UKRAINE: A few hours' drive south of the capital Kyiv lies a village with old houses, slightly off to the left, hidden in a forest, past a railroad crossing, with long plains on all sides.

This is where Nataliia Dembrovska and her husband Pavlo ended up. From here, she teaches her former students who still live in the war zone she fled from, in the city of Kherson by the Black Sea. 

For their safety, the exact name and location of the village where they live are not disclosed.

It's Wednesday morning. She gets into a car. She is going to visit old friends in Kherson. She comforts the journalist who is with her.

– Have you heard explosions before? You might get scared. But you're with us, it'll be fine, says Nataliia.

Pavlo has taken time off to accompany her. They are not going to their own house.

 Instead, they will stay with friends who have a basement. There, they can sleep safely at night if bombs fall.

When the War CameThursday, February 24, 2022, Pavlo was awakened by a phone call at 4 a.m. He went to the barracks by the airport in Kherson, where he worked.

Nataliia and their son Vlad stayed home all day.

– We saw the smoke clouds. I called Pavlo. He said everything would be okay.

So she stayed. She believed her husband and the soldiers, and in a quick success. 

Instead, the base was evacuated. The Russians occupied the city from February until they were driven out in November 2022.

An Unbearable Spring

Upon arriving in Kherson, we park the car outside their friends' house, a teacher couple who stayed behind. For Nataliia, the spring of 2022 became unbearable.

– In the beginning, we could move around a bit. Then all the checkpoints came. Soon we were practically locked in. Two 22-year-old boys were shot and killed along the road. I had taught them in school. I was terrified.

Three months later, she and her son fled.

– The house was shaking. Vlad looked at me. I said, 'Okay, we're leaving.'

On the way through no man's land, she heard grenades from both sides. Fortunately, the bus driver just kept driving. 

In an apartment belonging to a friend, she reunited with Pavlo. She hadn't seen him in three months. After that, they moved from place to place.

– I don't know how many places I've lived in the last two years, I'd have to count them all."

Her son continued his marine engineering studies from Kherson and went to Poland. Now he is in Canada.

Nataliia's salary kept coming, even though the school was closed. 

When the school year started after an extra-long summer break in 2022, she was in Lutsk, in northwestern Ukraine. From there, Nataliia resumed teaching digitally. 

Principals at several schools in the occupied areas around Kherson decided to collaborate to offer online education without involving the Russian occupation forces. Nataliia had up to 40 students in her class.

– It was very tough. I had 29 teaching hours per week. In the evenings, I prepared for the next day. The youngest students can only manage about 25 minutes of instruction, while the older ones can handle 45 minutes. But I also create many assignments for them to work on independently.

As a homeroom teacher, she received a small pay supplement. She earned around 13,000 hryvnia per month, which is about 3,800 NOK.

In November 2022, the Russians were driven out of Kherson, but from the other side of the Dnipro River, they continue to bomb the city. 

Since the school year began in the fall of 2023, it has become easier to organize teaching. Nataliia moved to the village where she now lives and has continued her work. Over the past year, she had 22 teaching hours per week and managed to keep her evenings free, Nataliia says.

Back in the School 

BuildingThe next day, Nataliia visits the school she works for, or at least the building. She greets her boss. Principal Anatolii Lutsenko says he has gone to his office every day throughout the war.

The school windows are covered with boards. An Iskander missile hit just a few meters away two weeks earlier. Nataliia shows her classroom. The door says 8A.

– It should say 10A now, she says, looking at the board, the desks, and out toward Kherson.

Then the alarm goes off again. She moves down to the lobby.

 Everyone stands with phones in their hands. Everyone calls their loved ones in such moments. Then the danger passes.

In the evening, Nataliia drinks wine, makes good food, and talks about the time before the war.

– Back then, we were happy enough. Everything you loved, I could fit in two bags, and what matters most, I could hold in my hand. Now I see that we were happy enough. I didn't realize it then, she says.