Four months of brutal battle, many prayers in moments when death seemed menacingly near, being separated from those he calls family, and watching many people die around him as bombs crashed into the terrain sending up smoke and screams of terror. That has been life for Ukrainian journalist and active army reservist Sergey Velinchanskiy since February 24, 2022 when Russia invaded his country.

In an exclusive follow-up interview with the Jamaica Observer, Velinchanskiy began with a heartfelt apology to Jamaican students, who were in Ukraine at the time of the attack, whom he advised not to worry, mere days prior.

“When we spoke, I was just talking about preparing for the war and I was sort of uncertain that it was going to be this big, of that scale. So I must apologise if I sounded very relaxed as far as giving advice to Jamaican students because nobody expected that this war would be that big,” he said.

But then, Russia invaded Ukraine, escalating the Russo-Ukrainian tensions that began in 2014 into full-scale war, which has resulted in many casualties, caused more than 9.1 million Ukrainians to flee the country, while a third of the population has been displaced.

Since day one, Velinchanskiy told the Sunday Observer, the army immediately took to positions of defence.

“Now it’s four months gone and we’ve been to many different combats and many different situations. I have seen death, I have had fear, I have had sorrow, but I never felt regret that I joined the army because we are fighting for our land. It has changed me. I am still yet to determine how far and how much, but definitely, it has. I have become a fighter, I have become a military person, and I will be one until we win. So I am determined to go on.”

As at June 18, the Office of United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said 4,509 Ukrainian civilians had been killed in the conflict.

It started with being away from his family for days. Days turned into weeks, and weeks into months. But Velinchanskiy shared that he has found solace in the separation by the comforting fact that, though far away, his family is safe.

“It is difficult but what helps me to cope with this is that everyone in my family is safe and I probably crossed that psychological border. Sometimes people ask how difficult it is to live this life compared to my normal life. I have transformed into understanding that this is my normal life now. I don’t have what was before February 24. It’s gone. Something new will come, yes, but right now, the present time is what it is,” he said.

“I just made sure that all my family members are safe, and now I am able to do my duty and my service. I have a son who is married and he’s fine. My mother has evacuated and she’s far away, and I have other family members and they are far away too, so that’s good,” he continued.

“In fact, this is my message to everyone, civilians or soldiers here: The only way to cope – the only way for resilience is to understand that this is the new normal. We don’t like it, we hate it, but we don’t have to enjoy it.”

He shared that there were many times that he thought he was living his last moments. The most intense, he said, was when a missile landed in close proximity to where he was camped. He had to be hospitalised as a result.

“In the military life, as I have come to know now, we soldiers in the active war, we die often in our minds. You are in the trench and you know that their shells are coming your way. In a sense, it is a lottery ticket whether the shell will hit your trench or hit elsewhere. This is how I was injured… I got a concussion and I was taken to a hospital because they sent a cassette of shells into our sector and it came very close,” he told the Sunday Observer.

He recalled it being like a countdown to death.

“I heard the sounds and I knew that within the next 10, 15 seconds they would’ve been landing. There were many of them. It was the moment when you pray, you prepare yourself to go to a better world. So it does change you from the inside because it’s just a very deep experience.”

And what lingers, apart from the sounds of the bombs slamming into the Earth, is the memory of colleagues who have been killed in the process.

“Unfortunately, our immediate company suffered three KIAs [killed in action] and about 15 injured. The battalion suffered about 30 KIAs and up to 100 injured. It is difficult.”

Recently, the world was blaringly reminded that the war is, in fact, still ongoing after what felt like a moratorium. On Sunday, June 26, Russian early morning strikes hit a residential building in Kyiv, the first attack on the capital in almost three weeks. Several people had to be hospitalised.

That was another moment that reinforced for Velinchanskiy that the war will not end anytime soon.

“This war is for a lengthy period. I hope it will end soon, but I am looking at all this year and perhaps the beginning of next year it will still be active, more or less. Another thing is that, like today [July 14], they shelled a city just downtown from a submarine in the Black Sea. About 15 to 20 people were already found dead and up to 100 getting medical emergency services.

He told the Sunday Observer that nowhere in the country is safe, “Though the war may seem to be farther east.”

“Unfortunately, we don’t have the air defence system sufficient enough to protect ourselves, so we are hoping the United States and the other countries of the West will provide us with the right air defence system so we can protect our cities from the missiles,” he said.

He added that closer to the front lines innocent civilians, towns, and villages are being bombed.

“They don’t care. They are just killing the people. It is a genocide. They are not targeting military targets. Just recently they targeted a shopping centre and today they targeted a concert hall. They have targeted housing buildings. They are just killing Ukrainians because they are Ukrainians. That’s it.”

Velinchanskiy said his closing message to the world is to highlight the fact that Ukrainians have to fight to defend their land. “We did not invade anywhere — neither for language, culture, nor for race. They are like big bullies who keep fighting us. This is terrible. It is like the only chance we have is to stop fighting and then give up. The economy is suffering, businesses are not functioning right, taxes are not being paid, salaries have dropped — some businesses are trying to function but they’re always under danger.”