“stay a little” to rebuild, the choice of Jane and her daughters, refugees in France

“I’m tired of hearing that question.” A smile lights up Jane’s azure eyes as she humorously rebuffs us. “I am asked every day when I think I will return to kyivcontinues the Ukrainian refugee in English, coffee in hand. But I don’t know, our daily lives are so uncertain.” The forty-year-old pauses. “Davai! Davai!” Those “go !”launched in Russian, are addressed to two small shapes that we guess in bed, huddled under the duvet. “Get up, we have to go to school!” Jane insists. The mischievous eye of 4-year-old Marta appears. Zlata, 10, responds with a grunt.

>> Follow the latest information on the war in Ukraine in our live

This family is one of the 70,000 refugees who have arrived in France since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine. The meeting takes place on a Tuesday in May, in a studio in Noisy-le-Grand (Seine-Saint-Denis), where the Groupe SOS association lodges it free of charge. Besides Jane and her daughters, there is the black cat, Lucifer, and the fish, Harry Potter. After crossing half of Europe in a jar of Nutella filled with water, he turns peacefully in an aquarium surmounted by a pink Eiffel Tower.

“Lucifer is stressed because you are here”assures us Zlata, finally seated in front of a solid breakfast of pasta shells and chicken. She seems to be talking more about herself than about the cat, busy devouring the pieces of meat she slips under the table. Jane is also a bit “nervous” this morning. You have to hurry to get to school, where her daughters started school yesterday. This is the third establishment – ​​one in Ukraine, two in France – where they have been studying since January.

At 8 o’clock, they finally leave. The crossing of Noisy-le-Grand is done on foot, with other refugees. More than 90 people are housed here by Groupe SOS, the leading operator for the reception of these displaced people in Ile-de-France. They are mainly single women with their children: the men stayed in Ukraine because of the general mobilization. “I try to recreate a kind of everyday life here, says Jane. Being able to talk to other Ukrainian women, who understand my situation, brings a little comfort.”

At the front of the group, Zlata, busy chatting with a friend, slips away without looking at her mother. “She’s already a teenager”, laughs Jane. But you have to accompany Marta to her class, where the teacher is waiting for her. “I don’t think she was registered at the canteen, you should get closer to the town hall”, warns the teacher. Jane responds with a puzzled look. The Ukrainian does not speak a word of French.

“Every day there is a new question that arises, a new document to obtain, a new problem to solve. And it’s more complicated when you don’t speak the language.”

Jane, Ukrainian refugee

at franceinfo

The 40-year-old photographer is lucky enough to get by in English, thanks to “courses taken a few years ago”. But sometimes he has to use an online translator to get his ideas across. An insufficient trick to manage all the administrative procedures that she has had to carry out for almost two months. Fortunately, for each of these questions, there is Groupe SOS.

In a room converted into an office, five employees of the association (including four Russian-speakers) schedule appointments with the doctor or the shrink, enroll the children in school, distribute clothes, organize activities for young people and identify initiatives in favor of the displaced. “It ranges from historical partners, such as Restos du Coeur and Secours Catholique, to large companies that offer mobile plans or finance the purchase of service vouchers”, explains Lidia, team coordinator. In the lobby, announcements in French and Ukrainian even give the address of a hairdresser who does haircuts for free.

“The association helps us a lot: I go to see them as soon as I have a problem”, greets Jane, who leaves SOS to take care of the registration of her daughters in the canteen. With the other mothers, she must already leave. Head to the Restos du Coeur, to pick up enough to feed your family all week. The forty-year-old drags behind her the pink suitcase which contained all her possessions from kyiv, transformed for the time being into a shopping trolley. “You might think I’m going on vacation”she jokes.

It’s one of Jane’s characteristics: she smiles almost all the time. “When we left Ukraine, I cried every day. But now it’s better, it’s easier to talk”, she says. Helped by a translator, she was able to see a psychologist and put a name to the “stress” who him “causes skin problems and other health concerns” : survivor’s guilt.

She never thought she would be away from her country and her loved ones for so long. When Russia invaded Ukraine on the morning of February 24, Jane was in shock. “Until then, I tried to ignore the information about what was coming”explains the photographer, who “only wants to chronicle the moments of happiness through his profession”. The day after the attack, she left for her mother, one hour from kyiv. “I took the essentials: the children, the animals and a suitcase.”

But as the days go by, “signs” that it was necessary to go even further have multiplied. Seated in front of a cappuccino (a pleasure she allows herself every week to remember “his life before”), Jane shells them. The grim list literally makes the hairs on his arms stand on end. There was this client, calling from Boutcha to describe the “russian tank” parked in front of his house. The daughter of a family friend, crossed with her infant two days after her delivery under the bombs. But also testimonies on social networks, accusing Russian soldiers of raping Ukrainian women in the east of the country.

For this “former math student”, “the calculation was quickly done”. “I could still leave, the trains were running. But I didn’t know if, the next day, bombs on the station or a tank in front of the house wouldn’t stop us.breathes Jane, tears in her eyes. I thought of my two daughters. We had to get them to safety.” The forties won Poland, where she thought “only stay a few days”. Two months have passed since.

It was in Poland that the first “links in the chain of solidarity” who brought Jane here. In a shelter, the photographer sympathized with two French people who had come to help the refugees. “Patrick put me in touch with Léna, a Ukrainian living in Paris.” Thanks to her, Jane got to know Céline and Xavier, a couple ready to put her up for a while in their apartment in the Ile-de-France region.

Everyone continues to see the little family today. “Two months ago I didn’t know anyone in the rest of Europe, emphasizes the refugee. I could never have imagined that today I would have friends in France. They saved us.” Because the return to Ukraine seems impossible for the moment. Every day, she asks relatives who stayed there if it is possible to come back. “They tell me it’s too dangerousshe regrets. Despite the situation, staying a little here is beneficial. Ukraine has spent the last 30 years trying to build its democracy. Here, my daughters see what it really looks like.”

“For weeks, Zlata refused to talk about the war.”

Jane, Ukrainian refugee

at franceinfo

Jane’s priority now is to bring some stability to her children. “Even though they are too young to clearly express their worries, I felt that these constant movements disturbed them”, worries the mother, on her way to pick up her daughters from school. She herself is “too tired, physically and morally, to move again”.

On the way back, Marta and Zlata tell their day to Jane, like the other children. And negotiate the snack menu: spread and some sweets. A little extra to improve everyday life, purchased thanks to service vouchers given by Groupe SOS. “I don’t often have sweets. But my daughters find it hard to understand why I can’t give them what they want anymore, like before, or why I sometimes have to ration cookies”almost apologizes Jane, watching the bill climb on the cash register screen.

In this daily life of permanent upheavals, a few projects are beginning to take shape. Language courses at La Sorbonne University, where Groupe SOS is trying to organize its registration. Jane could also resume her activity as a photographer, if her friend Léna manages to find her a computer. “I need it for touch-ups, but I was only able to leave with a camera and a lamp”, she explains. Finally there is this idea of ​​a trip to the beach, this summer, “so that Marta and Zlata can see the sea”. “I’m taking it one day at a time, without saying what’s to come. Today, I think we’ll stay here until August, contemplates Jane. And then, who knows? Maybe we’ll stay a little longer.”