Former Dynamo, Shakhtar and Ukrainian national football team player Junior Moraes shared his memories of the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
"It's very hard to think about it. Sometimes I even have blackouts when I try to remember the beginning of it all. Thank God, my family was stuck in Brazil a few days before because one of my relatives got sick with Covid just before boarding the plane to Ukraine.
This happened on a Sunday, and on Wednesday (actually on Thursday night - ed.) the war broke out. I was alone with my friend Luciano and his son. He woke me up at 5 a.m. He was so pale. All the time he was showing me his phone: "Look, look, Ukraine is being bombed, there's a war." I thought it was a bad dream, I couldn't believe it.
A war at home, in 2022? How is this possible? I started seeing bombs from the window of my apartment in Kyiv. I didn't know whether to stay there or get in the car and leave. It was a nightmare. "Shakhtar put us in a hotel, the roads were blocked. I could only pray. I was helpless. The club was looking for a solution to get us out of the country, gathering players and families in one place. We owe the club a lot.
There was panic in Kyiv. It was not easy to organize all this. After three and a half days, we received logistical support from Oleksandr Cheferin so that we could cross the border.
I couldn't talk to my family for a long time, it was very hard. It was as if people around us had lost their dreams. We must tell the leaders of this world that the war must stop now. Now, not tomorrow. Ukraine has to win and will win, it is not Ukraine that is killing innocent people," Moraes said.