Anna Horodetska, a 30-year old IT professional from Ukraine’s capital Kyiv, fled from her rented apartment, grabbing just a few T-shirts and a wedding present from her grandmother - a coffee machine.

Horodetska arrived at the Delhi airport on March 17th to be welcomed by her beau, 33-year old Anubhav Bhasin, a lawyer, who proposed to her with a ring when she said “yes.”

The couple, who had met in August 2019 when Anna was on a solo trip to India, have been dating for about a year. They now got married in a traditional Indian ceremony and plan to later make their wedding legally valid with a court registration as Anubhav is Hindu and Anna is Christian.

They met again in March 2020 in Agra, and then in February 2021 in Dubai, taking their relationship to a pivotal moment - all while being miles apart separated by geography, pandemic protocols, travel restrictions and most recently, the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

"We knew that diplomacy had failed but we still thought war could be averted," says Anna. "Many of us also believed that the attacks would be concentrated on the border and that Kyiv would be safe.”
"But on 24 February, I woke up to the sound of bombing and my first thought was, "Am I dreaming?" Then I saw messages from Anubhav and others confirming that we were under attack," she adds.

The very next day, she moved to a bunker with her mother and her dog, as the attacks intensified.
"It was filled with people. There was a curfew and we weren't allowed to leave the bunker but I had to go out to breathe and walk the dog. The city was filled with the smell of smoke and the sky was so red," she says.

Though Anubhav had been asking her to leave as he felt the war was at hand, Anna hesitated to make a move without her dog. The situation changed rapidly, with frequent shelling and restricted mobility. However, she managed to send her mother and her dog on a train to her grandmother’s village while she boarded a train to Lviv.

Anna travelled from Ukraine to Slovakia, Poland, Finland and finally to Delhi, when she saw a text from Anubhav that he was running late.

"I was super annoyed," she said. "I was exhausted. I just wanted to go home and sleep. But when I came out, he was there with music and balloons.”

Their heart-warming story and their new life together holds much affection, with Anna carrying the wedding present from her grandmother, a coffee machine, all the way for Anubhav, who loves his espressos.

"Anna is a trained make-up artist but she left behind her really expensive make-up to bring this coffee machine here. I think this machine is the real hero of our love story,” says Anubhav.