The Sirens of Ukraine ⎪ BIDF

Ukraine, February 24, 2022. In Kharkiv, not far from the Russian border, twin sisters Maryna and Vladyslava Aleksiiva have to flee their family apartment in the middle of the night under bombs. At the last minute, they took with them their Olympic medal, won in Tokyo a year earlier in artistic swimming. They took refuge in Italy for 6 months, then decided to return to Ukraine to train. From now on, they are obsessed with one goal: participating in the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. We met Maryna and Vlada in March 2023, in Kyiv. Since then, we have supported them and their artistic swimming team until they qualified for the Paris Olympic Games.Despite bombings, air strikes, power cuts, frozen swimming pools and endless trips to competitions, their motivation remains unwavering.