Ahmed Fatami Rume, a young Bangladeshi from Sylhet who had travelled to Ukraine for study two months ago, had first thought Russia would not attack Ukraine.
So he decided to stay in the bordering Ukrainian city of Mariupol. As the invasion began early on Thursday, he had pleaded for help to get out of the country even though everything appeared normal to him.
On Friday, he and four of his peers travelled to Kyiv for safety, only to find out that Russia was battering the capital.
“A loud warning siren sounds every now and then and we rush to a bunker for shelter. Please pray for us. We don’t know what’s in store for us,” Fatami told bdnews24.com with a panic-strained voice.
He and the others seemed to be happy to be able to leave Mariupol. Fatami sent a photo of them with a smile on their faces while they were leaving the dormitory of Mariupol State University for the station to take a train to Kyiv in desperation to cross the border.
“We can’t hold on to this much panic. So we're going to Kyiv. We will try to go to a safe place from there,” said Fatami as they succeeded in securing train tickets to the capital, some 783 kilometres from Mariupol.
The Ukrainian port city of Mariupol is located in the Donetsk region. Many parts of Donetsk are under the control of pro-Russian separatists. Donetsk is one of the areas of Ukraine where the Russian military launched an invasion on Thursday.
Around 1:00 pm (Bangladesh time), Fatami said they were only an hour away from Kyiv.
After reaching the destination, for them a transit point, they were not at all ready for what they saw, and heard.
They had no clue about what to do next after getting off the train as a loud warning siren sounded and they started running with the people to take shelter in the bunker.
"We're very scared. Buses and trains are all closed. We don't know what to do.
"Please pray for us,” Fatami pleaded again.
"People are shoving each other while rushing into the bunkers. We are not in a position to talk at this moment,” he said before hanging up.
Ukrainian guards fired warning shots to prevent a stampede at Kyiv's central railway station on Friday as thousands of people tried to force their way onto evacuation trains, Reuters reported.
Crowds were so large that not everyone could get on the trains from the capital to the western city of Lviv as fears of a Russian assault on Kyiv mounted.
Some foreign students also tried to leave. One, a girl from Mongolia, told Reuters at the station that she and her fellow students had been offered the possibility of being evacuated home if they managed to reach Poland, which borders western Ukraine.
Tens of thousands have already managed to leave the country, most of them women and children as men of fighting age were told to remain.
Although Poland and Romania have opened their borders to migrants fleeing the conflict in Ukraine, it is difficult for the Bangladeshis, most of whom are students, to travel to the borders with little cash and airspace completely closed for civilian planes.
Public transport is also not available for such a long journey. Cars of Ukrainians fleeing the capital have clogged the roads leading to the borders.
The nearest Polish border is around 500 kilometres from Kyiv. With no Bangladesh mission in Ukraine, the embassy in Warsaw is supporting the Bangladeshis in the evacuation.
