“Let them think this is just a trip,” Julia, a mother from Ukraine says as she looks at her daughters: 7-year-old twins Elisabeth and Caterina, and 17-year-old Alina.
“The kids are asking ‘Why are we leaving? Where are we going? Why are we hiding?’”
We try not to panic so they will not know what war is. We are telling them that they will….” she falters, crying, and trying to find the right words to explain how she is trying to protect her daughters from the brutal truth of what they have just escaped.
Protecting their emotions, “We try not to tell them this is war.”