Interlude: Kherson | Part II, The Front

Soon, roadside anti-tank barriers and sentry boxes draped in camouflage netting, along with a short queue of cars snaking down the road, mark the presence of a checkpoint at the city limits. We get our cigarettes and energy drinks ready, and when Dima opens the window for the sentry, he immediately announces, anticipating possible questions, that we are bringing presents for friends from this and that regiment stationed around here, and anyway: “How are you?. Do you need energy drinks? And smokes?” A block of cigarettes and a 12-pack of energy drinks are shoved into the soldier’s lap. In return, the latter - visibly overwhelmed by such a greeting - wishes us a good trip.

The first and also most important landmark of liberated Kherson is, of course, the semicircle consisting of five pillars at the entrance to the city, adorned with the inscription XEPCOH in gold letters. Here, a few days after the liberation of the city in November 2022, President Zelenskyy had his photo taken, and we spent a good 20 minutes taking pictures of each other as well.

In the background, we hear the rumbling of artillery fire. It’s distant but recognisable. In the city proper, we are surrounded by emptiness, desertion. But still, not quite. Even more than in Mykolaiv, the suburb’s big shopping centers, car dealerships and even the big bus station building have been abandoned. Signs of fresh destruction are indeed everywhere, but to my surprise we see trolleybuses and the same kind of little yellow buses I know from Odesa driving along the streets, here and there people (mostly old) are moving around and the cars are not at all speeding through the city at the terrifying speed to avoid artillery fire, as people in Odesa claimed it to be.

No, the city is pretty much alive. Life here seems to be anything but normal, but it is still a life. In the city center, some shops are open, the market next to the railway station is open, the sign “KABA” - “COFFEE” can be seen, so it is even possible to sit in a café...

In front of the station we meet a friend of Dima, Taras, who arrives in a muddy SUV with British number plates. We load up his car with the best of the best and drive a few blocks away: out of sight of the cops, armed to the teeth, guarding the railway station and staring at us suspiciously. It is clear, they wouldn’t look kindly if we started interviewing the man in uniform in a city where all filming is forbidden. Taras himself is happy to talk - and what he won’t talk about, he just says so.

He’s a physical education teacher from Odesa who volunteered for the military, took part in the liberation of Kherson and is now in a position somewhere near the city.

He praises the weapons and other assistance from NATO countries, explains that his unit’s day-to-day life is quite routine at the moment, consisting mainly of additional training.

Of course, Taras hopes for victory soon. Asked why the liberation of Kherson went the way it did - that the Russians were allowed to withdraw peacefully from the town - he says, unperturbed, that this is a matter for men of higher rank.

After sending Taras on his way with our best wishes, we head for the central square, which is adorned by the base of the former statue of Lenin, to which are pinned the red and black flags of Ukraine and the OUN. (There are more of the latter to be seen in the city, I suspect that the troops deployed in Kherson are probably emphatically pro-Bandera.)

We take pictures - because it’s not forbidden on condition that we don’t photograph military objects - and look at houses and people. The windows of the upper floor of the oblast administration building are empty and smudged, it remains unclear whether the building is currently in use or not. Some of the windows of the TsUM - the Central Department Store  - are covered with plywood, but the shopping center is open and bustling. The cinema theater “Ukraina” is clearly closed, but in front of its renovated façade, a couple of teenage girls take turns striking poses and photographing each other. A family passes me - a worried-looking father and mother, with a little girl in a pink jumpsuit between them, happily giggling away, holding each parent’s hand. In the background, cannons roar.

“Well, how is it?” Dima turns to me. “Normalna?”

“Interesno,” I say, trying to wipe the last scene from my mind.

We’re back in the minibus to see another attraction in this grotesque city - the Antonivka Bridge.

"So - we will still try to get a bullet in the head before leaving, eh?" I ask Alex, who bursts out laughing. After all, we’ve all heard that the Dnieper riverbank in Kherson is not to be visited under any circumstances - there are Russian snipers sitting on the other side.

But we feel that we really need to see the famous bridge that the Russians used to flee Kherson and which now stands in ruins. So we take the dilapidated road north of the city center. First, there are the grand but somewhat shabby classicist buildings, including St Catherine’s Cathedral, then the newer and even shabbier buildings: garages, closed cafés and a derelict hotel. There are very few people to be seen and no cars at all.

Soon, glimpses of the bridge pierce through the rooftops of the low riverside buildings. Though collapsed in the middle, it stands imposing, a remnant of its 1977-2022 role as a connector between the Dnieper's banks. We drive up to and under the bridge, reaching a small square choked with ruins and car wrecks. Phones sprout like sunflowers, all aimed at the bridge and the opposite riverbank. What are they capturing? History? Present? An intersection of both?

“Listen, guys,” says Nastya with a tense voice, “it could be dangerous here.”

We continue filming and taking photos of the bridge and of the other bank. Silence reigns, broken only by the rhythmic hum of the bus engine. Sunlight pierces the clouds, its warmth reaching down to the river below. So close, I feel I could stretch my arm out and brush its surface with my fingertips. Across the Dnieper, tiny houses doze under the spring sun, nestled amidst a valley already painted in fresh emerald, despite the calendar only reading early April. Dima mumbles something into his beard, turns the steering wheel sharply and presses the accelerator again, the bus’s tires squeal and we drive back towards the bridge.

Beneath its ruins, we can see movement - these are Ukrainian soldiers stationed there who have come to have a look at the idiots who have decided to risk their lives to visit the front line. But we don’t wait for anything or anybody, pass quickly under the bridge, then Dima makes a sudden right turn towards inland - again, the whole road around the bridge is a single field of rubble and debris, but with a passable path leading through. Though not for long - a mere hundred meters away, the entire northbound E97 is blocked by a crushed railway bridge that has collapsed onto the road. The bus stops, Dima curses and maneuvers, we drive back and pass the ruins of the Antonivka bridge again. I can still see Ukrainian soldiers suspiciously peering at us from underneath.

A few minutes later, we are back in the center. “Well,” Alex breaks the silence, “nothing happened, but I think we were just lucky.”

It’s hard to argue with that - every day, Ukraine’s Telegram channels are full of reports of civilians and soldiers killed or wounded in Kherson oblast. The former are mostly hit by Russian gunfire, the latter killed on the front line, sometimes by sniper’s bullets. And we were just there - on the front.