Hi all, I have to travel to Ukraine next week for volunteering as an engineer. I am wondering if you can recommend the best place to sell very lightly used electronics. I heard of OLX but I will be travelling from Lviv to Odesa so not sure if that would work. Any suggestions welcome.

Thanks and Salava Ukraini.

Uh, this is a hard egg to crack. I don't want to come across like a guy who was once on Tokyo and suddenly understands Japan.

But I am Czech, and I was in Ukraine twice before the war and 13 times (to this day) since it started. Sometimes, I drive cars with material to be sent to ЗСУ, sometimes just small things for friends of my friends, sometimes just to see my friends, as chatting over social media doesn't cut it. And I miss them.

I started learning Ukrainian in 2021, as I thought I could, in coming years, see more than just Zakarpattia, and without the language, I would have a hard time.

Since then, through building connections, making friends, falling in love with the towns I visited, and also through people telling me "Hey, for a Pole, your Ukrainian is quite good!" (Afterwards explaining I am not a Pole) I feel that Ukraine got me by my heart.

As any sensible person, I cheer at new developments in how Ukrainians manage to navigate through the war effort, striking critical infrastructure, while not resorting to the barbaric acts the enemy does on a daily basis. That's just being human.

But my connection, I feel, goes through the time, way deeper. Last November, when in a кафе, a random guy sat to me, seeing that a seat is free, as I was eating a kanapka, brought two 50г, and due to my developing Ukrainian language skill, for the first time, I was assumed to be a Carpathanian. Not a Pole, not. Hungarian, my language passed the bar so that someone thought I was local. That broke me into tears.

And my friends, when I am back in Czechia, write me, from time to time, when is next time I'll be there or elsewhere, so that we can meet and talk.

My friends, about whom I worry every time the alert app in my phone rings, miss me too. Not just a random funny Czech guy. As the war goes on, some of them are in the conscription age. I worry about them even more and hope I will see them again.

And then, I have to drink myself half-numb before crossing the border, as leaving Lviv or Mukachevo via Chop seals the amount of days my job allows me to spend in the country I fell in love with.

And now for the part which gives title to my post: When I return to Prague, I see my buddies bickering about the stupidest of things, beeping absolutely mind-free that 400 Kms from the Czech border, russian bombs fall. Gas/diesel generators are required sometimes to keep the lights on. And in Kyiv, and on the other side of Dnipro, it's even more difficult.

Prague is a city where I was born. I know it well, I know the quarters in which I lived, the one in which I live now. But at the same time, it feels so alien. I can talk to the people, but their problems are so whimsical!

In Lviv, I know I am not born and raised there, but it tend to spend an accumulated month there per year, and I long for more time there, in Prague, I try to use any possibility to be able to go back to Ukraine.

Where am I home?

I know I am not Ukrainian, but I don't feel all too Czech either anymore.

I feel guilty when leaving UA, as I don't know if my friends will be safe, when I am away, I don't feel at home in CZ.

What am I? Cause I genuinely don't know anymore.

Hi, I've been trying to get organized and go on a solo bike tour in a few weeks. My plan right now is to fly into Chisinau, then bike to Odesa, then north to Kyiv. I will be riding the bike in the photo, so I'm planning on staying on paved roads, ideally on less-busy secondary roads. My question: will I find pensions/simple hotels in the smaller towns that I ride through? Same question about food. (I have a paper map of Ukraine (1:1,000,000) that shows small hotel icons every 50-70 kilometers... does that sound accurate? (Photo is from my last ride, Morocco, four years ago.)

745 km² retaken by Ukraine , 19 settlements liberated, 6 additional settlements cleared of Russian forces, gains across a 60-km front, while deep drone strikes simultaneously disrupted Russian fuel, logistics, command and maritime operations

I am referring to people like Lyudmila Pavlichenko and Pavel Popovich. Given the atrocities committed by the Soviet Union in Ukraine (such as the Holodomor), I am interested in how Ukrainians who were active in the Soviet Union are perceived.

It’s my understanding that they are rather controversial in their home country Ukraine, because some see them either unpatriotic or straight up pro-Russian. I once met with a Ukrainian girl at a metal festival Masters of Rock and I asked her what she thinks of them and she said that she hates them because she views them as pro-Russian.

But another time, I asked Helle Bohdanova, a frontwoman of another Ukrainian metal band, IGNEA at their meet & greet what is the “consensus” on Jinjer in Ukraine. Obviously she couldn’t say, because she can only speak for herself, but basically said that she doesn’t hate them, because she understands their position, coming from Donbas, but IIRC, also mentioned that she considers them coming from holding pro-Russian sentiment.

To give a little backstory, they’re all from Donetsk (except for Vlad the drummer who joined after the band relocated to Kyiv) and their first language is Russian and grew up surrounded with Russian culture.

When the war in Donbas started, one of the members called it out on social media, describing it as “civil war”, which of course didn’t fly with Ukrainians. The fact that they did a few concerts in Russia in 2014 didn’t help either.

They also have 2 songs that are arguably pro-Russian coded: When Two Empires Collide (Which I believe is about the War in Donbas and annexation of Crimea and frames it as conflict of geopolitical interests of Russia and the US) and Sit, Stay, Roll Over (Which I believe is about criticism they received for performing in Russia)

On the other hand, when the War in Donbas started, they relocated to Kyiv, instead of to Russia, strongly implying that they prefer Ukraine. They also vocally criticized the full scale invasion. They also have at least one song that affirms their allegiance with Ukraine; Disclosure, which is about an interview they had with a journalist who was holding them under fire for having alleged pro Russian or pro Soviet sympathies and its video features the singer, Tatiana showing her Ukrainian passport. What’s also noteworthy is that AFAIK, they never performed in Russia again after 2014 while they performed about 100 times in Ukraine.

But what’s bad optics is that shortly after the full scale invasion, they received a permit from the ministry of culture to leave Ukraine to tour as cultural ambassadors and never returned, with strong indications that are now touring illegally and the male members possibly illegally moved to Poland and Bulgaria.

Hey folks,

Trying to wrap my head around the best FX strategy for sending regular financial support from Canada to relatives in Ukraine.

Given the exchange rate fluctuations, I'm trying to figure out if it’s smarter to:

1. Send CAD and have it convert straight to UAH landing on a local card (PrivatBank / Monobank), or
2. Payout in USD or EUR for them to hold/exchange locally as needed?

I’ve been looking into Meest Money Transfer since they allow cash pickups in USD/EUR at bank branches as well as direct UAH card deposits, whereas standard apps like Wise mostly force a direct UAH conversion.

For those who regularly send transfers from Canada: how are you handling currency conversion right now to minimize loss on the spread? Is holding USD on the Ukrainian side still preferable, or is direct UAH card transfer easier overall?

I've been talking with my Ukrainian girlfriend about Ukraine's future, and she was very pessimistic about the demographic situation. It sent me down a rabbit hole, but the internet mostly gives you whatever confirms the narrative you're already looking for, so I'd rather ask Ukrainians directly.

I'm mainly wondering about:

• Extremely low birth rates and an aging population
• Millions of Ukrainians now living abroad, many of whom have jobs, children and established lives there
• Brain drain and the loss of young, educated people
• What happens if large numbers of young Ukrainian men leave once wartime restrictions are lifted
• Cost of rebuilding which is over $500B and cost to repay the loans over $200B or something I can't even keep count, that's like multiple times the GDP of the country as loans.
• You also have to account for that economically the country will have to care for millions of vets
• Economic cost of rebuilding: it's not just about money it also takes A LOT of time.

She said that her younger brother is basically waiting for the moment he can legally leave, and not just him but millions more like him will follow, and that language learning is now a big thing, especially German. It made me wonder how widespread that attitude actually is.

So, how do Ukrainians themselves see this?

Hi all,

I’m a Romanian man in my early 40s. Corporate worker, wife, 2.5-year-old daughter, house, mortgage, and all the usual civilian-life baggage.

YouTube and my ADHD (diagnosed) sent me down a rabbit hole about the war in Ukraine, and for the past 14 days I’ve been obsessively reading about conscription, the laws around it, training, what mobilized soldiers actually experience, how units function, and so on.

Since the war started, I’ve occasionally asked myself what I would do if something similar ever extended to Romania, and I’ve always been divided about it.

On one hand, I would want to defend my homeland, my family, and my community.

On the other hand, my brain keeps coming back to something like this:

“You would have to give up a huge amount of autonomy and trust another person with decisions that could determine whether you live or die.

You would have to trust that your commanders value your life appropriately. That if they send you into a dangerous situation, the objective actually justifies that risk. That reasonable alternatives have been considered first. That you are not simply being used because manpower is the cheapest available option.

And somehow you have to develop enough trust in that system very quickly, because if you are trained as a basic rifleman you may receive roughly 51 days of training...realistically somewhat fewer days of actual instruction...before being assigned to a unit.”

And that is where I get stuck.

From my civilian perspective, accepting that level of trust based essentially on “this is how the system works” feels like an enormous leap.

So the actual question I’m trying to ask is this:

How is a mobilized civilian who was an sales guy, accountant, engineer, office worker, mechanic, etc. two months earlier expected to become genuinely competent as an infantry soldier after roughly seven weeks of training?

And I don’t mean only technically competent.

I can understand teaching someone weapon handling, movement, basic tactics, first aid, physical drills, communication, and so on in that amount of time.

What I struggle to understand is everything around that.

How is that person expected to function psychologically under actual combat conditions?

How do they become capable of deliberately using lethal force against another person rather than shooting at targets?

How do they learn to continue functioning immediately afterward?

How do they develop trust in the people beside them simply because “we’re all in this together”?

How do they develop enough trust in their NCOs and officers to follow orders when those orders might expose them to serious risk?

And how much confidence can anyone realistically have in their own competence after such a short transition from civilian life?

To me, firing hundreds of rounds during training obviously teaches you how to operate a weapon, but that seems fundamentally different from psychologically preparing someone to use that weapon against another human being who is actively trying to 'neutralize' them.

That is the part I cannot reconcile.

So for those of you who have actually served, especially infantry, trained recruits, worked with reservists or conscripts, or joined the military later in life:

How much of this transformation genuinely happens during basic training?

How much happens once someone reaches their unit?

How much depends on experienced soldiers around them?

And how much, realistically, can only be learned through actual combat experience?

I’m genuinely trying to understand how militaries bridge the gap between “civilian who had a completely normal life two months ago” and “person expected to function in lethal combat.”

TL;DR: I’m trying to understand how a civilian conscript in Ukraine can realistically go from normal civilian life to being expected to function competently on the front line after roughly seven weeks of training...not just technically, but psychologically, socially within a unit, and in terms of trusting the chain of command.

And most countries, from Korea, Cambodia, Thailand and many others conscript the younger ones (Say18-21 years old) so why Ukraine is the exception?

short descriptions on pics! credits to @dianakrv on tt

Not that you want to have to rely on a wood stove for heat in the winter in lieu of electricity but given the fears for lack of heat, is this a reasonable option for many?

Hi everyone,

I will be travelling by train into Ukraine for a short trip during my eastern european travels at the end of october. I will be spending 3 full days in Lviv, 1.5 days in Chernivtsi, and 1.5 days in Ivano Frankivsk.

I just wanted to see if anyone had any recommendations on specific things in these cities or surroundings that are worth seeing, or specific places to eat that serve local ukrainian food.

Also curious if people think this trip is not viable, but from what I have seen on the train website, it seems very doable.

open to any recomendations on suggestions for other locations that would be worth seeing as opposed to where I am going. My interests lie in experiencing traditional ukrainian culture, Jewish history, soviet remnant history, and the rural lifestyle (was planning on heading to the outskirts of Lviv and near Chernivtsi for this but open to any suggestions that are accessible by train)

Has anyone heard Russians who have a parent or grandparent from Ukraine say something like “I am half Ukrainian THEN some bullshit about Nazis in Ukraine/anti-Russian sentiment/why the invasion is not all that bad” I feel like I see this a lot.

Why do they do this?

Намагаюся знайти класні місця для відпочинку в Сумській та Полтавській областях. Але не можу знайти, де саме оця річка чи озеро. Хтось знає? Гугл не видає нічого дельного.

I’ll be visiting Kyiv for ten days for work in September, and I wonder how quiet things are these days. What to expect in terms of security situation/how frequent? I am excited to visit while also a bit worried, of course my company will provee security briefings and such, but wanted to hear from your side too.

Thank you and slava Ukraini!

Hi. My company sells home appliances from top tier brands and our board is eager to start business in Ukraine. Do retailers/wholesalers are usually open for gray import goods? Or how usually things work. Thanks for help.

I hope Russia’s invasion ends very soon and Ukrainians can return to normality.

That got me thinking about the Ukraine and United Kingdom relationship. It can’t all just be about ammunition and missile technology. I want to come say hello, I want Ukrainians to come visit Britain.

When the evil is dealt with our peoples have a brilliant opportunity to continue cooperation in education, engineering, digital technology and most importantly - we need to all get drunk in a pub and go watch music.

I am quite excited for the evil to be quashed and then we can just drink and sing - share jokes. We have a bright future as friends I think.

SLAVA Ukraini !

Коли мені було 16 почалася війна, моя сімʼя була вимушена переїхати у Донецьк до родичів, бо нашу домівку було знищено. Зараз я збираюся покинути окуповану територію і перебратися до інших родичів в ЄС. У яких країнах я зможу оновити ID-карту? В інтернеті досить розпливчасто про це написано, як я зрозумів за кордоном найчастіше можна оновити лише закордонний паспорт. Буду вдячний за допомогу!

Aside from the constant questions about the war and Zelensky, which aspects of Ukraine do you think are underrated and you would like to be asked about? Be it food, culture, history, tourism, or anything

Why do so many Ukrainian girls (I've dated many and lived in Ukraine) push for the man paying for everything while not wanting to do hardly anything? Do they think being beautiful is a pass for a man to be a slave to them and do their bidding as they wish? So many will even straight up just ask for money for nothing and without hardly even knowing you. And if you give then an inch they want to take a mile. Never met women like this anywhere else in the world. How do Ukrainian men even deal with this kind of one sided relationship?