My story (also) lives here: I.Z.

Sergei Bubka is the Olympic Champion in pole jumping. He was training in Donetsk, Ukraine, the city where I am from, and in front of Olympic stadium of Donetsk we have his statue (as you can see on the photo; Photo taken from Wikipedia). Everyone from Donetsk knows this place. When I moved to Finland, I started to learn Finnish and one way I did it was through the music. One of my favorite bands is JVG. Eventually, while listening one of their songs called Epoo I heard the name of Sergei Bubka in their song. I was shocked and I also got a dream to ask Jere or Ville Galle why they mentioned exactly Sergei
Bubka. 3 years later from that moment, in Hakaniemi, I was walking around and suddenly met Ville Galle there. So, I asked him why Sergei Bubka! The answer was: “Because he is a legend.”
P.S.: This is a true story
P.P.S.: Dream!

Many people who have been in Kamppi metro station platform know this sculpture called “Roots of the city”. I passed through it many times but never paid attention to the cities, as there are many. But eventually I learned that it also includes the name of my city - Donetsk. It is extremely important to me, as I was forced to leave my city back in 2014 when it was occupied. Since that day, 21 of July 2014, I haven’t visited the place where I spent the first 18 years of my life. Everything that was my life at that time just stayed there and I never had a chance to, at least, say goodbye. I thought that it was temporary and I would be back...
For me, it is still very painful memory, and therefore it is extremely important to me to see any mention of my city. Thus, now, every time I am in Kamppi, I take a few seconds to look up and search for my city’s name. Especially when I feel homesick.

This is a moomi in the outfit of football team of my city - FC ShakhtarDonetsk. They were playing in Tampere in summer 2025. If there is something that still strongly connects Donetsk to Ukraine and reminds that Donetsk is part of Ukraine - it is this football team! I like to look at this photo. I have lived in Finland for more than 10 years and during this time I visited Ukraine in total just for 3 weeks. I don’t feel fully Finnish but I also feel so much disconnected from Ukraine while still remembering that I am from there. I think this photo reflects well how I feel, combining 2 homes of mine. The photo is from the official Instagram page of FC Shakhtar Donetsk.

This is not related to my city, but it relates to the time when I was still living there - the year 2009. It was the first time that I visited Finland. My mom’s colleague and friend who got married to a Finnish man, moved to Eastern Finland and invited us to visit them. I was 13 yo back then. We lived with them for 2 weeks; my mom’s friend already had 2 children. During breakfast, she gave her children and me this Villis. At first, I didn’t know how to eat it as it had weird texture and also, in Ukraine we don’t have villi. Then I saw how one of the children was mixing it well and after that the structure of the villis became as condensed milk that I really loved. So, I repeated after her and from that moment I really liked this product. This moment somehow stuck in my memory. After 6 years I moved to Finland. And there were times when I missed Ukraine a lot. I remember that in one of the moments I felt so sad and homesick and then I remembered about villis. I went to S-market and bought exactly this one with mansikka-banaani taste (my favorite one). Then I ate it thinking that I am that 13 yo girl who was still living in Donetsk and hasn’t experienced war yet. So, this villis became my therapy. The photo is a screenshot from the internet.