Ukrainian family in Wirral dreaming of returning home
Video report by Victoria Grimes
A Ukrainian family who found refuge on Merseyside after fleeing their wartorn homeland say they don't know when they will be able to return.
Nina, and her children five-year-old Hanna and Seva, 10, moved to the Wirral after the Russian invasion of Ukraine a year ago but the children's father, Andrii, remains in Kyiv.
Since they left, they have only seen each other on video calls. Andrii says it's too long to be apart.
"I'm very worried about them and how they are," he says: "I miss them so much."
"We miss you too - very much," Nina and the children tell him.
The family were plunged into turmoil when the Russian invasion began, having to take shelter underground when air raid sirens sounded across their home city. Nina said: "All day, all night, we had alarms. This sound - I remember......"
She falters, unable to speak through her emotion.
“These 11 months have been very difficult," she continued. My daughter didn't speak for five months, except to me and her brother."
"It's not normal for children to have to listen to bomb attacks."
Nina and her children are just one of the hundreds of families who have made the North West their temporary home.
Living with their sponsor family in Wirral, Nina has found work as a cleaner and the children have settled into school.
"It is cool in England" says 10 year old Seva, "I like football, my school and I like chicken Kyiv."
He went on: ''I want to go home to Ukraine but I like it here as well. I would like to do a month here and then one there and keep swapping."
It is thanks to humanitarian aid worker Sally Becker that the family made it to the UK.
She has brought more than 140 women and children to safety here. She recalls the family fondly: "I remember Hanna on the flight home with us when we finally got to bring them to the UK.
"She was sitting in the row in front of us and was looking through the gap in the seats. It was very sweet."
Sally began her work in Bosnia during the conflict there in the 90s. She says the war in Ukraine has touched the hearts of people here in a particularly profound way:
"People just want to help. I think people in Britain realise that Ukraine is our front line against Russian forces and so they want to help because they feel these people are fighting for us.
"The women and children who are suffering as a result, are suffering because of the threat to the whole of Europe."
The help from those in the UK is appreciated deeply by Nina: " Ukrainian people say thank you so much to the families in the UK who have opened up their homes to Ukrainian families.
"Thank you so much."
Sally Becker is now involved in airlifting seriously ill children from Poland and Moldova using specially equipped air ambulances.
Her charity Save a Child is developing an app which allows doctors working on the front line to consult experts from around the world.
Nina is hoping that later in the year they will be able to return to their homeland:
"My daughter has a dream to be back there for her birthday in July".
No one yet knows if that dream will become a reality.
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