“The Kupiansk Paradise”: Diaries of a Veterinary Mission in the Kharkiv Region

“Kupiansk Rai”: several concrete letters have fallen from the district sign, leaving only “Rai” [“rai” means “paradise” in Ukrainian, while the original word on the sign was “Raion,” meaning “district”]. It’s hard to imagine anything more ironic.

Flags flutter in the wind. Fading inscriptions left by passersby shimmer on the painted concrete. The wind blows in our faces. My fellow veterinarians step out of the vehicle, and the dogs follow — beautiful Lyman and impossibly funny Ritchie. I capture them all on camera. A minute later, we’re back in the cars.

We dive beneath a tilted railway bridge; pieces hang over the road like something out of a movie with explosions and high-quality CGI. The car veers onto a dirt road, jostling us as clouds of dust rise.

At one point, the car dips down, leaving a few weary soldiers behind on the side — and I see water all around. Rusted remnants of the bridge jut up from the depths like the spine and ribs of a skeleton. Oskil [River]? I pull out my phone, recording a few seconds, but all that’s visible is dust, and all that’s audible is a tune on the radio, “Your heart will tell you, for it has sight. It’s him! It’s him for sure!”

Together with the veterinary team, we head toward Kivsharivka, where they will sterilize and treat animals. Thus begins the diary of these eight incredible, smoke-filled days.

Characters:

o   Nataliya Sokolova (Natalka) — Head of the Accessible Sterilization project, veterinarian.

o   Lolita Polishchuk (Lola) — Veterinary assistant.

o   Yuliya Tkachenko — Veterinarian.

o   Roman Bidnenko (Roma) — Animal catcher.

o   Oleksandr Pohrebnyi (Sasha) — Driver of the UAnimals veterinary vehicle.

o   Olha Slynko (Olya) — Volunteer.

o   Andriy Kharchyshyn (Andriy) — Manager of the UAnimals rescue department.

o   Liliya Florynska (Lilya) — Animal welfare volunteer from Kupiansk.

o   Ranok the Dog.

o   Village Council Head Vasyl Bokov — Head of the Osynovo Village Council.

o   Aunt Valya, Zina, and others.

Tuesday, September 3

The car sways wildly between the pale chalk hills, the landscape resembling a sliced Kyiv cake. 

Ahead, the Kivsharivka sign appears, painted blue and yellow. The flag flutters on it, too, though faded to a lavender hue. We head a bit south to the first spot where the mobile clinic will be set up — the village of Novoosynove.

At 2:02 p.m., we arrive. The unknown soldier [Soviet-era monuments present in virtually every village] bows slightly under an old birch tree. We park the veterinary vehicle there, hanging branches around it for cover, and carry our supplies into an abandoned outpatient clinic. In one of the rooms, military call signs and code words are pinned up. I drop my backpack there.

The clinic wall has a gaping hole, and beside it, a rose bush blooms. The roof is shattered, and torn wires dangle like garlands here and there. I walk further in. Shattered windows reveal smiles of jagged shards, and blackened streaks make it appear as if something hot has scraped the building.  The fence is scrawled with messages for the enemy. Finally, I see people — women sitting on benches surrounded by cats. “Are you a volunteer? I’d like to speak with you.”

I barely manage to explain the type of our volunteer mission before the women start sharing stories about their animals.

“Who wrote on the fence?” I ask.

“Oh, Valya wrote it while Kostya dictated. She really shouldn’t have! There are four mistakes in every word.”

On the way back, I indeed spot the inscription, “ruskiy korabil.” When I return, Roma, the animal catcher, has just arrived from his first round. Dogs and cats “spill” from the car like out of the mitten [reference to a Ukrainian fairy tale]. Well, it just seems that way — they’re actually secured in cages. These are strays that will be spayed, neutered, and treated for parasites.

One puppy is too small for a cage, so it was let to wander on the grass, waddling between the cages with little, wobbly steps. Wobble-wobble, wobble-wobble.

“We’ll vaccinate this one soon,” says Natalka. “Let’s get it on video. Can you hold it…?”

“I just need to grab my mic,” I say, but I can’t bring myself to set the puppy down.

“Hand it over here; I’ll hold it,” offers Andriy, our manager.

I start to feel a pang of jealousy.

“Why don’t you two go together?” Natalka suggests, ending the debate.

I hurry to the clinic to fetch my mic, still holding the pup. The little one shivers like an aspen leaf but obediently sits on the couch while I search for the equipment. Once ready, we vaccinate and microchip him. I capture the process on film and already feel like I’ll never let this pup go.

Meanwhile, Natalka, Lola, and Yulia begin sedating the animals in the cages and starting the surgeries. Later, these cats and dogs will be vaccinated for rabies and treated for parasites. Roma and volunteer Olya are preparing for the next round of captures. I grab my camera and barely manage to jump in the car with them.

“Turn around so it doesn’t see me!” seems to be the mantra of the day. Roma shouts it to everyone helping bring a cat or dog to the car. He holds that if the animal doesn’t see the catcher, he can safely take it from its owner and quickly place it in a cage.

We gather cats around Novoosynove and Kivsharivka. Some people hand them over; others, Roma catches with a special trap cage baited with fragrant kibbles. Some are caught barehanded, while others need a net. By dusk, we’re back with 18 cats in cages.

The veterinarians finish their surgeries: 15 animals sterilized on the first day. It may not seem like much, but we still have plenty of time ahead.

The frontline rumbles, making it impossible to sleep in the clinic tonight. We gather our things and head to the basement of a five-story building. The building seems empty, but suddenly, a woman materializes near the entrance with a bicycle. “You all need a place to wash up! There’s an empty, bombed-out apartment with a water supply. The soldiers used to go there to bathe. Oh, how long we have lived with them here! They left at one point, then returned because they were afraid Aunt Valya wasn’t around anymore. But here I am. They meet me, they wheel my bicycle up… Second floor, there’s a spoon sticking out of the lock.”

Wednesday, September 4

In the morning, I head out again with Roma, the animal catcher, and Olya. Roma drives, while Olya keeps tabs on requests coming from Andriy and occasionally Natalka, jotting them down in her notebook and managing calls on her phone. After returning animals to their owners in Novoosynove, we set off to the village of Podoly to follow up on more requests. We bump along the dirt road like wandering Bedouins on camels, the air thick with smoke.

In Podoly, we’re met by Zina, a local volunteer who shelters abandoned dogs and knows where others might be found. She’s essentially our diplomatic envoy in this village. Zina hops into the car and confidently extends her tanned finger from the window, directing us.

Our first stop is with a woman picking up her already-sterilized dog, Pushynka. The woman cries with joy when she receives her dog and again when handing over Pushynka’s puppies for sterilization. “You’ll bring them back tomorrow, right?”

Our car crawls over sand dunes left by military vehicles, reaching a neighborhood where many residents remain.

“Where’s your other cat?” one woman asks. “My comadre is still trying to catch her,” another replies. “Those are my cats,” waves a woman in a snow-white headscarf. “They’re displaced. They used to live in the military’s house over there, but then they came to me. A cat and three kittens. The soldiers left, and nobody was feeding them.”

Our conversations with people go smoothly until we arrive at the home of some local drinkers, where dogs cluster outside. Despite our diplomatic envoy doing her best, we couldn’t break through the wall of incomprehension. A man and woman shout and tell us, along with Zina, to go away. We manage to take only one dog for sterilization.

Today, we sterilized 46 animals and distributed rabies vaccines and parasite treatments — items unavailable for purchase here.

Thursday, September 5

Emerging from the basement, my eyes take a while to adjust to the light.

A rumble starts: two helicopters soar overhead, their heavy bellies skimming above me, only to return minutes later. I spot blue and yellow insignias. Hopefully, they accomplished what they set out to do.

Everything around is humming and vibrating. At the mobile clinic, our first client is Simka, a cat brought in by an older man, Oleksandr Vasylovych. He tells us he has another cat, Bilka, along with three kittens. Maybe we can catch and vaccinate them? We head to his yard together.

Under the grapevines, the kittens huddle on the seat of an old rusted moped.

“I could leave here,” Oleksandr Vasylovych laments. “I’d let my little dog go. But what about these ones? I’m in a deadlock! I don’t know what to do with them! I’ve got nowhere to go, let alone take them. If I leave, it would be to the Sumy region. But they’re not wanted there.”

We manage to catch two and carry them back. Another cat comes out. “Murchyk, come along! Today’s my birthday. I didn’t know since there’s no power, and then I charged my phone and saw that it was today.”

Meanwhile, locals continue arriving at the mobile clinic, some women bringing cats quite literally in sacks. Everyone discusses last night’s shelling in Kivsharivka. One shell hit the bus station near the kiosk where we bought food yesterday.

By late morning, I set out with Roma again to Kivsharivka and Podoly. After the strikes, the smoke was thicker. The bus station is blackened and destroyed, and patches of grass are still smoldering.

At 12:01 p.m., one of the busiest episodes of the veterinary mission begins. After returning sterilized animals to Podoly, we set off to locate a collapsed house rumored to be sheltering seven puppies. All feral, and they need to be caught to vaccinate them.

We finally locate the place: a sieve instead of a fence, and the house missing an entire wall. Piles of bricks cover the ground, while shelves stocked with canned food and household items are visible inside. Roma and I enter what used to be the kitchen — it’s dark and disorderly.

We shine our flashlights around but manage to locate only two puppies. The others dart under a gap in the floorboards, and the next 20 minutes are filled with dust and chaotic scurrying. Roma uses some kind of a rod to pry up the floor, reaching into the holes to grab the puppies by hand. They whimper, but eventually, we catch them all.

Back in Novoosynove, I set off on foot to find another store. A dull thud echoes in the distance. At an intersection, a burnt car lies under a wooden sign labeled “Store” with an arrow pointing left. I follow it. The houses along the way have warped walls, and on one, with relatively fresh pink paint, someone has scrawled, “Glory to Ukraine, death to enemies!”

“Do you have any bread?” I ask.

“No bread delivery today. Tomorrow.”

Apart from bread, they seem to have everything else.

By day’s end, we had operated on 37 animals, most of which were captured strays. We continued distributing parasite treatments.

As the sun sets, I step outside to take in the village. Tended but empty gardens stretch before me. Corn and unharvested tomatoes. Marigolds bloom everywhere.

Friday, September 6

We’re at a new location, though the village name isn’t much different — Osynovo, now on the right bank of the Oskil. Once again, we set up the mobile clinic near the village council and community center, where a crowd has already gathered. Some wait with cats and dogs for sterilization, while others simply want to chat. They sit beside us on the bench, talking, and talking, and talking… The common theme for everyone here is their dogs and cats.

Midday, soldiers bring in a dog named Sandy, who resembles a husky, for sterilization.

“She’s our sister in arms,” says Sasha, a soldier, squinting in the sun. “She’s been with us in the dugouts, the trenches… always hiding with us in the shelters. She’s been with us since she was a pup.”

Roman turns to me and asks, “Shall we head to the dump?” I nod, “Of course.”

The local dump is said to be a goldmine for catching stray animals. We arrive during the golden hour when everything is bathed in the warm glow of the low sun. Golden-tinted trash blankets the hills.

We’re followed by a man of remarkable erudition: “I know three languages,” he declares, “Ukrainian, russian, and Romani! And here’s my dog. Bomba, come here!”

Our trip to the dump is only partially successful; we manage to pick up just one dog there and another on the way back.

But today, more owners have started bringing their animals for sterilization. Altogether, we sterilize 59 cats and dogs: 33 brought in by their owners, with the rest from our animal catching rounds.

We settle in for the night at the village community center. The head of the village council brings us blankets; I lay mine beneath a poster of a Soviet soldier. There’s no Wi-Fi or phone signal here, so to catch an internet connection from the Starlink, we have to step onto the council’s porch. However, the community center houses a small library with relatively modern books. A red-painted sign above reads, “Kupiansk District! Our homeland.”

Saturday, September 7

“I brought seven cats from Kupiansk,” says volunteer Yulia, setting seven carriers in a row. “I collected them from people who can’t bring them here for sterilization on their own. Many people have left, abandoning their animals, who can’t fend for themselves. I’ve taken in one cat and four dogs. Some others, we go and feed.”

Today, animals are brought in from Kupiansk, a soldier and a few villagers come by. Later in the afternoon, I head to Kupiansk myself with Roman. We’re not alone: volunteer Lilia joins us, her notebook filled with addresses.

“How’s veterinary care here?” I ask. “Nonexistent,” Lilia replies. “It’s been about ten months without any help. Sometimes, people contact veterinarians in Kharkiv online or take animals themselves to Chuhuiv or Kharkiv. There used to be a clinic in Shevchenkove, but it’s gone too. Now, it’s only phone consultations.”

By the end of the day, the vets sterilized 67 cats and dogs.

Sunday, September 8

“This here is Sofa. She’s a sweetheart, never causes trouble,” a local woman, a mother of three, tells me about her dog. “Either way, she needs to be sterilized. It’s better for the dog and for us — otherwise, we’d have way too many dogs. I also have Lyalya. When the explosions are close, they run everywhere, barking. Sofa sleeps under my car because she’s scared of explosions.”

The wait is long, and soon, the woman shifts to sharing memories of the occupation.

“They took everyone to the basements, forced us to sing the russian anthem. Some made it out; some didn’t. It was terrifying when planes flew over the rooftops. At first, I’d huddle in a corner, clutching my head… I don’t know how I managed to pull myself together. It took them a long time to push them out of the woods. Now that our troops are here, it’s not as scary. God forbid it happens again.”

A clear autumn sky with thin, transparent clouds.

This is Prystin, the third village on our route. Here, too, we’ve set up the mobile clinic beside the village council and community center. Beneath a bench, a neat pile of shell fragments is stacked — smooth metal with jagged, torn edges.

At 5:37 p.m., the air thickens with smoke. The first puppy vaccinated during the mission sleeps, unbothered by any explosions. In Osynovo, I’ve already named him Ranok [“Morning”]. Some people sit “under the Starlink,” trying to pick up a signal. Andriy is on the phone with UAnimals manager Nastya: “I’ll text you every hour, ‘All good, all good.’”

This reassurance is necessary because it was whistling and falling nearby recently. We ducked behind a wall, though who knows what good it would’ve done.

Just afterward, our driver Sasha calls out, “Drone!” and we crouch near a birch for a few minutes.

I see people outside the village tying three cows to graze. The young women continue their surgeries while Roman is on a capture round.

In the evening, the village council head stops by again. “That drone dropped something near my house. There was some kind of another thing,  it fell in a woman’s yard. I’ll go visit her and tell you what that was. Will this one here turn out like marble?” He nods at Ranok, who indeed has a reddish coat with faint marbled patterns.

The veterinarians work late as usual: today, they’ve operated on 41 animals.

To keep the light use minimal, only the vet van stays illuminated. Once that light goes out, everything is swallowed by thick darkness. Only the sky over Kivsharivka continues to flash.

Monday, September 9

Early in the morning, something hit nearby again. I hear the village head on the phone, asking, “Could you bring a couple of canisters of water, at least? There was a strike, and we don’t want the fire spreading to the sunflowers…”

It’s the second-to-last day, so, together with Andriy, the manager, we record a video summarizing our efforts. He holds the shaggy Lyman in his arms. “The Grads [MLRS] last night were memorable,” Andriy says with a half-smile.

But it’s time to take stock for real: the vet mission has provided aid to 390 animals, most of them strays.

Tonight, there are few stars, but the moon is visible. It’s waxing but no longer a thin crescent. Its broader shape glows in the sky — a strange, blood-red hue.

Tuesday, September 10

We pack up, load Ranok into the car, and begin the slow drive back to Kharkiv with Sasha in the vet van. The veterinarians, Roma, and Andriy take a second van. The vet van has some mechanical issues, so we can only drive in second gear, giving us ample time to take in the sights of the Kharkiv region — beautiful and smoke-filled. russian radio occasionally breaks through the static.

In Kharkiv, I stop by a pet store, buy a dog carrier, and head home.

We arrive in Kyiv that evening, all of us — the veterinarians, Andriy, Sasha, and us with the dog.

Just before arrival, I text Natalka: “How are you?” “All’s well,” she replies, sending a photo from the van with a glass in hand. “Celebrating life.” And the little “marbled” dog is giving me a hard time to finish this text.