The soldier sits in the makeup room, facing the mirror dotted with light bulbs. An assistant warns: “If an air siren sounds but there is no missile, we film the show. Otherwise, we'll go to the air raid shelter. »
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Alexandr Liashuk nods politely while a makeup artist powders his nose. In a few hours, this 27-year-old Ukrainian soldier, member of the 122e territorial defense brigade, will enter the set of the Ukrainian version of the show “Who wants to be a millionaire?” », filming in kyiv this September.
In the event of victory, he promised to return half of the winnings to his family and the other half to his brigade, to repair and buy military equipment. The young man did not come alone. Her cat, Shaïba, is patient in the neighboring lodge, in miniature camouflage clothing, looking impassive, with a Ukrainian crest around her neck. “I consider him my teammate, explains Alexandr Liashuk. So why shouldn't he have a uniform too? » There is no irony in his words, the soldier is perfectly sincere, as is the affection he feels for his four-legged animal, pampered like a child.
“Take him in my arms”
Shaïba was still a kitten when Alexandr Liashuk discovered him, in October 2022, abandoned in a box, near his military position, in the Odessa region. “We couldn’t leave him, winter was approaching,” says the soldier, in uniform, the word freedom tattooed on the back of his neck. Since then, he has never separated from his feline, except when his missions, in Donetsk or Pokrovsk, in the Donbass, are too dangerous. “When I come back to our position, the first thing I do is hug him. Shaïba is so cute that it’s enough to cheer me up. It’s a secret weapon sent to us by NATO”he jokes.
The duo became famous in December 2022, when Alexandr Liashuk decided to make a « checkpoint miniature », in the trenches. The video, posted on TikTok, garners more than 2.6 million likes. In the process, several people contact the soldier to offer their financial help – since the Russian invasion in February 2022, online prize pools have been a common practice to support the army.
The idea hits home: what if the popularity of the cat could help the brigade buy the weapons and equipment it lacks? The soldier launches a fundraiser of which Shaïba is the star, and collects 700 dollars (660 euros). Stamps with his paw print are being sold in seventeen countries, from Japan to Chile via the United States.
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