Stamford volunteer at Ukraine frontline for Project Konstantin, Jack Bon Holly, reports on life as an aid worker in a warzone and renews appeal for support
‘Every day a month’.
It’s a saying often uttered among humanitarian aid volunteers in Ukraine.
What feels like weeks of workload crammed into a day’s waking hours.
It’s done day after day, week after week, mostly without an adequate break.
And still each volunteer is left with the exasperation of a job that is never done, efforts that are never enough.
It certainly rings true for Jack Bon Holly after selling up and leaving the tranquility of summertime Stamford for the frontline.
“One of my friends here says ‘every day a month’, and it really is,” he said.
“When I think back to leaving Stamford on that morning in June, it feels like years ago. It doesn’t feel like four months.”
The exhaustion, the strain of living constantly close to peril, and the desperate sight of innocent people caught up in a war zone takes its toll.
Now is a particularly raw time for Jack and his colleagues in Project Konstantin - a frontline humanitarian aid and medivac group.
Jack is speaking to the Mercury just days after a fellow volunteer, Tatyana Millard, was killed in a car crash in Ukraine.
“It’s difficult at the moment, it really is,” Jack says with a voice close to cracking.
“We have just lost Tatyana and she was like a sister so it’s still very raw and very difficult to talk about without breaking down.
“I have already been in some bad places mentally, so I’m trying to make sure this doesn’t push me over the edge.”
Volunteering as a medivac driver with Project Konstantin immediately thrust former soldier Jack into the sharp end of the conflict.
Working and sleeping for weeks and months uncomfortably close to the frontline, he and his fellow volunteers were taken out of the firing line to recharge in August.
“It was a good time to regroup although I didn't really take a break,” Jack admitted.
“I took a weekend and I can’t even really remember it. About three days were a complete blank.
“It wasn’t until afterwards that I realised what a state I was in.”
Now back in Kharkiv, for the time being, Jack has found his skills better suited elsewhere, particularly dispatching aid to civilians trapped in frontline villages where others are reluctant to go.
Through this he has established a network with other voluntary group drawn from across the world such as Helping Ukraine Grassroots Support (HUGS) and The Canada Way.
“Everyone has to find a niche here and I have certain organisational skills,” he explained.
“I have no qualms about going to the front, so at the moment I'm getting stuff to places that are difficult to reach.”
It is safer away from the line, but Kharkiv is anything but safe.
“We get rocket attacks all the time,” Jack said.
“The other morning I was delivering aid to a village and an Iskander (missile) came down in a street here about five minutes after I’d driven down it.
“The shelling is every day, sometimes every hour.”
The to-do list in Ukraine has no end and leaves Jack with ‘heartbreaking’ choices to make. Who to help and, hardest of all, when to say no.
“I start my day every day crying in the shower,” he said.
“There is so much need here - it’s everywhere you look.
“I’ve realised the best thing I can do is narrow it down and help a few villages.
“That way I get to know the people, they get to trust me and I get to trust them.”
Trust is an important judgement to get right.
Jack says there are Russian sympathisers around who would happily give away his position.
“The Russian artillery will target us because we are precious targets,” he said.
“They rejoice far more when they kill an aid worker than a Ukrainian soldier because it makes a bigger story for them.”
And yet this is a cause, and a calling, that Jack is committed to body and soul.
Time away from the country is not an option.
“I have no money to go anywhere and there is too much to do here,” he said.
“I can’t imagine taking a break from it. This is war. It’s relentless.
“Whenever I’m finding it particularly difficult I volunteer to work with the girls from HUGS and that keeps me balanced.”
Jack has other strategies to deal with the worst episodes.
“A lot of people who watch my posts on our Facebook page ask me why I’m always referring to myself in the third person,” he said.
“I do that so when the really bad stuff is going down, it’s not happening to me, it’s happening to some other Jack.
“That’s one of the ways I deal with it. It’s part of my coping mechanism.”
Ukraine has, unbelievably, attracted selfie-taking ‘war tourists’.
However, Jack’s Facebook posts are a vital way of raising awareness, showing how funds raised have been spent, and, crucially, promoting appeals for more resources.
His initial ‘Stamford 4x4’ fundraising campaign helped to buy a makeshift field ambulance which he drove himself in and around the front.
The £3,000 that remains in there is being spent on a specialist vehicle for a unit of marine special forces amongst which the husband of a Stamford refugee is serving.
A separate Stamford For Ukraine page has been created as a general pot to pay for whatever is needed, working alongside the Stamford-based Stretchers for Ukraine campaign.
“At the moment we need medical supplies, warm clothes, blankets - all the basics for everyday life to give to the people who have been displaced,” he said.
Thirty beds for an army medical unit have recently been bought thanks to donations and fundraising solely from the Stamford area.
Aside from the vehicles and beds, Jack has paid for everything else required out of his own pocket - reserves that will, however, soon run out.
“I try not to spend anything from there unless I absolutely have to,” he said.
“We now want to run particular appeals for specific things so people know exactly where their money is going and where it’s needed.”
Jack also wants to set up a collection point for old laptops and mobile phones which can be refurbished and repaired in Ukraine and given to children to allow them to access remote schooling.
But ultimately, even small gestures can make an impact.
“When you can give someone something, even something small, it can make such a difference,” Jack said.
“Handing over a teddy bear to a child is such an amazing thing, for them to know that someone in the UK is thinking about them.”
Jack is in need of a laptop himself - having given his away on arrival in Ukraine - to help with admin, social media and communication.
Volunteers are also wanted back home to build the group a website and help oversee its social media platforms.
There are many ways to help. Any skills can be put to good use, just as in Ukraine.
“Being a police officer can make you a very cynical person, dealing with some of the worst in society, but being here helps maintain your faith in humanity,” Jack reflects, his voice cracking once more. He pauses.
“Knowing there are so many good people who are just giving and giving, being able to work with them is an absolute privilege.”
If you would like to donate, visit www.gofundme.com/f/stamford-for-ukraine or https://justgiving.com/crowdfunding/stretchersforukraine
If you would like to offer your time, email Yvette Diaz-Munoz at yvettediazmunoz@gmail.com
