The morning in the city of Odessa, the most important port city in Ukraine, began with fifteen minutes of wailing alarms.
During a leisurely walk to the shelter, I chat with Nadia Arganov, a pensioner who claims in excellent English that the release of Kherson has increased the sense of security of the residents of Odessa.
"Putin wanted Odessa in order to cut off Ukraine from the Black Sea. Now that we have liberated Kherson, it is clear that Putin and the Russians will no longer come here."
Despite the sense of security expressed by the residents, the beautiful streets of the center of the port city are still strewn with steel "hedgehogs" and sandbags, and everywhere soldiers roam the streets.
Even though it is hard not to notice that they are dressed and equipped much better than in my previous visits to the country - evidence of the transformation that the Ukrainian army underwent during the months of fighting.
Still, the lack of basic equipment - mainly uniforms and related accessories - is still felt, and the one who fills the gap, at exorbitant prices, is the black market.
Peled "hedgehogs" are still scattered on the streets, photo: Neta Bar
At the entrance to a dubious stand that sells uniforms and equipment parts, I meet Igor (pseudonym) - a fighter who participated in battles in Kherson district and had to buy missing equipment in the market.
"It's frustrating that I spend so much of my salary on uniforms and accessories. When equipment arrives from the army or volunteers, I give it to my soldiers, because they don't have the opportunity to buy it. Now that winter is coming, we really don't know if we'll get proper uniforms. On the other hand, a lot of things have improved , the military food is great. I eat better than when I was a student," says the officer with a smile.
On a street corner near the train station, Zhenya Obovich, a taxi driver, surprises me.
"You're from Israel, aren't you? I recognized it from your speech on the phone," says the man, looking excited.
"My son showed me today that Israel sent heating bags for our guys at the front. My son is a fighter, and things like this help so much. I wanted to say thank you. I don't want you to think that we are ungrateful here, we appreciate everything the world does for us," he says, When he refers to a large shipment of heating bags provided to Ukraine by donors from Israel, and its arrival, including boxes with the IDF's C stamp, was well documented.
Life goes on despite the fighting, photo: Reuters
Despite the widespread attack on Ukraine's energy infrastructure, Odessa has not experienced serious power outages in recent days, but Ukraine's power generation infrastructure is in dire straits due to the attacks.
Yesterday it was reported that the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, the largest of its kind in Europe, underwent a series of explosions near two of the six reactors in the complex.
The nature of the explosions at the station, which is controlled by the Russians, is not yet known, but the Atomic Energy Agency demanded that both sides stop fighting near the compound.
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