Katerina Titova in her bombed shed and a jewelry station in her garden in Hostomel, Ukraine. (Dennis Lapin / CNN)
Today there is a traffic jam to the Ukrainian city of Hostomel, made worse because the bridge over the Irpin River was destroyed as the Russians advanced in the early days of the war. Now this is just a normal shift from Kyiv to Hostomel, Irpin and Bucha, the sites of some of the worst atrocities that Russian troops committed in Ukraine.
Bombed bridge. (Christian Moisescu / CNN)
In Hostomel, life has resumed amid ruins, broken windows and blackened buildings. The local market is again in front of the Hostomel glass factory, which is now destroyed and closed. The sounds of knocks echo the street where the corner store is being rebuilt with new plywood and colorful lettering.
“People live in a suitcase here; many lost their jobs,” said Mikhail Neymet, 48, the store’s owner. The owner of the store, Mikhail Neymet, in Hostomel. (Dennis Lapin / CNN)
He looked tired as the work went on. It is only the second day that the store has opened, which he said was totaled by the Russian army.
“I hope things are going well. Hope dies last,” he said.
With higher prices, it is harder to buy and sell in the market. And all quality fruits and vegetables from the southern regions of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia and Mykolaiv, the traditional harvest areas of Ukraine, are out of reach now, lost under Russian occupation.
Neymet has family in the US and Europe. He could always go there, he said, and leave the country.
“But for what? This is our homeland; we must restore our homeland,” he said. Mikhail Neymet in his shop. (Christian Moisescu / CNN)
Katerina Titova, 35; Alex Titov, 36; and his family are on the way. They fled Hostomel on March 4, the day after the Russians bombed their garden, destroying their new jewelry workshop as well as a neighbor’s house. The main house had broken windows, leaving huge holes in the brick wall and shrapnel embedded inside, among family photographs.
After that, the couple left home on foot with their two children, 10-year-old Makar and 5-year-old Taisia, and finally arrived at the relative safety of Kyiv. When they returned in late May, they could not believe that their house was still standing and that the Russians had not entered it.
Katerina Titova and her family sit in front of her house. (Dennis Lapin / CNN)
“I was stroking him like a cat, calling him ‘my love; we’ll fix you, darling,'” Titova said now, laughing at her own fondness for this place she calls home.
There was never a question they would not return.