The Ukraine Diaries - Entry #2

29 October 2025

Lviv, Ukraine

Krakow to Lviv. During the entire car ride I nurse a general nausea courtesy of sleeplessness, jet lag, and a dash of car sickness. There are three in the car, and our soundtrack is a maelstrom of Ukrainian, Russian, Hebrew, and Euro club tracks.

It takes several hours to drive to the border and three more to cross it. We are preceded by a caravan of lorries accompanied by police and military vehicles - a delivery of weapons to the fighting lines in the East. After the long wait at the border and the rest of the drive we arrive in Lviv as the sun is setting.

I am picked up at the hotel - chosen for its excellent bomb shelter - by a member of the team who will be translating our audience question and answer session after the performance. While we walk and talk about the event and what it will entail, she plays tour guide. She takes me through a park that was formed in the 16th century, past a statue of Ukrainian wordsmith Taras Shevchenko, and through the central square that is filled with people singing and dancing while a guitarist leads the crowd. We pass a tribute to the Ukrainian hostages currently being held by Russia, and she tells me that they don’t know how many there are.

We walk past the Opera House and into the old city. We enter café after café. One of them is dripping with chandeliers and enormous plants. Another is old and dark wooded with candlelit tables and walls decorated with sketches by an artist from before World War II with Leonard Cohen playing over the speakers. Another is in an old apartment building. We walk up the stairs and knock on the unmarked door. A man answers and invites us into his messy kitchen. He directs us into the closet. We walk in, push aside jackets as we go, and walk out through the back of the closet into a multi-level bar and restaurant. Back on the street, while standing in line to get into a club, a group of people start singing a Ukrainian folk anthem in harmony. It is a city full of cool and heritage and song.

After dinner, I take the long way back to the hotel. I notice that the streets are emptying out. Groups of students disperse. Couples exit arm in arm. The clock is pushing midnight, the cut off for being out. I pick up the pace and as I do, I think of what Branka says to Sarah when they meet for the first time: “It’s still the war, and there’s still a curfew."