5:50 p.m.: Those who have decided to return
In the snow-covered station of Przemysl, on the border between Poland and Ukraine, some Ukrainians watch for trains heading east, bound for Lviv, Odessa or kyiv. Olga, her husband Slava and her 10-year-old son Dmitri, who will celebrate his birthday next week, hope to return to Mykolaiv, a city in southern Ukraine that is under fire from the Russian army.
On a bench, a woman reveals that she intends to board the 10:35 p.m. train to kyiv. If she is grateful to Poland for her welcome, she misses her cat and her dog, left with friends. A young mother, Uliana, queues outside the door with her baby girl to return to Zhytomyr, a city further east. “In Poland, it was very good, but I want to go home,” she sums up.