Ольга Деркачова Olga Derkachova

By the way, I had a really funny experience with the Pioneer scarf. We were inducted into the Pioneers. And the induction into the Pioneers… With the Little Octobrists, I don’t really remember, it seems to me they just pinned some badges on us during some school assembly, and that was that. But it was all very ceremonial with the Pioneers. We recited the oath. A Pioneer. So there was an oath, and they tied the scarves on us based on that, there was all that. And then came Perestroika changes, and the teacher comes in and says, “Take off your scarves.” So it was all a lie, that is, none of that really existed, and can you imagine… And this was right during adolescence: eleven, twelve, thirteen years old. And those teachers, who had been figures of authority for you, who had been telling you about the same values, suddenly say, “No, it’s all okay now, you can even go to church.” Like, what do you mean? You told us that was forbidden. So when, say, up to eighth or ninth grade, they tell you one version of Ukrainian history, and then suddenly — bam — it turns out to be something else, and they tell you to forget everything you learned. Or with Ukrainian literature. It turns out we had the Executed Renaissance. That entire stratum that they never told you about. And you, as a teenage kid, have no idea what’s going on. When they used to tell you one thing, and now they tell you to forget all of it, it had all been false. Back then, you didn’t understand, now you do… Again, people were in those conditions, in those situations. But still, sooner or later, resistance happened, and it erupted. And here you are, not knowing what to do with all of it. And then they say, “Take off your scarves.” I said, “But how can we take off the scarves if we made an oath?” And the teacher said that like, okay, but there was no… And I said, “We need to hold a de-oathing.” I mean, I was a child for whom words mattered. For us, if you said something — I was raised that way — you’re responsible for your word. For me and my family, words [mattered]. And here we’d taken an oath, and now how could I just take it off? So I demanded a de-oathing ritual. I said I wouldn’t take off the scarf until this ritual was held for me. And just imagine: one kid in the entire school walking around with a scarf, and not because of some political or ideological convictions, but simply because she wasn’t given a de-oathing ritual. You know what surprises me? Not one adult called me in and had a proper conversation with me about all this. And I kept [wearing it]. At home, my parents said, “Olya, take it off.” I said, “No.” I can’t, we gave an oath. Let them gather us like they did at the assembly, let us read something explaining why. And also, you know, that teenage persistence. Even my grandparents said, “Olya, take off that scarf.” I said, “No.” And imagine: I wore that scarf until the end of the school year. And then, over the summer, it passed, and in September, I came back without it. That’s what it was like, and it was absolutely… It wasn’t political, it wasn’t ideological. I didn’t understand.

I worked at the Ukrainian Conversation Club. We worked with those Ukrainians who wanted to learn more about [Ivano-]Frankivsk, about the region, about the language in general, and study the language somewhere. I never encountered any aggressive, anti-Ukrainian attitudes. Any pro-Russian sentiments. I never encountered that at all. I can’t say I’ve had any negative communication experiences. My experience has been positive. When people needed support, I could give it, I supported them. Ukrainians come to my presentations. So we talk, we communicate. I supervise the University of the Third Age through Halytskyi Korespondent, for older people. These are the people who need some communication and a cultural space because the space they used to have was taken from them. That also applied at the Ukrainian Conversation Club, at the shelter where I worked — it’s the same. These are our Ukrainians, it just so happened that they ended up in a Russian-speaking environment. It’s okay, they’re changing. These are absolutely intelligent, well-mannered, reasonable people who understand that they need to be more integrated into Ukrainian [society]. And even the topics I talked about — whether about our Greek Catholic priests or about Stepan Bandera or Konovalets — didn’t trigger aggression or rejection. On the contrary. It was recognition… and understanding of how Russian ideology operated. How it presented things twisted, distorted, falsified. That realization also came, you know, like an insight — just how distorted and slandered it all was. We visited the Museum of the Struggle for Liberation of Ukraine. That’s the UPA, which is supposedly viewed with prejudice, almost hostility. But all of that, with sensible and wise communication, with patience and dialogue, can be overcome. We are Ukrainians, we have nothing to fight over between ourselves, right now, we need to fight for our independence. And that’s why I sometimes feel that when people talk… I understand that some had moments, nuances, but it was all kind of exaggerated, it was kind of blown out of proportion. And why does no one want to remember the good things Ukrainians who ended up here are doing? The businesses, the projects, the works of art they offer us? Communication. It’s not that pronounced somewhere. But we’re the kind of people who focus more on the negative, we like to dwell on the negative more than the positive. But as for my experience of communication, it’s been exclusively positive. There’s such warmth and such pain over those lost homes. I remember last year, on Holy Saturday, we had our conversation club in the morning, and then we went for a walk around the city. Because my husband is at war. Their families are scattered, they don’t have a home where they can prepare for Easter. So we walked around [Ivano-]Frankivsk, went to the Easter exhibition, looked around, walked, talked, and then we went off to gather and prepare our baskets. And one participant told me, “We somehow thought we’d celebrate Easter at home. And now we… Maybe we’ll at least [celebrate] Christmas [at home].” That feeling of pain, and when you hear it, is really hard because all you can do at that moment is hug the person.

It [the cultural life of Ivano-Frankivsk] has become more diverse and more open. Because if earlier the cultural life of Ivano-Frankivsk was more connected to artists rooted in this land, now the cultural life of Ivano-Frankivsk is much broader. Because now there are artists not only from [Ivano-]Frankivsk, who maybe before the full-scale invasion had never even been to [Ivano-]Frankivsk or had only passed through. It’s become broader, I’d say, more colorful, and that’s where some of its strength lies. Of course, we’re having discussions about what art should be and how. Some say that art shouldn’t talk about the war. Others say it must. But I believe that it should talk about the war, even though I’ve said to myself that it’s hard for me to read works about the war. But we must talk about the war in a way that is right for us. And we need to work through this painful experience. And it’s very good that art is speaking about it. In fact, the literary scene is stirring, but not with the joyful stirring of, say, the Stanislav Phenomenon era. It’s a different kind of stirring, a stirring as resistance to what’s happening and as a desire to preserve what is Ukrainian. I absolutely dislike phrases like “artistic front” “educational front.” The front is over there, and here is the rear, support, resistance, and doing the very best of what you can do. And there are a lot of artistic experiments — performances, for instance — that didn’t exist before. But it’s good that all this exists. It’s just a pity that the reason for it isn’t… but it’s good that this artistic life is happening, that it’s not in a stupor. However, once I used to think, “How can there be concerts during the war, how can there be performances, how can anything even be written?” But it can. And now I understand how important it is for this art to exist during wartime. And it’s not one-sided, it’s not closed off. I think, if we talk about the city and the people who have come here, then art probably opened its doors the widest. Art somehow [accepted] the artists. Like, “Welcome. Let’s all be together. Let’s create together — differently, but together.”

We live by victory, and that’s right. Sometimes, I think that, beyond the victory itself, what’s really important is to meet it with dignity, not to lose ourselves, our moral qualities, our values. We need to meet it with dignity and understand that we’ll have a lot of important work ahead, both on this world and on ourselves, after the war and after our victory. And that, too, will be another kind of struggle — for our identity, a more universally human identity, I would say. A struggle to preserve our humanity, to maintain a respectful attitude toward those who fought for our independence on the front lines, because we’re already seeing troubling signs that respect toward soldiers, and understanding, and empathy toward children who’ve lost their parents, are not always present. It seems to me that after the victory, we’ll need to work on ourselves. That is, not only rebuilding our homes, bridges, museums, hospitals, churches, libraries, schools, and universities. We’ll also need to rebuild ourselves. And we talk about friendly spaces, we say that modern buildings must start with ramps, traffic lights should have sound signals. You know, we need to readjust ourselves in the same way. We also need to have those ramps, figuratively speaking. I think you understand what I mean. This sense that you don’t speak unless asked, don’t express your opinion unless asked, don’t react to certain things — because you don’t know what someone has been through, what someone has lived through. I think we’ll need a very high level of compassion for each other because, truly, we don’t know what’s happening inside each person’s soul. For example, even if you bump into someone and they react aggressively, and you might want to respond — but on the other hand, you need to stop yourself. Because maybe that person’s most precious someone is missing. Perhaps, they haven’t had contact with them for days. That is, some of the things every one of us is living through. We need to learn to be mutually tolerant and mutually sensitive. I think such things will be the most important things after the victory. Because cities will be rebuilt, but we must rebuild ourselves with those ramps, with that sense that our souls feel comfortable, and that those who interact with us feel comfortable too. Maybe that’s naïve, but let that be my position — that if we learn to perceive people in this way, then they’ll perceive us the same way; and with this kindness, with this love and empathy, we should share with everyone and receive it in return. Only then, I think, will there be real peace after victory. Because victory doesn’t always mean peace in people’s souls.