Novopidhorodne, Raipole. Among the fields, steppes and gullies

Novopidhorodne is the easternmost settlement of the Dnipropetrovsk region, located in the Mezhova district right by the border with the Donetsk region. Along the southern side of the village runs highway T-0406, connecting the two neighbouring regions, and the railway line Pokrovsk-Chaplyne. The "Donbas" stele with its slag heaps and a sun, the symbol of miners' towns — a headframe and the slogan of electoral mobilisation — are set up beside the railway at the entrance to the Donetsk region.

At passenger halt No. 15, fitted with benches and shelters, stops the suburban train Avdiivka-Chaplyne. The length of the passenger platform is 152 m, more than enough for four carriages of an electric train.

On the outskirts of the village, which you still have to walk another kilometre to reach, a welcoming signpost greets you.

 

The village is surrounded by fields of sunflower, which depletes our black soil.

 

In the village there is a clear street layout, with the streets running parallel to one another.

The central street is crossed at right angles by Sadova, Pereizna, Vyshneva, Shevchenka and Myru.

 

Agricultural machinery and equipment are kept beside the farmsteads of the grain growers.

 

The central street is asphalted; on it are all the infrastructure and the landmarks of the village. The Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin occupies the premises of a former outpatient clinic and pharmacy.

For now the medical facility shares the premises with the library, which was closed that day because the librarian was on holiday.

 

The house of culture is open to folk talents. The grass cover on the football pitch has long gone uncrumpled by players and fans.

 

The closed rural-cooperative shops with their old signs have been replaced by new stores and cheap cafe-eateries.

 

In Novopidhorodne, schoolchildren do not have to travel to the district centre for lessons; the pupils were not deprived of their own school, as in other small villages.

 

In the schoolyard, a sports ground is being fitted out before the start of the school year.

 

For the preschoolers a kindergarten with a play complex has been set up.

 

For the military memorial a park was chosen — the usual place where rallies and public festivities are held.

 

Some of the memorial slabs have been moved onto the grounds of the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin.

 

Three or four times a day a bus passes through the village, Pokrovsk-Mezhova, by which one can reach Raipole — the centre of the village council, but waiting for the bus on a scorching day would have taken a long while, and I got there by electric train in just 10 minutes, one stop away.

From halt 364 km one has to cover a distance of more than 1 kilometre to the village.

 

Those fond of cutting corners have laid a path across the mown field, shortening the way by some 200 metres.

 

At the edge of the field road to the village, some 35-40 years ago, looking at the sprawling treetops, good people planted apple and pear trees. The shade of the dense crowns shields the traveller from the rays of the scorching sun, the branches touch the traveller and offer him a taste of raika, semerenka and lymonka. A short stop, to savour the fragrant little apple with gratitude, and in a wonderful mood I head on.

 

The water tower has lost its purpose and now serves as a ground landmark. Sunflowers have crowded vegetables and melons out of the fields; this industrial crop soaks up the strength of the sun from the fertile earth and manages without watering.

 

Portraits of the graduates welcome you at the entrance to the administrative centre, which comprises the villages of Kolona-Mezhova, Krasnoznamianka, Marivka, Novooleksandrivka, Novopidhorodne and Sukhareva Balka.

 

The village is gasified, and, just as in Novopidhorodne, the streets run parallel to one another.

 

Signs at the crossroads help make sense of the new names.

 

The building of the village council was put up in 1967 for the 50th anniversary of the Great October, as attested by the inscription on the memorial plaque.

 

On Central Street, a paramedic station, the post office and the library are housed in a single building.

Across the road are the village club and a children's playground.

 

An added bell tower, new window openings and murals on the walls have completely transformed the neglected premises of the former village shop, which the Church of the Great Martyr Demetrius of Thessalonica now occupies.

 

The small shops of the former cooperative carry on their trade in the centre of the village.

 

The Raipole school was built in 1976 and now a little more than 100 pupils study there.

 

In the common grave rest 93 soldiers of the Red Army.

A memorial sign honours the fellow villagers who served as soldiers and the victims of the Stalinist regime.

 

A cross has been erected in memory of the victims of the Holodomors, which in 1932-1933 came into every home and mowed everyone down in a row.

 

The economy of the villages of the Raipole village council is based on agriculture. A former cattle farm serves as a grain store and a place for keeping farm machinery.

 

A kilometre from Raipole lies the village of Sukhareva Balka, where people come from all around to the famous oil mill to buy fragrant sunflower oil.

 

On the northern outskirts of Raipole a panorama opens of the "Sukhareva Balka" landscape reserve, created to preserve biological diversity and ecological stability in the Mezhova district.

 

The sunflower depicted on the bus stop is not turned with its blooms toward the sun, which contradicts both its property and its name.

 

Through Raipole the Mezhova-Pokrovsk bus passes several times a day.