BarcelonaWhen the first missiles hit Kyiv, Lluís Cortés (Balaguer, 1986) was unaware of the odyssey that awaited him. Ukraine was at war to defend itself against the Russian attack, and like him and his physical trainer, Jordi Escura, thousands of people took four things to leave the city. The journey back home lasted more than three days. Despair surrounded them and fear for the uncertain future of an entire country accompanied them on their journey to escape. Now, from Balaguer, he is attending ARA to reflect on this experience that he would never have “imagined living”.
You’re home now. It’s been a nightmare. How are you now?
– I am OK. I was able to reconnect with my family, my people, and I’m in a safe place. After what we’ve been through, we’re finally safe. Now, however, I have a very strange and very harsh feeling for the people who are still in the country. It’s what makes me feel bad; i want to help and i want people to help. It’s relatively easy to help people who have been able to get out, but it’s extremely tricky to help people who are still there.
Do you have a sense of responsibility for being able to escape?
– Totally. When you experience this in the first person it is such a big slap in the face that it makes you touch the ground. Think about it, “This is really happening, it’s happening, and not so far.” There are other wars in the world, of course; they should stop and make no sense, but this is happening very close to our house. I think we need to be aware of what is going on and how serious all this is. Now from here we are trying to help in whatever way we can. I am in meetings with UEFA and other federations to bring to life the footballers we have within the country, which is the priority goal. As for those who are already out, we want to find a way out for them to play on another team and have a salary to help their families who are there.
The war may have fallen far short of our collective imagination. Even though there have been armed conflicts in the world for a long time, we have never had one so close that it shakes us in this way.
– We are not aware of what a war entails. I knew her from what you see in the movies or from what my grandfather used to tell me, and you think, “That was before. It’s impossible for the 21st century to happen with all the media and everything we have.”
“The war is such a big slap in the face that it makes you touch the ground” ”
When you arrived in Kyiv the day before, was everything normal?
– Yes! When we were in Turkey, we talked to the people of the federation because we had to go back to Ukraine to sign a pending paper from the bank. We asked them, “Do you mean it’s safe to come? What comes to us here is that the war is ready …” They told us no, that it was part of the media pressure from both sides to negotiate, but that no imminent war was foreseen. On Wednesday night, when we had already arrived in Kyiv, we went out to dinner. We were walking around, all normal, with the restaurants open. And the next day we woke up to the sound of explosions. Jordi Escura woke up to the sound of three bombs and called me and said, “Lluís, we already have her here.” The anti-aircraft sirens sounded and the adventure to leave the country began.
How did you react to Jordi’s call?
– At first I thought I had fallen asleep, because we had stayed for breakfast [riu]. When he told me this the first thing I thought was, “Really? How can that be?” And I quickly said, “We have to go.” I woke up my rep, we met at the hall and we started talking to the federation and the embassy. The federation told us they were putting us in a van to start driving miles. The first survival instinct is to get organized quickly, but the real thing is what comes next: when you’re 60 you only sleep 5. When you eat two muesli bars and some nuts and the body doesn’t ask for more. It’s like putting on stand-by and you just need to live, move forward. And it is very beast. At that moment you put up with everything. I don’t know if it’s the adrenaline rush, but it’s a weird feeling.
And how are decisions made in this state?
– It’s not easy, but you have to keep a cool head. We wanted to be able to decide what we thought was best at any given time and we were going to trust the federation, but if we thought we had to do something, we were going to pressure them to do it. We had to trust everyone who was helping us out of the country. For example, we needed to trust the driver to be professional and make the trip. In a war circumstance, he might have said, “Get out of the car, steal everything you have, and save me and my family.” It could have happened.
Through social media you also did an important informative task.
– We had to move messages of calm out, and that’s what we did through social media. The idea was given to me by Albert Llimós, an ARA journalist. He told me I could do it, and I was very good at informing and keeping mine calm.
You’ve seen a lot of despair on this trip. How is this impotence managed?
– With brutal sadness. We were privileged, because we were in a car, with a driver. It could happen that we ran out of gas or took many hours, but the picture outside our car was much worse. People walking from Kyiv to the border, which is 600 km and it is horribly cold. It is lived with sadness and disbelief that this is happening.
As you progressed, so did the war. It is a constant pressure.
– Brutal. With the mobile phone we watched as we moved away from Kyiv, advancing very slowly, but also as the Russian tanks got closer and closer. They were already beginning to bomb strategic points in the capital. When we arrive in Lviv, we think we are in a safe zone, until after a few hours the anti-aircraft sirens sound and make us go down to the bunker to wait.
How does it feel inside a missile bunker in the middle of a war?
– It’s a very strange feeling. Also, it was surreal, because the hotel bunker was thespa! Hotels take advantage of bunkers as more of a hotel space and we were there, protecting ourselves from a missile. You’re locked in there and the feeling is you can’t do anything. We needed peace of mind. It’s a feeling of helplessness, frustration, sadness …
You have met many people on the run from Ukraine, some who left like you and others who stayed on the road. What is it like to leave them behind?
– I’m surprised by the harshness of these people. The character, the resilience of all. In our own team, in the selection, it has happened. Some footballers are from Ukraine, they could leave the country, but they have decided that they want to stay to help and defend their land. Men cannot leave the country: some are in hiding and others in front. When we left Lviv, all the men were on the train platform saying goodbye to their families, children and women. It’s a situation that shattered me inside and it’s hard for me to understand.
How has this whole journey changed for you until you were able to return home?
– I don’t know if we took it on. The first night I slept at home I spent it dreaming that I was waiting for the policeman who had taken my passport to the border control to return it to me and he didn’t. I was suffering all night. These are things that affect you and I think we are not aware enough of how it will end up affecting us in our lives. When you experience this, you realize how important outside help is. When people cross the border, they don’t know what to do. They have nowhere to go, they don’t know what their future will be. When they cross is when the real odyssey begins.
Maybe the fear you didn’t notice at the time is coming out now.
– Maybe so, and it’s part of that self-protection. Now that we are in a safe zone I realize everything I have experienced. What is certain is that I was scared as such only at two specific times: when we got in the van on a dirt road in the dark and we didn’t know if the driver knew where we were going and when on the train. to Poland we were stuck in nothingness for two hours. Nobody said anything and suddenly we saw suspicious lights outside … You think, “The Russians have found us and will kill us or take us prisoners of war.” People were silent. It’s as if they’ve already assumed they’re going to die: “We’re dead, we’re on the train, and whatever comes next will be better. It’s as if the worst has already happened to them. Anything that came would be good.
