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Date Published: 21/03/2022

ARCHIVED - At night, under curfew and martial law: diary of the Benidorm expat who drove across Europe to help Ukraine

ARCHIVED ARTICLE

The story of ordinary people crossing into a war-torn country to supply aid to the Ukrainians displaced within their own country

<span style='color:#780948'>ARCHIVED</span> - At night, under curfew and martial law: diary of the Benidorm expat who drove across Europe to help Ukraine

Jo Hollingworth lives as an expat in Benidorm, and volunteers with the homeless charity Project4All, an association on the Costa Blanca that offers support and friendship as well as feeding over one hundred people a day, all year round. They feed the homeless, families in need and pensioners with little support.

So when Jo saw the suffering of her fellow human beings in Ukraine, the question she asked herself was “How could we not help?”.

Within the space of just a few days, a plan had been drawn up and a daring venture proposed.

Jo joined up with fellow expats Jonny Hellraizer and James Coyne under the banner Project4All to ask the expat community of Benidorm for help and donations, and they responded in force. From both Spain and the UK, donations flooded in and in less than a week they had raised 10,000 euros and had enough boxes of much-needed items to fill five vans.

Nine days later, the group set off with a van and a people carrier full of donations from Spain, another from the UK.

They drove over 3000km from Benidorm on the Costa Blanca to Romania to hand them over to the Ukrainian soldiers who had sent a list of their “most wanted” items. When they arrived, after passing through the Romanian border, they learnt that the van set to meet them was over 600km away and had no fuel. They couldn’t take the donations back into the EU, and when the border guards asked them to enter the war-torn country, at night during the curfew, to get them in to a local aid centre, three of them decided they had no choice. So, they did.

They aren’t ex-military or super-adrenaline junkies. They are ordinary people: a rock musician, a translator, a builder, and a whole community of dedicated supporters.

They were given personal bodyguards and support vehicles supplied by the army to ensure they got the donations to where they were most needed. They survived two air raids whilst they were there. They drove into Ukraine in the dead of night to make sure that the items they were entrusted with made it to the hands of those who needed it the most.

Less than two weeks after deciding to go, they had everything placed in the hands of the Ukrainians themselves to decide how best to distribute it across their country, and they are now receiving video footage daily of the donations being handed over to women and children across Ukraine.

Below is Jo’s blog entry of the group’s night spent in Ukraine during the curfew and under martial law, when they bravely risked their lives and their freedom to deliver the donations to the Ukrainians:

Project 4 All - Mission Accomplished

On Sunday night, our Romanian friends had arranged for us to meet members of the Ukrainian resistance in the “no man’s land” between the Romanian EU/NATO border and the Ukrainian war zone border to offload our vans for them to distribute in the cities of Ukraine most in need.

When we arrived, a Ukrainian border guard told us that our contact had been in touch to say that their vans were stuck further down the border without enough fuel to get to us. How would we feel about driving about 60km across the border with a military and police escort to deliver directly as they desperately needed our donations? Well, what could we say?

So, at 1am Sunday night/Monday morning our two vans, trailer and car flew at 150km per hour into a war-torn country with Kalashnikov-wielding escorts, during the night time curfew and under martial law, towards a collection and distribution point run by soldiers and territorial guards.

We arrived to find several men waiting to help us unload. They explained that they were sending trucks and buses up and down the country delivering aid to besieged cities every day and getting them into the hands of the military and ordinary Ukrainians suffering in this devastating war.

And then the air raid sirens broke through the silence of the night. A slight flicker of fear passed briefly over a few of their faces and we were quickly ushered into a “safer” place inside their warehouse.

A deep Ukrainian voice barked for us to turn out all of the lights and Kalashnikov guy, a professional Ukrainian soldier with a face of steel and eyes that could write a thousand murder mysteries, herded us like sheep from the warehouse into the dark, meagre shelter that their office provided. We had no choice but to hunker down for the night.

In this undisclosable location, the true wartime spirit reminiscent of the blitz raised its beautiful head. Coffee, tea, food and warmth were provided and we settled on the sofas to wait for the danger to pass. To break the ice, we asked for a glass of Jack Daniels and, playing the perfect hosts, one of the soldiers produced a magnum of champagne, offering to open it to celebrate our arrival.

The men that surrounded us were young, proud and determined. They took pride in telling us about their desire to fight and crush the invading force destroying their country. They told us of their sisters, mothers and friends who refused to leave and who stood side-by-side with their male comrades taking up arms and protecting the vulnerable.

Their fears, suspicions and incredulity at our arrival turned to warmth and smiles and giggles as we shared our story and journey with them and they shared their brave stories with us.

A tear formed silently in the eye of one of the soldiers as he learnt of how the supporters and friends of Project4All had united to show their solidarity and support. They were agog to learn that we had brought two vans of donations from Spain and we had sponsored a van of donations from UK, travelling thousands of miles, to help in the only way we could.

Their warehouse had been empty when we arrived. As soon as donations arrive, they are distributed across the country within 24 hours. They told us that they had set up their own Non-Profit Organisation within Ukraine to deal with donations as a huge chunk of aid arriving via the big NGOs and smaller charities is being siphoned off and sold on the black market before it even reaches the border. We are so pleased to have made these contacts so that in future we can work directly with these men and ensure that 100% of any future donations we receive get to the people on the ground.

When the all clear sounded, we leapt up and continued to unload the vans and all the donations, separating into pallets the food, clothes, toiletries etc. for easier distribution. Fear of a future raid forced us to leave our new found friends and head back to Romania.

During the drive back, the air ride sirens began to blare again and our escort increased the pace. Driving through this was terrifying. We saw what we had been told, the petrol stations were empty. People had to walk for miles to reach the safety of the European border.

The most devastatingly heartbreaking moment for us all was on the journey back to the safety of the EU as the curfew ended at 6am. As we were escorted by our military and police convoy, the sun rose quietly over the horizon, the frozen earth and snow-covered fields came into view as did the silhouettes of exhausted families who had travelled for days to seek refuge, warmth and care with only the clothes on their backs and the small suitcases they were able to carry.

At the border, the chilling sound of children and babies screaming and crying as they were coaxed from their fathers’ arms filled the air as Daddy has to stay to fight. Families were being torn apart before our eyes, possibly forever; it sent shivers down our spines and brought lumps to our throats.

We can’t stop now. We need more than ever to keep supporting this community. These people are exhausted when they arrive, they have no idea what the future may hold and I cannot begin to imagine how that feels.

This is just one night of part of the team’s adventure, involving myself, Jonny Elraiz and James Coyne. We still have Jim, Mike and Konstantin and the amazing Jacqui Birch and Dani Bowler helping out.

We want to raise awareness of the cause and help fund more vans to support the displaced refugees within Ukraine, not only on the EU side of the border as most charities do. Over three million people have fled Ukraine. Forty-two million remain. Let’s help them stay strong and stay alive.

We would also like to publicly thank everyone who made this incredible journey possible.

More information about Project 4 All and how to donate, visit https://www.facebook.com/cook.for.the.homeless

Images: Jo Hollingworth

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