Lastly, they left. It was round 11 a.m.
Klymiuk was now hours not on time.
She snapped on yellow gloves and unfurled a trash bag, dragging it behind her by way of puddles of snowmelt. She moved in fast, brief bursts, snatching wilted carnations and soggy roses off the unsanctioned memorial, then flicking them into the trash bag.
The 52-year-old former psychologist has been caretaking the monument for the reason that spring of 2022, when an American named Ryan Routh — now notorious for his 2024 assassination try on President Donald Trump on a Florida golf course — pitched a tent on the garden close to the Tchaikovsky Academy of Music with a poster: “My girlfriend was killed by Putin. If you understand somebody who was killed by Putin, put up a flag.”
A couple of flags, inked with the ages and name indicators of fallen troopers, become 1000’s. Klymiuk felt like she had no alternative however to assist. She’d been volunteering for over a decade, for the reason that Maidan Revolution in 2014. So she saved displaying up, taking the metro an hour every method from her dwelling on Kyiv’s Left Financial institution. Days become weeks after which years. Although one other girl, Tetyana Prantenko, additionally helps, Klymiuk and her companion, Oleg Karas, have turn out to be referred to as the memorial’s essential caretakers. Guests acknowledge Klymiuk by her hair, dyed purple and scraped into pigtails.
“You see how all of the flowers are damp and moist?” Klymiuk mentioned, pointing at one other limp bouquet — the day gone by’s sorrows changing into at present’s process. “I wished to wash it up yesterday, however I didn’t have an opportunity.”
***
She darted forward together with her trash bag.
Pausing, she plucked slivers of shattered glass from the snow. Although the coldest winter in additional than a decade — exacerbated by Russia’s repeated assault on Ukraine’s power system — had left her with out warmth or energy at dwelling, she was largely nervous in regards to the picture frames, a few of which had been shattered by subzero temperatures.
The images inside had been warped and weathered, solely the outlines of faces left. She wished to seek out replacements earlier than the boys light totally.
She and Karas did just a little of all the pieces. Whereas municipal employees largely saved to the sidewalks, sweeping the pavement clear, the couple repaired damaged flags with electrical tape, sprayed pesticides on the grass, raked the leaves within the fall, and carved paths by way of others’ grief.
In his backpack, Karas saved a pre-packaged lunch, trash baggage, everlasting markers, zip ties, two-sided tape, a screw driver, a field cutter, a hammer and Ukrainian flags and braided ribbons, each of which he offered. He mentioned he donated the cash to the army to purchase drones and a hospital in Kyiv that treats wounded troopers.
“We arrive at 8 a.m. and go away at 5 p.m.,” he mentioned. “We take off possibly one weekend a 12 months, simply to sleep.”
