The clacking of the heavy wheels on this endless ribbon of metal is a melancholy song and the sweat on my upper lip tastes like the salty times. I’m somewhere east of the Polish border and west of a cold angry bloodletting. My four cases of film equipment jog and sway as the train thunders eastward. The damp and crumpled QR code that is stuffed in my pocket says, in some universal language, that in 15 hours I’ll be in Kyiv. What it doesn’t mention is the Russian rockets that just obliterated a couple condos there.  My camera sleeps comfortably rocking to the rhythm of the rails, clueless to the devastation and misery that it will carry home.

I fan my shirt to cool off as fields and forests rumble past.

“Does anyone know if there is water?” There is some hot coffee at the end of the train car but no water. No air conditioning. I’ll be dripping sweat until I run out of it.  

When I was a child, I had nightmares of mushroom clouds. My parents were just beyond the headrests and my brother beside me on a girthy cloth seat. We were careening through the emptiness of the western desert in our eggplant Pontiac. Every direction we turned - another flash of light, another sucking rolling cloud lifting to the heavens. That was the cold war.

There is nothing cold about this train, but some of the windows have a special gift — the very top opens and the outside air trades places with precious little of the boggy air inside. I drench my shirt in the (surely undrinkable) sink water of the lavatory and hang my hands out the top of the window. And I think to myself, "Why?" Why am I not watching Netflix in the smiling sunny suburbs of Atlanta? I have twelve more sweltering hours on this clacking ribbon of steel to think about that.

I think about this instead:    

1989. Flags waiving. People cheering. The fall of the Berlin Wall. Gorbachev. Glasnost. The end of the Soviet Union. The rise of a blossoming prosperous Russia. The end of my mushroom cloud dreams. Lord God, where did it all go wrong?

Now I’m no Russia hater. Hear me out. I did trade a Def Leppard cap for a pristine lacquer box in Moscow in 1986. Three cheers for me. (I lived in Rome at the time and it was a high school field trip — yeah I know it all sounds weird but you’ll have to take my word on this). Golden Domes. Leningrad. People swimming in the ungodly frosty river after hacking through the ice. Those cool fur hats with doggie ears. I thought I was in heaven. So Vladimir, I’m not a hater. I’m just trying my hardest to understand what the hell is going on as I start to drag 200 pounds worth of equipment off the train in a parched mad frenzy at Kyiv’s main station. 

“There was no AC?”  “No.” 

Eugene Shklyarevich is ashamed. He is my local contact/producer and fought his way against the crowd onto the train car to help me out. And from that point on he made damn sure I would not suffer like that (OK I did not suffer in any non-suburban-USA sense of the word… but throw me a poetic bone here)... I would not suffer like that again in his country. Period. War or no war.

Restaurants are open. Cafe’s. Bars. The “Bursa" hotel is clean and welcoming. I fall into a queen-sized bed on linens made from nebulous clouds. This is wartime Kyiv. The Russians just weeks ago thundered up to the doorstep of this happy home, tore up the lawn, massacred the neighbors, torched the hood, and were beaten back to Belarus down blood lines streets. But... we have wood fired pizza. We have a Ferris wheel. Ice Cream. 

When this city welcomes you she smiles, and the soft wrinkles by her eyes are charming. And her quiet voice is calming. She sips from her morning coffee and laughs with friends. Her children play in the streets on skateboards. The electric tram rumbles past.  Pigeons pick at bread crumbs. Two young soldiers walk by. They are laughing as well.  

This city is quieter than it should be.  

At a restaurant that is clean and upscale I ask for a local beer. “Sorry Sir, we only have Corona.” It takes me home for a minute as I sip my Mexican beer and, by and by, ask for a second. The waitress almost chuckles, “Sorry that was our last beer.” My second drink is gin. The supply chain here ain’t what it use to be. 

Lines at gas stations stretch seemingly for miles down the streets. “They can’t store the gas in bulk,” Eugene tells me. It will get targeted by the Russians. So they ship it in, truck by truck, from the border.  

As we leave the city we swerve around barricades. There are countless checkpoints. Kalashnikov rifles with folding stocks hang off the shoulders of soldiers. They have discretion on who to pull aside. Eugene and I are “winners" almost every time. “Who is he?” they ask in Ukrainian. “He is with the press,” Eugene says. We show our papers. “Amerykanskyy?” “Tak,” replies Eugene. The guard peeks into the car and his stoic military expression turns into a smile. He waves us on. Yes I am not here to enjoy the linens at the Bursa or ride the Ferris wheel. I came to see what it is like when war rumbles across the border and into your quiet hometown.  

We drive to the rural village of Ploske where we meet up with Jhanna Komanch. She is an energetic and passionate volunteer that emits the aura of a wise soothsayer partly due to the colorful scarves she often wears on her hair that fall over her right shoulder. As kind as she is to us, she does not disguise her impassioned animosity toward Russia.  She regularly delivers food, medicine, and toys for the children in remote areas of the Kyiv region where some have lost everything. Jhanna escorts us to a neighborhood that was devastated in the first days of the war. Russian tanks had rumbled out of an adjacent field of grasses and laid waste to the homes of innocent civilians here. From the dusty street, we notice an older couple sitting quietly on a bench in front of a decaying faded blue camper. To their right — scattered bricks and the charred-out remnants the home they once enjoyed. Their calm demeanor betrays the horror that they hold inside. 

Antonina Omeliashko, shares her memories of the invasion. And as she opens up the doors to her soul, we enter a dark place inside where all hope is gone, and living on in a rusty camper is nothing but perfectly pointless:

Olga had fled with her husband and son when the Russians were approaching.  She was not in the house when it was shelled.  The family now lives with her mother nearby.  

Many Ukrainians were in total disbelief as the Russians poured in with convoys miles long from Belarus on February 24th. And Russia expected a quick victory. By some accounts their orders were to be in control of the government buildings in Kyiv within 12 hours. That did NOT happen. They were met with stiff resistance. But by the 27th of February Russia had pushed right up to the back door of the capital. Here they occupied parts of two cities that to many are commutable “suburbs” of Kyiv — Bucha and Irpin. A fierce and bloody battle raged until the 12th of March, flattening great swaths of these cities. Single family homes were leveled, and massive residential condominiums were left hollow and charred with some in near total collapse. Ukrainian Armed Forces were finally victorious and pushed the Russians out of the Kyiv region.

As Ukraine took a deep breath and surveyed the smoldering battlefield, they discovered things that shook the collective conscience of much of the world. Civilians had been bound and executed in the streets. There were mass graves. Surveillance footage that was being collected showed cold blooded murder. Civilians were shot while attempting to flee in cars with white flags plainly visible and children inside. People were shot for no apparent reason while simply walking the streets. And so was born the term, “The Massacre of Bucha.” The Russian authorities took issue with the use of that term as used on Wikipedia and filed a lawsuit to have the terminology removed. They stated that the pictures and evidence were fake and part of a misinformation campaign by the USA. We ask the mayor of Bucha, Anatoliy Fedoruk, if he feels that is a possibility:

People all over this region experienced the cold, angry, heartless, lack of restraint among the soldiers that blazed through with a bloodthirsty vengeance. Soldiers ransacked homes looking for signs that the household was harboring anyone who had fought against Russian backed separatists in the LNR or DNR. These were commonly called ATO (or Anti-Terrorist Operation) soldiers. The Russians also hunted people who considered themselves Ukrainian Nationalists. Owning a book about controversial Ukrainian Nationalist figure Stepan Bandera could be a death sentence to those in the home. Galyna Zinovatna was a witness to this witch hunt in her tragic encounter with Russian invaders:

When the shelling destroyed her house, Galyna was sheltering in a neighbor's cellar. The matter-of-fact tone in her voice almost disconnects me from the barbarity of what happened here. Her brother is buried in garbage bag in the front yard of her shattered home at the base of a cross made from lumber scraps. Yet she moves on seemingly detached under the shelter of some magical defense mechanism of the human psyche. (Go us!)

This is a theme that plays out time and time again here in the devastated villages north of Kyiv. And somewhere here among torched dreams and makeshift crosses we stumble on a Disney Princess who finds a treasure you and I would have missed:

The family is currently staying with friends in a nearby apartment.

The government of the Ukraine has promised to help these people rebuild their homes. The homeowners are told to leave the damage until a state inspector drops by to take photos and notes. In the end, a fund will be created and distributed based on the extent of the damage your home has incurred. Great plan, but the war rages on. City after city is leveled. I just don’t think this shit is gonna work.  

Somehow the locals have faith — eternally optimistic.  

Back in the capital I charge my batteries, copy my media, and fall into puffy clouds. And when the sunlight bleeds through the drapes at 4:30 AM I’m still four and a half hours from waking. Jet lag is taking its toll. I sit up and rub my face. I seek out coffee at the hotel and am tempted into an omelet. The eggs are overpowered by a unique tangy melted cheese. It’s a wake-up surprise to my taste buds but within seconds I’m a super-fan. I’ll be doing this again.  

Eugene has a special gift for me today. Destination — a mall in the suburb of Brovary. During the attack of Kyiv Oblast, parts of Brovary were shelled from the nearby invading force but the mall was undamaged. Inside shops are open, consumers are consuming. But that’s not why we are here. On the second floor, we approach a wide set of glass doors. Behind them it seems dark and still. “I swear it is open. I called,” says Eugene. We throw open the doors and before my eyes is a massive, cavernous room that has to be acres in size. Below us are seemingly endless twisting lanes of karting tracks. How could this even be real — it is by far the largest indoor karting venue I have seen in my life. And the most silent. Not a single engine sound. No laughter. No echo of bravado from bragging kids. No squeaking sneakers on the rubbery floor. But across a bridge in the center of the quiet cathedral-like space sits a ticket counter. And behind the ticket counter sits a lady. Indeed, this venue is open for business. Smiles invade our faces. Helmets on. A quick pull on the starter and the engines rumble.  

And here in Brovary, we do our part to edge this city back to the joyous bustling capital it once was. We single-handedly fill the mammoth venue with the sounds of firing cylinders and skidding wheels — and the echoes of braggery.

Back in the city center the wail of air raid sirens comes on a cool breeze through my rolling drapes. I lean back in the chair and glance over toward the dark window. No cause for concern. The sad voice of the weeping siren has spoken so often even she is bored of her own voice. Lately when the sirens call in Kyiv, kids in the park don’t stop laughing. Couples don’t stop chatting. Life goes on. 

The authorities sound the sirens if any threat is headed in the general direction of Kyiv, but most are hunting other targets and some are neutralized by Ukrainian Air Defenses. Only rarely does a missile actually fall on the city. And it’s a big big city. So locals have grown numb to the siren's ubiquitous drone.  

That’s not to say that the Armed forces of Ukraine are not prepared for the next stage in this fight. The city and the surrounding woods are littered with trenches, sniper nests, walls of sandbags wrapped in camo, and Czech Hedgehogs (those life-sized jacks that are meant to slow the progress of tanks and armored vehicles). Also spray-painted warnings appear here and there on walls and the road surfaces pointing the the direction of “mines.” I think any attempt for a land force to claim Kyiv in the near future would be a very bloody endeavor.

The streets in the areas north of Kyiv that weeks ago were littered in the shells of burned-out tanks have been cleared. They could use a new coat of blacktop. Some of the mangled tanks have been put on display in a city square in Kyiv in a show of defiance. In a gesture of reverence, countless civilian cars now form a rusty mountain in a roadside parking lot in Irpin. They were once owned by civilians but now are tortured masses of twisted metal and torn fabric. Some of them were the last hope of escape for families fleeing the encroaching Red Army. They didn’t make it:

Today, as the war rages in the east of the country, here in Kyiv they are caught between a yearning to return to normalcy and the reality that no normal is coming any time soon. In nearby Ploske one young girl dearly misses her burned out school. She speaks of death almost casually as no child her age should:

As this bloody conflict turns into a slow grinding humanitarian disaster and death falls like rain on the cities of the Donbas, Zaporizhzhia and the Kherson Oblast, comes the simple question: Putin, what are we doing here?

When this aging man stands in front of the mirror does he look for a semblance to the tzars? When he droops his head and stares into his own eyes, does he wish for more from the cold angry man that stares back at him? Is this his push for legacy?

Sometimes I see Putin as a misunderstood and lonely child who feels like the world is a bully.  They mock him as he sketches lions and bears at his desk in the back of the classroom.  He knows he is smarter than them but somehow he can’t make an impression to save his life.  But he has the keys to his daddy's gun safe.  

And in the cold morning hours of February 24th 2022, he barges through the steel green doors into the atrium of the secondary school wearing a black trench coat. And his footsteps slap the vinyl tiles and screams echo off lockers down the labyrinth of hallways.  Somewhere scribed on his doodle sheet beneath the graphite wispy lions (on the floor of his closet back home) are written six words: "The world will respect me, someday.”

We don’t know where this war leads. I don’t think there will be any real winners.  

Eugene was raised in the Donetsk region and understands the struggle for identity that has plagued Ukraine for decades. He offers up a somber prediction for the future of his country, but one with a bright and shimmering silver lining:

Under the ceaseless onslaught from a world power and the constant threat of nuclear aggression, these people do not give the impression that they are anywhere near ready to back down. And so for the foreseeable future, this city will remain defiant and calm. She will sit on the sands of the Dnipro (Nee-proh) river as her children splash and play. She won’t look up from her magazine when the bored siren sings its lonely tune. She will turn and laugh and smile when her friends place their towels beside her. But they will all laugh a quieter, softer laugh than they used to. 

I feel just a touch like I'm abandoning the new friends I've made - like the glowing staff at the Bursa Hotel; those smiling faces at the small grocery store down the street where I bought fresh bread every day; the proud young soldiers on leave that I met at the bar; but mostly Eugene who kept his promise that I would be in good hands.  He sees me to the main station and we drag my heavy cases down the skinny aisle of the train car. A firm handshake pulls into a hug and a smile. It's time for goodbye and Eugene disappears into the crowd. 

The train lurches, screeches, and rumbles on westward through the night.  

The entire country of Ukraine, somehow, does exactly the same... It rumbles under the echo of artillery and moves defiantly and slowly toward the West. 

Teague Kennedy is an independent media producer.  He holds a BA in Film from the University of Central Florida and an MFA in Film from the University of Miami.  He has produced multiple documentaries and TV specials for CNN, HLN, BBC America, Travel Channel, Weather Channel, and others.  He has won 10 regional Emmy awards.