LU, the Ukrainian nickname for Ludmila, is a work in progress about one of those women that come to Italy from Eastern Europe to grant their family a better life. They usually work as caretakers for old people but Ludmila got ill and was hospitalised for a long period. We met in Italy but I followed her back in Ukraine for Christmas: it was three years she didnít go home. Her world is firm and warm. Full of signs from the past but also of the welfare sheís working to afford. She managed to have a beautiful marriage for her daughter and sheís very proud of it. She’s still the head of the family, loved and well respected for what sheís doing for them. But you can feel in the air the fear for her leaving again. Her dream is completing a building they started by their house to open a florist shop. In Italy people know nothing about what these courageous women left behind: they are just seen as substitutes for what public welfare isnít able to guarantee, and often they are underpaid, irregular workers. There are many political proposals to get them out from this hypocrisy, but nothing will give them back the things they donít see at home: children growing, young girls falling in love, the landscape changing through the seasons. I’m going back in September, cause they say I must see the incredible Ukrainian flowers. LU is a book and can be seen and purchased HERE.
