Escaping the war, this Ukrainian athlete spent 24 hours on a train as bombs hit

Paris: Artem Kolinko was woken up by the bombs.

Sitting in his bedroom in Ukraine just over two years ago, Kolinko logged onto Facebook.

“I saw a lot of messages that Russia was attacking and bombing Ukraine,” Kolinko said.

This was an urgent situation for a family with a disabled man. Kolinko was living with his parents who knew they needed to leave their house in the Ukrainian city of Zhovti Vody as quickly as possible.

Kolinko has muscular dystrophy and has required a wheelchair since the age of 12. He needs help getting in and out of bed, so a 24-hour train ride in a packed carriage with not enough room to properly go to the toilet was not ideal. Getting to the train was hard enough.

He took what he could: two wheelchairs — electric and manual — a bag of clothes, his passport, laptop, money and most importantly to him, his boccia set.

Kolinko will represent Ukraine at the Paralympics in Paris, having endured a harrowing ordeal in the war engulfing his country.

The 40-year-old fled to the Netherlands to live with his brother and has been practising boccia in a small room — 20 square metres, he says — to hone his craft in the sport that bears similarities to lawn bowls, played by people with a serious physical disability.

This masthead spoke to Kolinko in Paris. He discussed the morning where he had feared for his life in a “scary” train ride where 10 passengers were crammed into carriages that normally fit four people.

Kolinko was lifted into the upper bunk so he could lay down, which made the difficult task of going to the toilet even more taxing.

“The scariest part was the night. We heard shooting and there was some panic,” he said.

“It was a lot of people in the train. People were just sitting in the corridor and it was full of people and baggage, dogs, cats. I can’t walk, so my parents and other people took me by hand and carried me through this corridor to one coach.

“I laid down for 24 hours. In the night, we stopped a few times because we heard shooting. Everyone had to turn off their phone. It was dark on the train. It was scary.

“For example, if people left the train, I would have been lost.

“I realised a lot of things we don’t need in life. I took my boccia set, of course.”

Kolinko took up boccia in 2013 at a rehabilitation centre in Crimea and always wanted to participate in a Paralympics. Fleeing his homeland wasn’t going to dampen his spirit as he beamed with pride at Wednesday’s opening ceremony.

He will compete this week in the BC4 class, grateful that he can pursue the sport that has given him so much happiness. Living with his brother has helped him fine-tune his technique and strategy of rolling boccia balls down his ramp.

“I live in the kitchen or a living room without a bathroom, so I have to ask my brother to carry me onto the second floor to have a shower,” Kolinko said.

“I hope the war stops and I have the possibility to come back [to Ukraine]. Now it’s a very difficult time. You just live day by day. I miss my home and my friends.

“Because I have boccia, it gives me power. I have a goal and it helps me to live. Without having goals, living day by day, it is very hard. Boccia helped me to go through this tough time.

“It was always my dream to go to the Paralympics. The dream has come true.”

The Paris 2024 Paralympic Games is live and free on Channel 9, 9Gem and 9Now and ad-free on Stan Sport.