Ukraine 'more united than before' Russian invasion, journalism student says

"It was a fight for survival," journalism student Elina Konavalyuk explained about living last winter in occupied Kherson, a city now in line for annexation into Russia.

Amy Kellogg currently serves as a correspondent based in Milan. She joined FOX News Channel (FNC) in 1999 as a Moscow-based correspondent. Follow her on Twitter: @amykelloggfox

Last winter and spring, I posted some of what Konavalyuk shared with me during her time underground, never using her name out of fear for her safety.  And in fact, she says Russian border guards checked her phone and interrogated her intensely on the way out, suspicious as they are of each fleeing Ukrainian. Her "Diary of Survival" memoirs read like poetry with descriptions of what it feels like to forget the smell of fresh laundry and the taste of jam.

Konavalyuk is a journalism student. Documenting what was going on in her hometown and teaching herself what blasts correspond to what sort of weapons fire in order to know when to run, how to react to the constant noise and bombardment all around her, she says, helped her get through the long and terrifying months. Now, in the safety of Europe, she finds it hard sometimes, she says, to see people enjoying the worry-free life of those who are not living in a state of war.