A glass of water per day

A bomb flew into our apartment on March 10. I don't know how we all survived. We slept on the floor, having shielded ourselves with nightstands.

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The explosion broke all the windows with frames, all the interior doors, and our front door flew out. The building frame only left after the explosion. And we moved to the neighbors, whose apartment was not damaged. The six of us lived in the corridor for a week. We had six cookies and a glass of water to eat per day.

Women

Only men were kept in the cellars. It is difficult to even imagine what has been happening to women. The younger ones and children were raped, the older ones were forced to cook. There were cases when a woman was undressed and taken away on a chain. Some young girls could not stand it and joined the invaders. Invaders took those with them then.

"We almost suffocated"

We went to live in the basement, and in about a month the house was destroyed. Everything burned down there. And then the projectile flew into the basement. The fire was fought, but the smoke intensified even more. We almost suffocated. When I went outside, I looked up - there were a lot of stars, darkness, and all the houses were on fire. Everyone shouted: "Help".

Graves

The first missile strike targeted the center of Mariupol, near a 9-storey building. Most were affected, there were large holes. Several people died. We took out the bodies… I wish we could bury them at least. We covered bodies with carpets so that children would not see them. We tried to dig small graves to somehow… We tried to bury them, but there was no time or energy for that, because others had to be pulled out. There was a cathedral nearby, where we went later.

"They beat us every day"

We were kept in the cellar for 26 days. Immediately after the abduction, we were stripped naked and searched for swastika tattoos and traces of injections. They claimed that we were drug addicts and Nazis. For the first 2 weeks, no one was allowed to eat, drink or go to the toilet. They beat us every day. They put out cigarettes on us. We were very afraid of the evening, because then they got drunk and came to beat us. One day the youngest of us, a 19-year-old boy, was beaten until he fell unconscious. We all lay down together and hugged him so he wouldn't freeze. In the morning we woke up and the boy was already dead. We were allowed to bury him in two days in the yard. All this time he lay with us in the cellar.

"We melted the snow"

When we were in Mariupol, we went outside to cook. It was difficult because the planes flew every ten minutes, maybe every five minutes. We had to leave the food on fire and run to the porches. Then we came back. We did this again and again. Every day. Planes dropped somewhere from two to six bombs. Volunteers brought us water. They brought us water to the last. A driver drove up, hid himself in the shelter, and those people who were not afraid, approached and took the water. And we melted the snow or poured water from the roof when the snow melted or when it rained.