🇺🇦MEETING REFUGEES FROM UKRAINE (Rabbi To The Rescue)

[Music] i'm glad we've gotten to this point okay we are in romania cold so here in romania the pandemic is officially over check this out so in the airport there are workers who are taking the stickers off the ground stickers that would tell people that they needed to stand six meters apart whatever they're being taken off okay so that was really easy to get into the country they didn't really ask any questions just stamped me in the border guards were not wearing masks the people the workers at the airport are not wearing masks the flight attendants were not wearing masks it's very interesting to see because after two years of traveling in the pandemic finally it seems like this thing is finally over and the government of romania declared last week that the pandemic is over in this country so hopefully we're headed into better times okay so i'm outside the airport and my hotel is in walking distance it's like a three-minute walk no need to take a taxi i'm just gonna head right over there and five minutes later good morning from bucharest romania i've been in this hotel for like nine hours i'm pretty sure i have not slept not even one minute i don't know why but my body's all messed up from so much traveling a jet lag i could not sleep at least i got a little bit of work done and i got a shower i made my bed to the best of my ability and i'm going to pray in davon chakras really quickly and i have to run to the airport because my flight's in about an hour and five minutes thank god it's only a five minute walk from here and it's a domestic flight hopefully i'll be missing okay so i made it to the airport flight is boarding what's crazy is that literally 20 minutes ago i was in my hotel room and now i'm already past security we're boarding the plane now um my only regret is that i didn't stay in bed longer because the airport is so close to the terminal and i literally could have just probably tried to sleep for another 10 or 15 minutes but uh it wasn't meant to be [Music] so we're getting on the plane it's a small one a couple other jews here thank you okay next up yes romania i almost missed a step over there okay so the rabbi is supposed to be waiting for me here and you are about to hear a very sad but also a very beautiful story so i've seen a lot of small airports in my day but this one takes the cake i mean this is the arrivals terminal you come in from that door there's the bags and then you go right out that door so this one is tiny tiny tiny oh no okay so i'm here in the car with rabbi shalom gap and from lugansk foreign today so lugansk is in ukraine yeah and the rabbi is here i noticed his license plate is also from ukraine so you drove the car you sure yeah from ukraine to here when did you run away from ukraine i remember two weeks ago today's day were to start the war so as soon as the war started okay and uh you came with your whole family yeah not you already all children israel not all of them it's before four children okay and and your community also and that one here on the other page swore you cannot take the the communities you know i don't know real work comedy money you don't know what to do to which to ride to left which pass to the car to the trade to the play you started it's a sugar it's uh homeless today everybody else so so what happened you came you just is there a border with ukraine and romania yeah okay so you came through the border they let you in no problem yeah because i'm israeli guy you're an israeli citizen okay so you'll be able to get in and then and then what i hear that there's a lot of people a lot of jewish people who are here now when you're taking care of them okay [Music] we have arrived at this hotel compound what's interesting is that a lot of these cars parked here are from ukraine so this one has the ukrainian license plate that one is a ukrainian license plate and this one is a ukraine license plate this one too has the license plate from ukraine people literally took what they could got into the cars and ran and they made it here the rabbi has a similar story that he's going to tell us later we'll get to that but one thing i want to be very clear about is that i don't want to get into the politics of this war what's going on between russia and ukraine that's not what i'm here to do i want to show you the human side i want to show you the people the regular people who are being affected by what's happening in the region so we've been driving for about a half hour and now we're at this place i understand it's a kind of hotel or resort and this is where the refugees some of them are staying the rabbi is putting them up here so how many people are here rabbi 96 50 60 people 50 or 60 people it doesn't know exactly because every day is changing people are coming and going let's see what's happening here [Music] this is the very rich romanian guide talking in brew good really his sister english speak english maybe a little english a little bit so you guys work at the hotel no thanks okay so we are entering this is the makeshift synagogue for the time being this is a torah surface that they have with them so they can pray [Music] so here we are this is some of the food that has arrived [Music] so where did this food come from israel [Music] the jewish organization they sent the food yeah sure more tomorrow i think wow and this is enough for everyone no it's not enough it's it's in two days finish it we need they need one something like this every electron kosher food right so now on tuesday you say there's going to be more yeah one more thoughts and who's cooking they found a volunteer we came from israel those people in the kitchen yeah they're also cooking so you had to make the hotel kosher yes sure sure the rabbi i met today and the one who's showing me around he is a shliyak of khabad he's the emissary of the laboratory for those of you who are not familiar lubavitch is an organization the largest organization of jewish rabbis and leaders around the world they have over 5 000 rabbis stationed in different places all around the world and over 100 different countries and the goal is to keep jews connected to the judaism wherever it may be there are chapters in places you would not believe and this rabbi is a rabbi of khabad who was living in ukraine he is now pretty much in exile with a bunch of people from his community and people he doesn't even know who he's helping anyway they've taken over this hotel compound and it's it's just it's it's really really rough to see like i travel a lot right after a couple days away from home it's like you just want to even if you're having a good time on vacation whatever you just want to be back in your own bed at your own kitchen table eating your own food in your own comfort zone and these people have no idea if their homes are even standing still their homes could have been bombed and even if their homes are standing it's not safe to go back and they have no idea when they're going to get home again and it's just really really sad to see and i can really empathize with them [Music] music [Music] so i'm just sitting down now with a couple of jewish people who ran away from ukraine we're going to hear a little bit about their stories and how they ended up here and what's going on in their lives so basically what i'm hearing is that this couple they're you know they actually were doing well in ukraine they had a nice house outside the city and when things started going bad and the war started they went to this house out of the city where they had this house out of the city and they went there because they figured that outside of the city it'll be safe it'll be quiet what they didn't know was that there's an airport uh very close to their home which the russians wanted that airport and they there's a lot of fighting in the area and they were home stuck in their house for a full week no electricity no water and um and bombs raining over their heads and it was a terrible situation so they had to get out [Music] there was things got so bad there was no water that they literally had to take snow and melt it in order to have water to drink you have to drink to something and to wash themselves that's crazy that's that's crazy yeah it's absolutely situation okay so first of all um they they had milk yeah so they had a little bit of milk in the house for the baby but there was no way to heat it because there was no electricity anymore they literally had to go outside and collect wood start a fire to be able to heat up the milk then things just got out of hand they couldn't continue living this way so after five or six days they noticed a pattern [Music] okay um they noticed a pattern that the russian army was shelling the area that they were in every day at the same time so after five or six days they realized that at a certain point and it's pretty much the same time every day at a certain point the shelling would stop it's okay it's okay let the baby make money they realized that the shelling would stop at a certain point so after they figured out the pattern of when the shelling was happening they got into their car and left and they came here to do it where did they go first um [Music] and so he just said that he first of all he's asking that anybody who can help should please help because they're you know people are literally stuck in ukraine and all over europe now as refugees they said that they're living under shelling and bombings bombs do not discriminate they just land places and kill people and um whoever can help the situation would be much appreciated number one number two i want to thank all those who have already helped and have sent help of some money and sent food and sent aid it's really appreciated um can you ask them do they think they'll be able to go home anytime soon so i asked them if they think they're gonna be able to go home anytime soon and he said he hopes that um the ukrainians will be able to win their land back and you know the russian army will leave and he believes that's going to happen he said i cannot make any plans i don't know what's going to happen today i don't know what's going to happen tomorrow i don't believe what happened yesterday we're just waiting and it's i mean for a human being to just be in that situation where they don't know what's going to be and when it's going to be very very tough so apparently this whole complex was not enough place they even have a house across the street that also they rented and they put families in there [Music] rabbi's gonna show me around oh what a cute little doggie hello apparatus called these people came these ladies came they saw how how old is this woman 86. wow see could you imagine that people are 86 years old they have to run like unbelievable unbelievable it's terrible yeah wow okay good luck rabbi you know these people no i don't know these people's people ask me the robber from the project call me i have a group for 15 minutes twelve fifteen people their favorite place say let's sure let's send wow i don't know why that's crazy so i i thought when he introduced me to all these people that he knows them so he doesn't even know who they are they just people called him said can we come come it's okay yeah you can go in we'll go oh what's his name archie archer archie hi i don't have any food i'm so sorry wow first time in his life so these people are jewish and it's their first time now that they're here and they're they're in you know they have refugee status and they're away from home it's actually the first time they ended up in the synagogue on shabbat so i i wouldn't say it's a good thing that they're not home but now that they are not home they're reconnecting with their roots which is also very interesting yeah okay thank you good luck so rabbi honestly when i came here i thought that i'm going to see people sleeping outside and you know not taking showers and no food and it looks like they're living uh a good life if i may say so in the sense that they're refugees but they're they're in a hotel they have hot water and they're able to eat normally or whatever so although they're away from home and it's a terrible situation they're lucky to have an organization like you and chabad who is uh helping them live as much of a normal life as possible are you it's real it's like that because i think the refugees is mean we know what's know what what's going to be tomorrow today you must leave goods tomorrow this is principle that's that's how you see refugees sure yeah these are refugees must be no i don't know what to be tomorrow i don't know how to go right now it must be everything like home this is our principal this because this we have a good fit a good place a good hotels we take a care good driving a good route yeah good luck the rabbit that's not the best teacher to give to to give to everybody the maximum we can okay so dinner is about to be served and these romanian people who speak hebrew are preparing it hello again [Music] wow [Music] hello okay so family just showed up new refugees in the house and they brought dogs yeah i give it a paper right okay so the rabbi is taking their bags and he's gonna get them situated in the room this is happening all day all night even on shabbos people are arriving and the rabbis just putting them up and getting them taken care of so um can i ask you what your name is my name is irina rina and this is and you guys came from where from how far is that from [Music] wow so um was there was there bombing in your city yeah yes so you were there then yes yeah what was it like scary scary yeah i could imagine so you just how did you get to romania we uh sit in the car we traveled from zappos to um then we came to vinitza then to we came to kitchen off then we came to yasi and we're here how many days have you been traveling uh about a week about a week nine march march we came from the parisian so now for the first time in a bunch of days you're going to be relaxing and yeah settling down that's wonderful and you brought the dogs with you yeah so the dogs three dogs so who this is what's her name or his speaks dixie is the mother no no no mother this is the mother where's the other one oh my goodness that is a cute this is his son adam told me and they're all they all ran away with you yes yes were were the dogs afraid when they heard the bombs yes wow okay why don't you he put it in the back he jumped right into the bag so he was excited to get away from there yeah okay so please go go inside and make yourself comfortable [Music] okay so this is my friend mark how old are you mark uh i am 15 15. wow i thought you were older you you're tall you're a big guy so where are you from uh i'm from ukraine you're from ukraine right we're in ukraine oh sorry repeat this where in ukraine are you from ah sumer okay how like we're in ukraine is that near kiev or it's far away from here is it near kiev oh yeah yeah yeah okay and um what happened uh to your family like were you there when the bombs started falling uh we hurt them you heard the bombs yeah yeah but i didn't see it right but it was in it was in your city like in your neighborhood yeah yeah um around the city the nearest like it was uh bombing but my city assumed the center um not so much but i thought right so no not so much in the in my hood or like like that right okay so when did you when did your family decide that they needed to leave ukraine uh decide um it's nine march march 9th yeah yeah okay my family decides decided decided to leave the country very quickly because um country again so your mother's friend mother's friend aksana proposed to leave the country uh because he she she because she has a car a car yeah okay so you got you all went into her car uh yeah but we went uh from the country by car and you drove to moldova no no no to chernoff sea okay uh it's near to romania [Music] right into romania so you cross from ukraine romania and how did you end up here do you know this rabbi uh no i have not seen him before sorry for my language no it's great you you don't know who he is you don't know him no i don't know but she is a kind person so how did you find out about this oh then you can how did you find out that you can come here um our our rebel said that we need to come here to sleep oh cool so so exactly so the rabbi from your city told you that you can come here and there's another rabbi who's gonna take care of you uh yeah um yeah yeah do you think you'll be able to go home yeah yeah when uh when no not tomorrow uh but uh maybe um till year or two a year or two no wow let's go in and eat dinner yes yes okay [Music] so everyone's eating mine everyone's eating dinner in the dining room i'm going to the car now because i brought some stuff with me from israel i never liked to come empty-handed so i reached out to my good friends at mint capital and we bought a ton of chocolate a lot of chocolate to give out to the people who are here you know it's not easy being away from home refugee at least we could try to make it a little bit sweeter with some chocolate so we're going to be handing out chocolate thank you mid capital for sending the chocolate [Music] um let's bring more [Music] any time [Music] for you chocolate