Celebrating Jewish holidays during the war: Hanukkah 2022. Lubny (Poltava region), Ukraine

Int.: How did you solve the problem with kosher food?

Inf.: First, kosher food, whatever remained, was delivered from the storage facility – there is a firm called “UkrKosher” [Ukrainian Kosher], a supplier of kosher food in Ukraine. They did deliveries in the first days [of the war], and even by Pesach I placed an order, although I didn’t count on much. I thought, there will be fish, potatoes, vegetables, which would be ok… I didn’t think that they would have full supply – where would they get all this? <…> But by the time when the Russian troops were already pushed back from Kyiv, they were getting deliveries from Israel, America, Belgium, England… <…> There were periods when there was shechita in the city, and periods, when there was not. <…> [For Pesach our family received] a huge box with humanitarian aid from Israel, and it was filled with all kinds of stuffs – even coconut cookies, sugar, coffee… I never thought that I would be so happy about food in my life – happy about chocolate, sugar, and other things like that (UJRI_062_K)