The Irinas of Kharkiv: Helping People to Begin Again
By Matthew Parish
Saturday 26 September 2026
Kharkiv is a city that has learned to live simultaneously with normality and catastrophe. People go to work, children grow up, couples fall in love and babies are born. At the same time, Russian drones and missiles continue to strike the city and the front remains sufficiently close that new waves of displaced people continue to arrive from towns and villages threatened by the fighting.
Behind the statistics are people who have spent more than four years trying to make this extraordinary situation bearable. Two of them are called Irina. Both were entrepreneurs before Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022. Both became volunteers almost immediately. Since then, their work has ranged from feeding people and animals to finding clothes, shoes, beds and medicines, helping displaced people with documents and organising children’s activities intended to give some semblance of an ordinary childhood to young people who have experienced things no child should have to see.
One of the two Irinas is a co-founder of the charitable foundation WoW Division, whose work has a particular emphasis upon abandoned animals. The other had headed three civil society organisations protecting entrepreneurs’ rights before the war and now works extensively with internally displaced persons (IDPs), including through a children’s humanitarian hub serving more than 2,300 families.
The Lviv Herald spoke with them in Kharkiv about what four and a half years of war have done to their city, what happens to people when they flee their homes with nothing and how volunteers try to put the pieces of ordinary life back together.
The interview was conducted in Russian. It has been translated into English and lightly edited for clarity, continuity and length.
Matthew Parish: Let us begin before the war. Who were you and how did you become involved in this work?
Irina 1: My name is Irina and I am a co-founder of the WoW Division charitable foundation. Our work is primarily connected with animals. We feed abandoned animals, rescue them and try to find new families for them. But everybody should understand that behind every animal there is a person.
Before the war I was an entrepreneur and I still am. I have two dogs myself and that influenced the direction my volunteering took. Helping animals became the natural thing for me to do.
Irina 2: I was also an entrepreneur. I headed three public organisations concerned with protecting the rights of entrepreneurs, both here in Kharkiv and in Kyiv.
Our volunteering began on 27 February 2022, three days after the full-scale invasion. I approached the management of the market and asked them to give us some space from which we could help people. By that evening we were already providing assistance to people in Northern Saltivka, which was being bombarded from the beginning. We delivered food there and throughout Kharkiv Oblast.
The first people we helped were not actually displaced people. They were the people of Kharkiv and the surrounding region who had suddenly found themselves under attack.
Matthew Parish: Those first weeks must now seem almost unimaginable. What did humanitarian work consist of then?
Irina 2: Food parcels and logistics. We helped families leave the city, including large families and children from institutions. We supplied essential household items and medical assistance.
Everything was immediate. People needed food. They needed to get out. They needed medicine. Later the waves of displaced people began arriving from elsewhere as the fighting moved and different places came under attack.
Irina 1: I left Kharkiv on 7 March and returned two months later. I had just given birth and was in Western Ukraine, but my husband remained in Kharkiv from the first days of the war rescuing animals.
Even while I was displaced myself, we did not sit doing nothing. From the beginning of March we were sending money and animal food. We contacted foreign companies and organisations ourselves, including Polish and German organisations, and found humanitarian assistance. We travelled to collect it and sent it back to Kharkiv on evacuation trains.
For those first two months I was an internally displaced person myself.
Matthew Parish: That gives you the unusual perspective of having been both a displaced person and somebody helping displaced people. What condition were people in when the first large groups began arriving?
Irina 2: Terrible. At the beginning people were extremely distressed because they had lost everything. We were often amongst the first people able to give them the things they needed.
Gradually people began to recover psychologically. Psychologists helped, as did our organisations and many others. Constant support mattered. Some people rented accommodation and others lived in dormitories. Slowly they began to form communities and come to terms with what had happened.
But consider what “losing everything” actually means. People needed lawyers to help restore their documents. They needed accommodation, clothes, shoes and medicines. They needed somebody to accompany them through the social services and the city and regional authorities. When you flee suddenly, the problem is not simply that you have lost your house. You may have lost every piece of paper proving who you are and everything necessary for conducting an ordinary life.
Matthew Parish: Where are the people arriving in Kharkiv today coming from?
Irina 1: Many now come from Kharkiv Oblast, including the Kupiansk and Vovchansk districts. Some arrived during the renewed Russian offensives. Many live in dormitories and others rent accommodation.
From my perspective, one of the greatest difficulties is what happens to their animals. It is very hard to find accommodation with an animal. Dormitories generally will not accept them. So people sometimes have to leave their animals behind.
That is terrible, but you also have to understand the position these people are in. They are trying to escape and find somewhere to live. This is why I say that behind every abandoned animal there is a person.
Irina 2: People arrive from wherever military operations are taking place, wherever the front approaches and wherever evacuations become necessary. Sometimes the regional authorities organise the evacuation and sometimes people leave by themselves. They are saving their lives.
Matthew Parish: What does somebody need when they arrive after an evacuation?
Irina 1: Everything. It depends upon how they escaped. If somebody was able to leave early and bring some possessions, perhaps they have a fork, a spoon and a pillow. That is already something.
But many leave under fire. They are simply trying to get out alive and arrive with absolutely nothing. No pillow, no blanket, not even a plate. So in the first few days they need all these basic things. Then they need some financial support so they can begin buying things for themselves and reconstructing their lives.
Irina 2: The first question is: where do I live? Then: what do I sleep on? What do I wear? What do I eat?
There may also be medical problems. People may have been injured or they may be in shock. They may not have documents. So the immediate requirements are housing, food, clothing, shoes, medical assistance and legal support.
Matthew Parish: Who are the most vulnerable people arriving now?
Irina 2: If you look at the different categories, relatively few young people who are capable of working evacuate to Kharkiv. Many go further, including abroad. The people who remain until the last possible moment tend to be elderly or ill, people with disabilities and people who cannot move independently.
You have to understand why they stay. Their home may be the only thing of value they possess. It is what they have worked for throughout their lives. Then there are their animals, their livestock, their dogs and cats and their land.
So those eventually evacuated to Kharkiv are often amongst the most vulnerable: people with disabilities, people with illnesses, people over 60 and people who remained in their homes until the very last moment.
Irina 1: There are also many single mothers and mothers with children, as well as large families. Many elderly people cannot travel abroad. They may not have the money and their health may make travelling difficult.
Matthew Parish: Once people reach Kharkiv, how difficult is it to resume anything resembling an ordinary life — finding employment or putting children into school?
Irina 1: It is difficult. Kharkiv itself has problems with schools and kindergartens because of the war. There are only a limited number of underground schools and kindergartens. Children may attend in shifts and they cannot necessarily go every day.
Online education is valuable but this makes employment difficult for parents. Many schools and kindergartens were bombed and have still not been rebuilt.
Irina 2: There are difficulties everywhere: housing, employment, schools and kindergartens. These people have no roots here.
A displaced person may have been highly skilled before evacuation but cannot necessarily find skilled employment in Kharkiv. They may end up working as a salesperson or cleaner. In many respects they face the same difficulties refugees and displaced people encounter anywhere. One advantage here is that there need not be a language barrier. We speak Ukrainian and Russian and can understand one another. But everything else can still be extremely difficult. That is why outside assistance from volunteers, lawyers and social workers remains important.
Matthew Parish: How effective are the municipal and state authorities? Where does official assistance end and volunteer work begin?
Irina 1: The municipal authorities work hard and help people as much as they can, but volunteers are everywhere as well. If a building is struck, volunteers organise almost immediately. Windows need to be covered or replaced and people need help keeping warm. The authorities provide hot food and material assistance. I think everybody helps as much as they can.
Irina 2: I would distinguish between municipal services and volunteers. Experience has shown that people reach out to other people first. Volunteers who have worked since the beginning of the war are amongst the first to help when somebody is in trouble.
Of course the emergency services come immediately after a strike: rescuers, firefighters and ambulances. But when we are talking about humanitarian assistance — somebody suddenly needing clothes, shoes, food, medicines or household items — volunteer and charitable organisations can act immediately.
The municipal authorities work as well, of course, but inevitably they work more slowly because there is bureaucracy and paperwork. For us the priority is immediate assistance.
Matthew Parish: You decided to create a separate humanitarian operation specifically for children. Why?
Irina 2: Our work covers many categories of internally displaced people but we realised that particular attention had to be given to pregnant women and families with young children.
Originally we worked with adults and children together. Then we decided to separate the adult and children’s branches and created the Children’s Humanitarian Hub. We support families from pregnancy through childhood, up to around the age of 14. Today more than 2,300 families use the Children’s Humanitarian Hub.
Children are the future. That was the reason for creating it.
Matthew Parish: What happens there? Is it simply a distribution centre for children’s necessities?
Irina 2: No. Socialisation is an important part of it.
Mothers may first come to us while pregnant. Then they give birth and we watch their children grow up before our eyes. At first they need nappies and baby food. Later they need clothes and shoes, toys and food.
We also create celebrations for the children. Sometimes we invent reasons to celebrate: the first day of summer, an autumn festival, Christmas, spring, Halloween or New Year. Almost anything can become a celebration.
There are gifts, games, quests and surprises. The point is that children come together and communicate with one another and with adults. They become part of a social environment again.
Matthew Parish: Many of these children have experienced bombardment, evacuation and the destruction of their homes. How does that affect them?
Irina 2: Most of our children are from displaced families. Unless they were born here after their families evacuated, they may genuinely have experienced shelling and the loss of their homes. Some have seen their parents injured. Some have lost the animals they lived with. They have witnessed grief and terrible things happening around them.
You have to find a way of communicating with them. You have to encourage a child to talk and find a common language.
But children change when they see that people treat them kindly. They discover that somebody will play with them. We try to give them something beyond clothes and shoes. We search everywhere for toys.
We let children be children during a very difficult time.
You also see the relationship between the child and the parent. When the parent becomes calmer and begins to smile, the child relaxes as well.
Matthew Parish: There is something striking about that expression: “We let children be children.” In wartime, humanitarian assistance is presumably about more than keeping somebody alive.
Irina 2: Of course. Life continues whether there is a war or not. People meet. People fall in love. They get married and they have children.
That means babies continue to be born and the need for help is enormous. Families need pushchairs and cots. They need baby food, clothing, nappies and hygiene products.
Children are particularly difficult to support because they grow so quickly and they cost families a great deal of money. In present circumstances it can be extremely difficult for parents to earn enough.
We are like first aid for them. Sometimes we are the magic wand. We are a constant source of support. Nappies and baby food in particular are extremely difficult for us to obtain in sufficient quantities. Those are amongst our greatest needs and we are enormously grateful to everybody who helps us.
Matthew Parish: You also operate what might be described as a free shop. How does that work?
Irina 2: Everything in our humanitarian hubs is provided free of charge.
Charitable organisations donate things. Foreign donors help us. Ordinary people in Kharkiv bring things their children have outgrown. People bring possessions left by their parents. Sometimes people who have emigrated leave their belongings behind for others.
Anybody who wants to share with us can do so and we in turn allow people in need to choose what they require. Internally displaced people, large families and people with limited mobility are amongst those we particularly want to help.
The needs change with the seasons. Obviously people do not need summer flip-flops in winter. We try to provide appropriate seasonal clothes and footwear, while things such as household cleaning products, bedding, bathroom supplies, medicines and other household necessities are required throughout the year.
Matthew Parish: You have both worked with international volunteers and donors. How useful has that international assistance been?
Irina 1: We have worked with foreign volunteers throughout the war. We have had help from Poland, Germany and even the United States and we are genuinely grateful for every piece of assistance people send us.
But there is something I would like foreign donors to understand. Sometimes they send food or other products from abroad and the goods themselves are expensive, then they also spend money transporting them to Ukraine.
Often we could buy the same thing from a Ukrainian producer here much more cheaply. If somebody simply provided the money to buy it locally, the same amount of money could achieve much more.
In the case of animals, for example, perhaps we could even establish a small production facility here to provide food for animals abandoned during the war. Rather than continually paying international transport costs, investment could create something in Ukraine that continues meeting the need.
Matthew Parish: Your work began in the emergency of February 2022. More than four years later, what has changed most?
Irina 2: At first people were simply devastated. They had lost everything. Gradually, with psychological help and continuing support, many began to recover. They found somewhere to live. They formed communities. They began putting their lives back together.
But the need has not disappeared. New people are still being evacuated and arriving with nothing. Children are still growing up. Babies are still being born. People still need help finding accommodation, restoring documents and obtaining basic necessities.
Irina 1: And animals are still being left behind when people evacuate because people cannot take them into the accommodation they find.
That is why the human and animal problems cannot really be separated. When you find an abandoned dog or cat in a village near the front, there is usually a human story behind it. Somebody loved that animal. Then something happened that made them leave.
Matthew Parish: After everything you have seen since February 2022, what does volunteering mean to you now?
Irina 2: It means being there when somebody needs help immediately. Institutions have procedures and paperwork, and of course those things are necessary. But a person who has just escaped from shelling does not experience their life as a procedure.
They need somewhere to sleep. They need something to eat. Their child needs clothes. They may need medicine. They may need somebody to tell them where to go next. That is where volunteers come in.
Irina 1: And sometimes the person you are helping is visible only through the animal they had to leave behind.
Behind every animal there is a person.
The two Irinas describe humanitarian work without much sentimentality. Perhaps after four and a half years there is little room for it. Their vocabulary is instead relentlessly practical: beds, documents, nappies, shoes, medicine, pet food, schools, accommodation. These are mundane things, but war has a way of making the mundane precious.
There is also a deeper theme running through their account. Humanitarian work in Kharkiv has evolved from emergency relief into something closer to the reconstruction of ordinary life while the war is still taking place. The object is no longer merely to get somebody through tonight. It is to help a mother find work, allow a frightened child to play, give a displaced pensioner somewhere to sleep or prevent a family fleeing the front from having to abandon the dog that has lived with them for ten years.
Perhaps the Children’s Humanitarian Hub’s deliberately invented holidays capture this transformation best. Christmas is a reason for a party, but so can be the beginning of summer or the arrival of autumn. The particular date scarcely matters. The purpose is to create an occasion upon which children can play together and parents can smile.
In a city repeatedly obliged to accommodate the consequences of destruction, this is a modest form of reconstruction that cannot be measured in tonnes of concrete or kilometres of repaired road. As Irina puts it, their task is to let children be children. In Kharkiv in 2026, that is itself a form of resistance.
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If you would like to donate to the two Irinas' cause, please visit the donations page at:
