading our full region-by-region summary here.
MUSIC: A Scene from Before the War
Here’s a scene of Christmas Day in western Ukraine 2022, celebrated on 7 January by both Greek Catholics (part of the Roman Catholic Church) and Orthodox Christians. This was life in Ukraine right before the war:
You can read more about the scene above here: “Singing Against the Darkness: How Ukrainians Keep Christmas”
But then as with all conversations during Ukrainian Christmas, it was halted by music: some friends swept into the flat’s entry hall with instruments, including a double bass. My hosts, with accordion, flute, violin, tambourine, etc, began to play one of the vibrant, polyphonic Ukrainian carols, which seem to loop around and around and over and over.
Ukrainian Freedom News: Info to the World | Supplies to Ukraine’s Frontlines
Here is our next batch of supplies which our Ukrainian Freedom News team is ready to drive to Odesa region.
For those who wish to help us with supplies, we welcome you to follow our new speciality Telegram Channel, Ukrainian Freedom Supply, where we will share stories of how we source and ship essential items to the front lines.
We welcome your donations via LvivLab.com:
Via our Telegram Channel, we can reach you without social media interference.