What (not) to say when you are on a date with a Ukrainian woman in war time.

This week, the Ukrainian playwright Polina Polozhentseva takes a somewhat brutal look at what men think is a great pick up line...

BY POLINA POLOZHENTSEVA

“Have you seen the Bayraktar? I made it.”

That's how my friend met her new British mate (he claimed he wanted to be more than just a mate, but that's a whole different story). Bless him, the man had actually taken the time to Google the names of the weapons that Ukraine uses to defend itself against the enemy, so he could make this clever joke. (Bayraktar is an ‘unmanned aerial vehicle’ - drone! - produced in Turkey and it has been vital for the defense of Ukraine against the Russian invasion - Google it.)

So, on their first date, my friend had to explain to this well-meaning British guy the concept of “bayraktarshchyna”. Spoiler alert: it’s a purely Ukrainian cultural phenomenon that refers to parasitism on the theme of war. Isn't that sexy date talk?😂

And you know what’s not sexy at all? When British gentlemen ask: “Are there supermarkets in Ukraine? Do you have McDonald's? Is there Zara? H&M?” This is how I would describe my recent date with a local. By the way, the answer to all these questions is yes. However, McDonald's has been closed in some cities near the front line during the war. For example, in my hometown of Zaporizhzhia, people learn about the cancellation of the Big Mac only through Facebook. And they travel to the neighboring Dnipro to get a McMenu.

Another friend of mine was out with an Englishman who turned a friendly conversation into a political debate on the topic of “the war will stop with a change of government.” Is he wrong? No, he’s right. In an ideal society, that’s how it works. When the government changes, the policy changes. But the problem is that there have never actually been elections in Russia. A facade, a spectacle, an imitation—yes. Genuine expression of the people's will—no. And nothing indicates that this will happen in the coming years. How do I know this? Because I have lived for decades in the shared information space with Russia. My native language is Russian, and only after 2014 did I start to think: why is it like this? And after 2022, I completely abandoned Russian. Yes, I am now a native speaker of no language. Such things happen.

(Btw, if you want a blog about how I transitioned from Russian to Ukrainian, let me know in the comments)

I was lucky because before the Euromaidan, I worked as a journalist at a local TV station and later at a news agency. I wrote news in Russian (this only changed after about seven years). And there, I saw the true face of propaganda (there it is, happiness): We covered the same events as the Russian media (this was just before the occupation of peninsula Crimea, 2014), but we wrote completely different stories. We told the truth. They spread lies, from A to Z.

For example, the Russians would start filming a rally only twenty minutes after it ended, when people were already dispersing, and then they would say, “almost no one came to the square.” Or they would provoke activists (by shouting or throwing stones at them), and then film their angry reaction. Or they would find people to create non-existent stories. Once, we saw a neighbor on TV who claimed that tires were being burned in the streets of Zaporizhzhia. But at that time, the city was calm and quiet. Some of his neighbors wanted to beat him for this.

I had professional protection against propaganda - my own eyes. So, I lived in the paradigm: the sky is blue, the grass is green, the Russians are lying.

In my bubble, this fact didn’t need proving. If someone in my hometown of Zaporizhzhia had said that the government in Russia could change, people would have called an ambulance. Because this would have meant that the poor fellow had completely lost his mind.

Returning to the story, my friend had a choice: explain to the proponent of the government-change-theory history from its very beginning, change the topic, or call an ambulance (just kidding). She chose the first option. My friend is an idealist with an unlimited amount of time. She can patiently talk to a person for hours. And then, afterwards, she complains for a long time on the phone to me about how exhausted she is from it.

“Why doesn't your Zelensky just surrender?” - these are the words of my former boss from Egypt. He lives in the paradigm that men run the world (yes, he manages to do this even in London, where feminists have conquered almost all existing rights). So he looked down on me and my arguments about “our Zelensky.”

Before writing this blog, I did a poll on my social media asking: “What do foreigners say about the war in Ukraine?” A dozen responses were similar. Residents of other countries ask why Ukrainians don’t surrender, as the Russian advantage in terms of force is obvious. As representatives of the civilized world, they don’t even consider that after raising the white flag, Ukrainians would simply be… killed. This is already happening right now in occupied territories. For example, my former colleague Iryna Levchenko - a journalist from Melitopol - has been in Russian captivity for almost two years. There is no news about her or her husband at all. At the time of her detention, Iryna was already retired, had grandchildren, and a garden. I remember her as the kindest woman, whose kindness could only be compared to that of my grandma...

“Two dictators started a war, and ordinary people suffer” - this is also a thesis from my former boss. (That’s why he is my former boss. At some point, I couldn’t withstand the eternal confrontation with Russian propaganda. What do they watch in their Egypt?). Of all people, Zelensky is definitely not a dictator (even if he had wanted to be), because Ukraine maintains pluralism of opinions and freedom of speech.

And in this war, there is definitely an aggressor and a defender. It’s convenient for Russia to say “two dictators,” equating the two warring sides. They usually add “it's not that simple,” blurring the lines. But for us Ukrainians, especially in other countries, I believe it’s very important to maintain this framework of black and white, good and evil, truth and lies.

“Zelensky is not a dictator. He is the president of a country that is defending itself” - in arguments where foreigners only want to express themselves rather than listen to an alternative opinion, I usually emotionally hold back. I outline my position, and I don’t allow them to call the war a conflict, or equate one dictator with two, and that’s it. Here, it’s probably worth mentioning that I have a lifelong conflict avoidance syndrome. So this approach is a struggle for me.

But if the interlocutor is willing to listen, and I don’t perceive the conversation as aggression, then I’m ready to share my opinion. Moreover, in the Ukrainian space, there is currently an active rethinking of our history and its decolonization going on. I’ve watched these programs, podcasts, and news broadcasts, and I can easily juggle facts.

So, I had another colleague - from Sardinia… The Italian information space is also a disaster. I lived for a few months in Rome right after the start of the full-scale invasion. From my observations, Russia put its claws in there as early as 2015. The scheme is as follows: Italian agencies simply “feed off” Russian money. So here and there, “it's not that simple” pops up in the live broadcasts of TV channels in Rome.

For instance, an Italian man, the boyfriend of my acquaintance, called Zelensky “the new Mussolini.”

So, back to my colleague from Sardinia… One time we were sitting together during a lunch break, talking about life and cats, and he said, “Kyivan Rus was once Russia.” And his eyes were so beautiful and deep at that moment. Well, I thought, for such eyes, it’s worth fighting. The next day, I prepared a special presentation in English for him. I explained step by step that the first mention of Kyivan Rus dates back to 882, while Moscow was only mentioned in 1147. My Sardinian colleague listened silently to my presentation and then replied, “Thank you, I didn’t even know that.”

Or another example (I have a million of them): In London, my daughter and I walked past a store with a yellow-blue sticker of a map of Ukraine with words of support. But. This map didn’t include Crimea. The store was already closed, and the sticker was on the inside of the store window. Even if it hadn’t been on the inside, we come from a civilized country, come on… Barely waiting for the next morning, just before opening, I was already at the door saying, “Thank you for your support, but you know…”

The shop owner turned out to be a woman from Latvia who clearly didn’t keep the detailed features of the map of Ukraine in her head. She was very upset about the absence of Crimea because it was obvious that these stickers were printed intentionally (we have a very cunning enemy). They took the map down and hung a handwritten phrase instead. Now it proudly displays “Support Ukraine” in yellow and blue markers. Better, right? Much better.

Polina Polozhentseva is a Ukrainian playwright living in London. Her plays are full of humor, although audiences sometimes don't laugh - because 'you can't laugh about war, can you?' With Polina, we are adding the perspective of a Ukrainian woman, mother, refugee and barista abroad to our blog, hopefully you will enjoy her sometimes irreverent musings.

If you want to know more about Polina and her work, have a look here.

May 8, Polina’s play ‘A Fan of War’ will be staged in New York, as part of the festival ‘Showcasing Ukrainian Theater in the USA’.