The Central Street

In the late 60s, there was no bypass road around our city, so all transit cars drove along the central street. Quite often we went out to the main street to look at foreign cars because they were different from the Soviet "Moskvich" and "Volga" and looked better. There were many cars from France and Holland, fewer from Germany, but they were there too. Two guys from our yard, who came from Kyiv to their aunt every year, once said that there were also foreign cars in Kyiv, but they were scattered all over the city, and here they were all in one place, driving along the main street, so it seemed that there were more of them. Once, in a haberdashery store, I saw French tourists who drove up to the store in a beautiful car. They were a man with a girl who was a little older than me. She looked about 15-16 years old. The girl had unusually large eyes. Maybe that was the fashion in France at that time. Now I don't remember the brand of car that the French tourists were traveling in, but I still remember for yet that girl's eyes. ---- #Dubno, #Cenralstreet, #retrospect

Banderka

A mountain on which, in the forest, there's a village called Girnyky. When I was 12 or 13 y.o., the boys would go there in the early spring to pick snowdrops for our mothers, grandmothers, and sisters for March 8th. Then, we called the mountain Banderka. We inherited that name from older boys. Several years ago, I asked a resident of this village if there were Banderyes there during the war (Bandery – members of OUN-UPA, Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists - Ukrainian Povstanska (Rebel) Army). "Yes, there were," he replied. "There were real Banderas and fake ones. What do you mean fake? - I didn't understand. The real ones wore uniforms, but the fake ones didn't. Father of that man was a tailor in the village, and Banderiyes would come to him to have him sew uniforms for them. They brought their own fabrics and always paid for the work. The "fake Boundaries" were ordinary gangs of armed robbers who roamed nearby villages, collecting food from the peasants, supposedly for the "real Banderites." Near the hotel in the town, there's a memorial stone commemorating the site where, in January 1945, three residents of the village of Rachin were publicly hanged for being members of the OUN-UPA. Those executed were 35, 25, and 23 years old. #oldvillage, #Girnyky, #memorialstone, #Rachin

Children and war

According to the official "Children of War" database, as of June 2026, at least 707 children have been killed and over 2,570 injured since the start of the full-scale invasion in Ukraine. Forced deportation: The Ukrainian government has identified over 20,000 children who have been forcibly transported or deported to Russian-controlled territories or to Russia itself, with only a fraction of them being safely returned.

Fool's gold

A pack of 'prop' notes I saw in a local shop could easily be mistaken for real cash. Gamblers sometimes use them for scams, even if they are marked as souvenirs."

Betsy

A new nine-story building has sprung up on a vacant lot opposite the furniture factory. It can be seen against the backdrop of the abandoned barn of Countess Shuvalova, on which there is a sign stating that it is an architectural monument. Betsy Shuvalova is known for the fact that Carl Gustav Monnerheim himself fled from her charms. After the coup in the Russian Empire, Betsy emigrated to France, where she died in 1938. She left us the barn as a legacy. https://we.org.ua/.../knyazi-mista-dubno-grafskyj-rid.../

A homeless passenger.

I don't know if this story is true or false, but I heard it once. A man signed a contract with the city mayor to pick up stray dogs from our town. He signed similar contracts with mayors in other nearby towns. The man and his team simply rounded up stray dogs in one city and released them into the wild in another. This carousel brought them a good income. The homeless dogs only disappeared from the city temporarily.

p : New buildings are transforming town's skyline.