Krystina Drobysh

In the district of Minsk where I lived, people would drink beer right on the stoops and stairwells of the apartment buildings. When I was 13 years old, I already knew about alcohol and cigarettes. I could have easily ended up on a bench, drinking a bottle of vodka. I wished to be an actress and applied to drama school… At first, I didn’t get in and got angry. I ended up getting accepted in the next year. After finishing my studies, I became a full-time actress. My mom attended my performances. My dad never did.

I worked as an actress at the main theater in Belarus; the Yanka Kupala Theater. After the presidential elections, throughout Belarus, all those who protested against falsified results were brutally beaten. Our theater refused to open a new season and expressed protest against the official authorities. As a result, over 70 theater employees resigned in protest. Almost the entire acting troupe, all directors, and most of the other staff left. After leaving, the resigned actors formed their own theater, the “Independent Theatre Company Kupalautsy,” and performed underground for a whole year.

About 120 people attended our first show. Each visitor received an invitation that began with the words: “The first rule of Fight Club: you do not talk about Fight Club.” People parked their cars far away from the performance place and arrived in small groups at different times. At any moment, the door could have been broken down by the authorities, and we could have all ended up lying face-down on the floor. Nonetheless, we kept performing for a whole year. The theatrical season was in full swing, culminating in a musical project based on the poems of contemporary Belarusian authors. It was a miracle that we remained free. Then, one by one, we began to leave the country.

I left for Ukraine, a few months later, to Poland, where I played in my last premiere, in “Dziady” by Adam Mickiewicz. After that, I never returned to the stage. The theater lost all meaning for me. In Belarus, after the elections, there were thousands of political prisoners in jail. People who spoke out against the government can’t find jobs. Hundreds of thousands of people need actual help. They don’t need theater performances.

For a while, my son Hleb used to ask me, “When are we going back to Belarus? When are we going to Grandma’s?” In Poland, he started first grade. He started to really like it here and has already stopped asking that question.

I can’t say I miss my country. It’s not the same as I remember it. I only regret that I can’t go to the cemetery to visit my loved ones. My grandmother got the wrong gravestone, the one she didn’t want. Apart from that, I took everything I could with me. My son has a chance to be free and see the whole world, and I have the chance to live this life without fear that he might be taken away from me.

Krystina Drobysh arrived in Poland in 2021.