Andrii Barabash, called Andrew, comes from Ivano-Frankivsk, in western Ukraine. The 23-year-old studied law with a bachelor’s degree in the neighboring university city of Lviv and has been modeling since his spontaneous discovery on Instagram in October 2019. When the Russian war of aggression started on February 24, 2022, the modeling business was only just taking off after the Covid break. Andrii was in Milan at the time. Since then, Andrii has been living out of a suitcase. He works tirelessly around the world to financially support his family, who continues to live in Ivano-Frankivsk, and the Ukrainian state.
Cyte met Andrii for an interview in Hamburg.

Cyte: Please, tell me about your family in Ukraine.

Andrii: I have a smaller sister. It is just two years. We are very close, like best friends. All my family still lives at home. I am from Westukraine. It’s safe. People can live like normal. Though it’s hard because of the war.
Cyte: Since 24th of February 2022, Ukraine has been in a Russian war of aggression.
Before this we all knew wars only from cinema. How does it feel like to live with this?

Andrii: Hard, but to be honest: I cannot even imagine, because I have not been in Ukraine since then. I left the Ukraine two month before it happened. I haven’t seen the bomb and everything. But I miss my country. I want to live with my family, with all my friends. I would like to live a normal life in Ukraine. All Ukrainians would like to live normal life. But they cannot, because of the war. It’s hard. It’s hard. It’s hard.

Cyte: Have you lost loved ones?

Andrii: From my family just one uncle. From my friends I lost a few guys from my school. They are actually the same age with me and they were killed very cruel by Russia. 

Cyte: Did you flee from the war?

Andrii: No, no! As a model I am moving around the world. That time, when war started, I was in Milan. I continued to stay there for a longer time. But I have no place now, where I am based. I am always with my luggage and I am moving around the world. Around Europe to Asia and so on. Where ever I have a job, I am moving with all my stuff.

Cyte: So you do not have a homebase?

Andrii: No, for now not. It is although why I want back to Ukraine. I don’t have a place where I can stand more than a few month. The model company give me usually some apartment or some Model apartment or some airbnb.

Cyte: So you are a kind of refugee. Being a soldier at the front must be hard. Being a refugee might even be tougher. What would you say? Do you think, you will avoid the war?

Andrii: I don’t know. Honestly it is a very hard question. I ask myself this question a lot of times. I don’t know. It is a decision that will your life change. For now I am trying to help my country from outside how I can.

Cyte: You are working very hard. Maybe to forget? 

Andrii: No, not to forget, because I do not have another choice, actually. No, I don’t want to forget, because when you forget, you do not help. And I want to help. I want to do everything what I can. I work hard, because I need to earn money: First to survive by myself and although to help and to do something for the Ukraine, like do some donations. Sometimes I do some fund racing. I collect money for soldiers to help them. In Italy my friends and I started to do volunteer jobs. It was very intensive and we got a lot of help from local people. And we collected financial help and did send it to Ukraine.

Cyte: Do you think that this kind of life has an effect on you? Are you unhappy, do you have fears?

Andrii: I think, it effects myself. I think all Ukrainians need some psychologists. I even try to go to them. I think, it is important to overthinking things. You are always thinking of bad things. For instance two days ago Russia missiled a children hospital. It is very big stress! But I cannot say that I live hard. People in Ukraine do have the worse situation. Anyway, I am lucky that I am outside. I am in a safe place and I can live more or less a normal life than people in Ukraine. It’s not fair to young people that they do not have a normal life in Ukraine. In the whole world young people in my age can live a normal life: they are going to school, they are going to university, they have a student life, they have fun. They can do everything, what they want. They can travel. But in Ukraine they have borders which changes everything. It’s very unfair, it is life!

Cyte: Would you call sadness your constant companion?

Andrii: Yes, sadness is always with me. I do have happy moments. I have a lot of friends everywhere. Sometime I meet with my mom and my sister in Krakow. They come from Ukraine and I come from another country just to meet for a few days. That are very happy moments. But after some time you do not know anymore what is reality. I cannot be ok with this situation, because I really love my country and I want to live there. I had my best life in Ukraine. I had everything that I wanted there. And I never wanted to leave aboard in another country. But now we have this.

Cyte: Russia is known for not being particularly gay-friendly. How does Ukraine feel about queer people?

Andrii: Ukraine is not like Russia, because Russia is a homophobic country. In Ukraine it is not a good situation, but going better in small steps. Queer People are more free. But for the old generation it is very hard. The old generation does not want to understand. They are more strict. Gay or lesbian – for them it is not normal. In a few years in Ukraine it will be better.
Cyte: Was that perhaps an additional motivation for you to leave Ukraine?

Andrii: No, no. I had never a motivation to stay away from Ukraine. For me it has never been a problem.
Cyte: The war is unlikely to end quite soon. What plans do you have for the near future?

Andrii: I can’t even plan for one month. For me everything changes so quickly. I don’t have any plans, because everything changes in last minute. It is because of model life. Today you can be here in Germany, but tomorrow you have to go to China. Sometimes you sit on your sofa and your agent calls you, you have to go to a job. It is very spontaneous. But I think, it is a good job for young people and it is a nice opportunity to travel. And I love my job!
Cyte: Would you like to go back to Ukraine after the war?

Andrii: Yes, yes for sure! It is my biggest dream to go back to Ukraine. And the Ukraine free without Russia, safe country with happy people and I live there. Everything I want, is just to go back to Ukraine.

Cyte: Then you would make the Ukraine to your homebase and work from there?

Andrii: Exactly, for sure. It is my dream. I hope, I will go home soon, but nobody knows, when the war will finish.

Addition from the Cyte editorial team:
According to estimates by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), around 32.5 million border crossings from Ukraine were registered from the beginning of the war to mid-June 2024. The number of refugees was sometimes over 200,000 per day. The neighboring country of Poland has now taken in the most refugees with 1.5 million. 1.17 million refugees were registered in Germany. So far, no European country has succeeded in making the good training of refugees from Ukraine fruitful to a greater extent. According to the Federal Employment Agency, their employment rate in Germany was only 25.2 percent at the end of last year. People predominantly work in low-paying professions, such as in geriatric care, in hotels, in restaurants, in simple services, in agriculture and in temporary employment agencies. All these people are united by their deep sadness.
Jewelry designer Valery Guzema describes these emotions very aptly in Vogue, as Andrii also explained to us: “It seems impossible to be happy now, no matter where I am and what I do, the grief is always there…We have lost our home, our jobs and our normal lives and are trying to adjust to life in different countries. But we all have the same dream – to come home!” May this dream soon become a reality for everyone.