"10 Days of War: Kherson, Occupation, Us." A Diary by Journalist Kseniya Keleberda
At the onset of Russia’s full-scale invasion, Kherson journalist Kseniya Keleberda made the decision to stay in her hometown. In the first days of the war, she kept a diary, documenting daily life and the transformations of Kherson and its residents under the impact of combat and occupation.
On April 13, 2022, Kseniya was forced to leave the Russian-occupied city. Her husband and son remained behind and were eventually taken to a Russian “basement”. In November of that same year, shortly after Kherson’s liberation, she returned for a visit. On May 1, 2023, she came back for good.
Today, Kseniya lives in Kherson and works at Drone Media. As the third anniversary of Russia’s full-scale war approaches, she revisits her old notes and reflects on them. Signal to Resist is publishing her memories of the first ten days of the invasion alongside her present-day reflections.
Once, my hometown of Kherson was home to almost 300,000 people. A southern city by the river, shaded by acacias and apricot trees, with bustling markets, an unhurried rhythm of life, and the salty breath of the nearby sea. In three years of war, it has become a ghost. Thousands of its residents will never return to this mutilated city—they were killed in the war, disappeared without a trace, and were tortured in Russian “basements”. Others fled to different towns and villages across Ukraine; many left the country altogether.
Now, only around 60,000 people remain here. Most of them are elderly. Our children study remotely and play in bomb shelters. By 4 PM, the city is dead, with only a few scattered windows glowing in the dark—signs of life. Here, people are killed daily—hunted by drones, shelled by Grad rocket launchers, targeted by ballistic missiles and KABs. This is how we live now. Every Kherson resident remembers that terrible February 24, the day that marked the beginning of wartime.
I started documenting everything on February 25, 2022. Writing about what was happening to us and to our city. At first, my "Kherson Diaries" were published in the online newspaper Postfactum. But after the outlet’s founder, Maksym Negrov, was arrested on March 5, 2022, the site was taken down. In early March, The Guardian offered me a platform to chronicle life in occupied Kherson.
Every day, I walked through the city, met with friends, went to stores, visited a volunteer center, attended protests. And in the evenings, I sat down at my computer and wrote down everything I had seen that day. On Fridays, I submitted my texts for translation; by Saturday morning, they were in London. By Sunday, they were printed in millions of copies—in the newspaper and online.
I wanted to go through the war with my family. Keeping a diary helped me survive the occupation—it was work, something that needed to be done. And that was important. But then, on March 28, 2022, the official website of the Kherson City Council published an article about my "Kherson Diaries." I didn’t want to end up in a Russian basement myself. So, I left. My family stayed behind.
Then came new cities, new countries, losses, and, finally, a return home. The war is still going on. As of February 24, 2025, we have entered the fourth year of this war. I invite you to remember how it all began. This is a deeply personal text, but many Kherson residents lived through the exact same thing.
February 23, 2022
A regular day at the Kherson office started with a discussion among the employees—whether or not to congratulate the men on "Soviet Army Day." Most refused, but two women said, "Let it be, it's still a holiday."
The day was long—with a lunchtime walk, discussions about the latest news, which was unsettling but not terrifying. A colleague was debating whether her daughter should go to study in Kharkiv or stay in Kherson a little longer. They agreed that Kherson was safer. After all, who would even need Kherson…
And in the evening— the long-awaited premiere of Eternity and One Day, a directorial improvisation by Serhii Pavliuk based on The Dictionary of the Khazars by Milorad Pavić.
In the theater lobby, everyone was handed black plague doctors masks and invited to watch the interactive performance. A hellish mix of different variations of stories about love and death—where death outweighed love—lavishly blended with music and Bosch’s video projections…
The stage revolved, carrying the audience through the visually reflected searches for meaning by the play’s strange characters… Personal waves of fear, amplified by the streams of theatrical blood… I keep replaying all of this in my memory even now—three long years after that one day ended—the last day of the pre-war world…
It feels like we are stuck on that stage—in that day that refuses to end, and we understand the word "eternity" more and more. The stage keeps turning, carrying us through the loss of friends, missile strikes, burned cities, through the war, in that dreadful eternal day… And when the wheel will finally stop—no one knows…
February 24, 2022
I slept like the dead after the play, after processing everything I had seen. Fell into a black hole, only to be yanked out of it by a phone call. My eldest son said, "War, Mom." And then—everything blurred through tears, like in a fog. I cried, but I did what had to be done—packed an emergency bag, made a list of supplies, called family and friends.
Explosions… The city was deserted. But public transport was still running— marshrutkas, trolleybuses. Fighting had already started near the Antonivskyi Bridge. We scoured the internet for information, but no one knew what to do…
My younger son called. He worked at the regional administration—he told me that Hennadii Lahuta, the head of the Kherson Regional State Administration, had fled. Told everyone to evacuate. However they could. Later, I learned that on the first day of the war, many deputies, officials, and activists packed their cars and drove out of Kherson.
We waited for someone—anyone—from the local government to speak. But there was silence. Instead, a fresh video surfaced. I sat in front of my computer, watching an endless column of Russian military vehicles rolling across Kherson land.
Somewhere on the outskirts, people were building barricades. That, too, was posted online. Newly created Telegram channels were flooded with requests for warm clothes, food, sleeping mats for the fighters. On Facebook, people were sharing Molotov cocktail recipes. That’s how we stepped into the war.
February 25, 2022
In the morning, I rushed to the stores. Bought everything in sight. Stuffed my bags with anything edible. Online, volunteer groups had already started forming. In the complete absence of government action, volunteer networks sprang up almost instantly. If humanitarian aid needed to be delivered—people found drivers online and set off. New Telegram channels popped up.
Heavy fighting continued at the Antonivskyi Bridge. The wounded needed help. People were desperately trying to find bread for them. But there was no bread in the city. The bakery had shut down.
My neighbors went to the bomb shelter at the semiconductor plant. Built back in Soviet times, according to all the regulations—ventilation, toilets, everything. They said it wasn’t bad, just damp. People slept fully dressed, emergency bags packed and within reach. Families gathered in one apartment. Together, it wasn’t as terrifying.
February 26, 2022
In just a few days, we had almost gotten used to the war. We only cried on the first day. By the second, we were already looking for ways to help. All information was in the newly created Telegram channels—addresses for enlisting in the territorial defense and municipal police, as well as locations for collecting supplies, food, and bread.
In those first days, Kherson had long bread lines. "We need bread," people wrote in the chats. "At least let’s feed the wounded!" My husband and I baked four loaves. Found some old yeast—revived it. Mixed what flour we had—corn, rye, since there wasn’t enough wheat. They didn’t turn out pretty, but they were good.
Gathered whatever I could—cookies, preserves, warm clothes, a yoga mat—packed it all and took it to the city executive committee.
They didn’t let me in. Sent me, bags in hand, to the Korabelnyi District Council, where the volunteer center was. Near City Hall, I ran into a familiar videographer, Andrii Andriushchenko, and Oleksandr Shumkov, a former Kremlin prisoner and bodyguard of Dmytro Yarosh (he had spent years in a Russian prison, was released right before the war, and returned to his hometown). The guys had just come from the military enlistment office. It was locked. They knocked, but no one answered. They thought someone at the executive committee would help. But there, too, they were turned away. Somewhere on the outskirts of Kherson, fighting raged, shaking the city.
February 27, 2022
The volunteer center is packed. People bring food, clothes, bread, water, medicine. Sorting supplies for the children’s hospital, the wounded, the territorial defense.
City council deputy Oksana Pohomii takes a sedative and barks out orders, her voice already hoarse. So many familiar Kherson faces. They say students from the vocational school are welding anti-tank barricades, others are making Molotov cocktails. I want to hug everyone. These days, people hug a lot. Like they’re trying to share their warmth.
Bread is being baked in the city again. They sell it straight from trucks. The lines are massive. A friend stood in line for four loaves—she left two at the volunteer center. We go for a walk through a small park by the theater. The sky is gray. A distant rumbling. But it isn’t thunder. The siren wails. And in the park, children and adults walk as if nothing is happening. The wind catches the flag, draping it over the Potemkin monument. We sit on a bench, eating bread, drinking wine—to our victory.
February 28, 2022
I am out hunting for food again. Everyone is stocking up, cramming their fridges with whatever they can find. The supermarket is packed, but people are polite, letting others go first, cracking jokes.
There’s no wheat flour left. Only coconut. We stuff our backpacks with whatever remains—cookies, chocolate, butter, sausages… A craft beer shop is closing down. They’re giving away the last of their stock for free. We each get two liters of beer and some anchovies as a bonus. Rumors have been spreading that the supermarket in central Kherson is also open for the last time. The whole city is drifting from store to store, grabbing whatever food is left.
Public transport has already stopped. We walk. We stop by the theater, talk to a familiar director, Andrii Mai. In the theater basement, turned into a bomb shelter, 70 theater workers and their families are living now. Andrii tells us he wasn’t able to leave with his young son. He had bought train tickets for February 24. Went to the station, but the last train was canceled. The station was empty. No trains. Bus routes—canceled, too. By then, the only way out was by car. Until February 26, the road to Mykolaiv was relatively safe. After that, it became a battlefield.
Lines for everything. But the pharmacy lines—unreal. People stand for hours just to get medicine. I don’t even try. No time for that. Have to be home before dark. The sounds of war are creeping closer, getting louder. For now, the war still exists mostly in social media, on the outskirts of the city, somewhere far away. And then, by morning, a foreign army entered the city.
March 1, 2022
The first day of spring. Bitter cold. Snow is falling. All night, distant explosions rumbled somewhere in the suburbs. In the morning, we brew tea while we still have electricity, sit down at our computers. All the news is there.
A ridiculous video is making the rounds—overnight, Russian occupiers looted a Vezunchyk grocery store on the outskirts of Kherson. The security camera caught them. One of them grabbed three boxes of Raffaello.
Outside, a voice shouts: "Private, fall in!" I drop my laptop, rush to the window. Soldiers with rifles march down my street, one after another. No passersby. Russian troops have entered Kherson. And only then does fear set in.
March 1, almost everyone stays home, glued to their computer screens. In the chats, people write that a shell hit an apartment building. There are dead and wounded. Two cars came under fire. Civilians who step outside are being killed. Gunfire echoes through multiple districts. Kherson’s mayor, Ihor Kolykhaiev, addressed the people, urged them to stay home, assured them that Kherson is a Ukrainian city.
And so, people stay inside. But outside, soldiers of another country march down my street. Moving in formation, shielding themselves with their rifles, ready to fire at any second. They are scared and angry. Reports say contract soldiers have entered Kherson—the ones who have already fought, the ones who know they won’t be greeted with flowers.
Are soldiers hungry? A new video surfaces—Russian troops are looting a supermarket. Walking out with branded bags, loading them into their BTR. Kherson residents mock them, film them, post the clips in Telegram chats, tracking their movements around the city. By a small church, one occupier unrolls a prayer mat and kneels to pray. Beside him, another makes the sign of the cross. Someone films them from a window. "We should strike them now," a voice mutters off-camera.
By evening, a new video appears on Facebook—in Buzkovyi Park, bodies are torn apart. They were territorial defense fighters. They had tried to stop the advance into the city…
None of them survived. Rumors spread—there were 30 of them. No, 50. Maybe 80. A priest from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Serhii Chudinovych, secretly buries them. He doesn’t know their names. He takes a personal item from each body, something that might help identify them later. He records everything in a notebook. The Russians find him. They throw him in prison. Torture him. He survives. He escapes to unoccupied Ukraine. He carries the weight of his time in the basement, and only months later does he tell his story to a journalist from a well-known Ukrainian publication.
The video was uploaded to YouTube by Hennadii Shelestenko. Russians flood the comments, rejoicing at the footage of mutilated bodies. Someone asks him to turn off the comments. He refuses. I didn’t understand why he posted it. Didn’t know that later, he would work for the occupation government. There was so much we didn’t know on that first day of war’s spring.
March 2, 2022
Overnight, Russian military vehicles rolled into residential neighborhoods. They stood in the courtyards. Knocked on doors. No one opened.
Morning comes, and the city is silent.Everyone stays home, scrolling through the news in Telegram. During the night, Kherson’s city hall was shelled. Some districts remain without electricity or water. The Fabrika shopping mall was bombed. It had stores—groceries, electronics, brand-name clothing. Russian soldiers looted the food. Took the expensive liquor, too.
Then, looters appeared. Our own. But Kherson residents quickly organized self-defense groups and shut it down—harshly. Looters were duct-taped to poles, their pants pulled down, their photos posted online.
Mayor Ihor Kolykhaiev warned of a humanitarian catastrophe in the city. He demanded a green corridor to evacuate the wounded and the dead. Gunfire echoed through the night again.
March 3, 2022
Kherson residents are burying their dead. Volunteers collect the bodies. A beat-up old car transports them, a cardboard sign taped to it with 'Morgue' written by hand.
Some stores have reopened. We stand in food lines for three to four hours. We share what we get with our neighbors. That’s how the day passes—lines, updates from the internet, restless sleep under the sound of artillery shelling outside the window.
I went out to find our nearest bomb shelter.
Neighbors told me about two basements nearby. People had already settled in. One used to be a tennis club. The other—a dormitory basement under the medical college. I made sure they’d let us in if we needed a place.
The Russians have taken over the Kherson Regional State Administration building. Their military vehicles are parked in Freedom Square. We watch it all through security cameras. A woman from Kherson posts on Facebook—she’s looking at the Russian vehicles from her window. Ten minutes later, she reports back: The soldiers have looted the nearby pharmacies and left.
We still go outside with fear. We choose routes carefully, avoiding places where the occupiers are.
Life goes on. We are still stockpiling food. Water and electricity are still working. Garbage is still being collected. But an environmental disaster is looming.
March 4, 2022
Tanks and armed soldiers on our street. Checking documents. Like an old black-and-white film about the Nazis. "Ausweis" always on hand.
The Russians have taken over the TV center. They’ve set up tripwires. Now, we only have Russian channels. Ukrainian broadcasting is still available via cable. But, as it turns out, not for long.
Kherson residents are being invited to a concert and a food distribution from the Russian humanitarian convoy. For four hours, the mobile service is cut off. But there’s still Wi-Fi.
On March 4, for the first time, people took to Freedom Square with Ukrainian flags.
They made it clear to the Russians that no one will be taking their rations. The humanitarian convoy is sent in the direction of the Russian warship. That phrase is everywhere now. Even kids say it, and adults don’t scold them.
On Facebook, a handsome bearded man—director Serhii Pavliuk, well-known in the city—calls on Kherson residents to come to the March 5 protest. As if inviting them to the premiere of another one of his plays. The neighbors are planning to go. They’re bringing their kids.
March 5, 2022
There were two explosions during the night. Somewhere near the river port. But we’re used to it now. We don’t go to the bomb shelter.
A friend, a doctor, spent the night at work. Curfew in the evening—no way home. She sent a message that she was fine.
Women in Kherson are giving birth, even in bomb shelters. In this time, two babies have already been born underground.
Bread has arrived in stores. Danone is giving away its remaining stock for free. The factory is shutting down, so whatever is left in the warehouses is being distributed around the city. But the yogurt is already close to its expiration date.
Life in the city is getting back on its feet. The water supply has been repaired. A few trolleybuses are back on their routes. Shops have reopened.
Since last night, social media has been buzzing about the resistance rally. And by morning, people start heading toward Freedom Square in Kherson. Families walk together. A stream of people from all over the city flows toward the central square. At 9:40 AM, the crowd is still small. Around the perimeter, armed Russian soldiers stand watch. Two of them are leading a detained man. More and more people arrive. And they take the man back. The soldiers guarding the regional administration fire a warning shot into the air. But the crowd does not disperse. It keeps growing.
People march with handmade signs: "Kherson is Ukraine." They chant: "Putin is a d*head."**"Russian warship, go f* yourself."** "Go home." Around 5,000 people fill Freedom Square. There are lots of Ukrainian flags.
But among protesters, there are men in dark clothing, hoods up, faces hidden. They move through the crowd, recording people who have come to protest. One even hisses: "Nazi pigs." They are definitely not locals.
We don’t talk about what day of the week it is. Or what date. We say it like this—"Today is the 10th day of the war."
Kherson has been named a Hero City for its resistance. Kolykhaiev has been awarded a medal. We are on the front pages of the news.
During the night, Chornobaivka was bombed. Now, the whole world knows the name of this village, where Kherson’s airport is located. But back then, it was the first time. Glory to the Armed Forces of Ukraine!
February 20, 2025
I wrote these texts three years ago, in a city occupied by the enemy. Now, I’m rereading them in liberated Kherson, and I realize just how naïve we were. We didn’t grasp reality. We played with it. Life is an adventure. We’ll live through it. But war was no adventure. For some, it passed them by. For others, it brushed against them, just slightly. And for many, it took them completely.
Our beautiful world shattered into a thousand puzzle pieces, and we will never put them back together into the picture we once knew. Behind each of us—a graveyard of people, lost illusions, broken families, severed friendships. How to piece it all back together? No one knows. Especially if you live in Kherson, where every day brings new shelling, where drones hunt people. This is the borderline between real and unreal worlds, and we are standing on it—on the edge of war.
It may seem that all we ever did was search for food. And honestly, that’s not far from the truth. It was our only excuse to step outside into the world of war. And we used it. And we believed the war would end soon. That we’d renovate our homes, go to the dacha, and then head to the sea...
The war goes on. The windows in Kherson are boarded up with thick plywood. The dachas were flooded when Dnipro’s waters surged after the Kakhovka dam attack. The seashore is mined. The Potemkin monument—the Russians took it with them when they fled. But in the theater basement, there are still concerts, performances, workshops for children.
In my apartment building, a shell pierced the roof. A drone dropped an explosive on my friend, the doctor. She has a concussion and leg injuries. Last night, three KAB bombs hit the city.
We wake up to explosions. "Oh, the geese are flying"—Kherson residents write in Telegram chats. (That’s our code name for outgoing strikes.) That’s how a new day begins in a frontline city
