Sixteen days ago, Oleksandr Abramenko was certainly the happiest of men.
After his silver medal in freestyle ski jumping in Beijing, the Ukrainian had even shared his joy with the Russian, Ilia Burov, who was, meanwhile, mounted on the third step of the podium.
And two weeks later, the Olympic vice-champion went from dream to nightmare.
Living in Kiev, a city bombarded by Russian forces for a few days, the skier is hiding in a parking lot, with his wife, Alexandra and his two-year-old child, Dmitry.
Russian Ilia Burov.
Ukrainian Oleksandr Abramenko.
The beauty of sports.
🇷🇺🕊🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/0EVtv2VARc
– Eurosport France (@Eurosport_FR) February 24, 2022
Photographed bundled up in warm clothes, the 33-year-old skier has been living in his garage for a week, for safety.
“We spent the night in an underground parking lot, inside a car, because the warning siren is constantly on,” Abramenko wrote, during an exchange with the New York Times, before describe his daily life since the beginning of the war: “It scares us to sleep in our apartment, I myself could see through the window how the anti-missile defense system works and I hear big explosions.
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Freestyle skier Oleksandr Abramenko won Ukraine's only medal at the Beijing Olympics.
Tonight he sleeps in a Kyiv parking garage with his family.
I asked him to take a picture and send it to me.
This is him with his wife, Alexandra, and their 2-year-old, Dmitry.
pic.twitter.com/Nzso6XxiU6
— John Branch (@JohnBranchNYT) March 4, 2022
"I don't know if I'm going to go to war or not"
Abramenko hopes to leave Kiev as soon as possible with his family to go to safer places, near the Hungarian and Slovak borders: “I planned to go see my coach, Enver Ablaev, who lives in Mukachevo, in Transcarpathia.
I will go there by car, I will take with me only essential things: food and my Olympic medals, ”he explained to the New York Times.
The skier is also worried about his parents, who live in Mykolaiv (Nikolaev), a port and industrial city in southern Ukraine.
“Fighting is already underway in Mykolaiv,” Abramenko wrote, using an alternate spelling for the city's name.
“My parents are sitting at home hearing the explosions.
It's dangerous to leave Mykolaiv right now, they really want to stay there.
They may be able to leave later.”
Finally, in this same interview, the Ukrainian remained vague as to his possible enlistment in the army to go and fight the Russians: “I don't know if I'm going to go to war or not.
I don't know what the people who are called to the front go through.
For the time being, our army is fully facing the offensives of the Russian soldiers”.
