Ukrainian Odyssey – reunited after 70 years

(extract from my book, Ukrainian Odyssey – another part of the story is also featured as a guest article on the excellent Velvet Escape blog by Keith Jenkins)

So we set out to the station again, and the long and disorganised array of taxis that were parked outside. After our adventure with Jurek the day before, we had become fussy about our transport, and so spent a few moments selecting the nicest looking car to take us on our way. It was around 15 minutes to the village, and on the way I asked Mama what she wanted from the afternoon exploration. She said that she wasn’t really enthusiastic about this excursion, but that she hoped that at least if we met someone, they might be able to tell us where the house in Podłuże had been.

We stopped the taxi outside the church in Podpieczory, and set off along the road, in anticipation of another few hours of road walking and asking questions to strangers. Immediately we saw a lady coming towards us, and so approached her and Mama asked if she knew an Irina Sliwińska. This is the name of Babcia’s (grandmother) brother’s granddaughter, and the youngest person in the old photo that we were carrying. She suggested we try in the chemists, which was directly opposite. Mama felt encouraged by this, as she remembered something about her being a chemist from the previous correspondence.

The building was a large, old concrete block, and the chemist was only one little unit next to the front door. We walked into the sparsely stocked but very tidy shop. A lady with a round face and greying hair greeted us from behind the counter. Mama asked if she was Irina Sliwińska, and she gave a nervous nod. If she looked nervous at that point, the expression and bewilderment changed still further when Mama pulled out the photo, and showed Irina her own photograph as a teenager. Mama revealed her identity, and Irina stood in silence for a while, the tears welled up as she tried to take it all in.

Her family had been writing to Babcia throughout the 1960’s, and then once Babcia had died the contact had dried up, mainly due to the fact that none of us had been able to read or write Cyrillic. Now here was one of her relatives, standing in front of her with her son, and with no warning whatsoever. After a brief moment of awkwardness, Irina asked us if we would come back to the house with her. We asked what time she finishes work, and she told us normally at five, but she would just close the shop now. Too bad for any locals who wanted anything from the pharmacy today! She pulled the shutters now, and called to one of the young lads who was hanging around outside to get his car so that he could give us all a ride to the house.

So it was that we tracked through the back roads of Podpieczory in an old but clean Mercedes, and arrived soon at the top of the village. We walked down the small lane towards Irina’s home, and she told us about her family. Specifically that she had two sons, but that one of them had died last year at the age of only 32. When we reached the house, outside there was a beautiful and ornate shrine to Our Lady, made in his honour. We paused outside and it was only too apparent how raw that emotional wound still was. She spoke with a shakiness in her voice about his illness, his many operations in Lvov and Kiev, and the family he had left behind.

The old house was a wooden shack, and stood empty at the entrance to the plot of land. The new house was an altogether more solid looking construction, and nestled proudly on the hillside, three stories high and surrounded by a garden that grew fruit and vegetables on every available inch of earth. We followed the path up the hill towards the porch, and entered into the cool interior, a pleasant contrast from the now stifling heat outside. The house was spacious and well decorated, with much of the furniture clearly having been in the family for many years.

Irina ushered us into the living room, while she went into another room, calling out to someone who was there. Moments later, she emerged and closely behind her was an old lady, hunched almost through 90 degrees, shuffling slowly in with her sticks. She didn’t register any reaction to the strangers in her house, and when her daughter asked her if she knew who these people were, she said nothing. When she revealed it was “Maryśka from England” the reaction was dramatic – tears flowed immediately, as she kissed Mama on her arms and hugged her.

Such was the emotional reaction that she could barely speak for a good few minutes, but between the tears kept saying how she had always wondered where we were, whether the English branch of the family was still ok, and was so sorry that contact had been lost all those years ago. Her metal mouth shone in a bright smile as she slowly processed the sudden shock that she had experienced.

This was her first cousin (her father and Mama’s mother were brother and sister), and the first time she had seen her for around 70 years – indeed she described with great excitement how she remembered seeing Mama as a baby in her father’s arms, back in 1932.