The 1,000 kilometers and 50 hours of the Spanish Amilcar to leave Ukraine: "The tanks and the troops passed by our side"

• Direct War between Ukraine and Russia

• War Yuriy Vernydub, from winning a soldier for Ukraine at the Bernabéu: "He went looking for his family and joined the defense of the city"

When the Russian bombs began to fall on

, the professions, interests or short-term plans that its citizens had there ceased to matter.

Suddenly, there were only two options: stay and fight or try to escape.

Among the million people who have crossed the borders to

these days there are also Spaniards like

, a

-old footballer born in

but living with his family in

.

His story is the story of thousands, the palpable representation that war makes no distinctions.

Tuesday

should have been a day of celebration for Amilcar.

and was going to enjoy the moment with his teammates from the

residence , a team from the

.

But the city, 340 kilometers south of Kiev, 160 west of Kharkov and 170 north of Dnipro, was already the eye of the hurricane in the war triangle.

"When Russia began to attack Ukraine,

and I panicked," he tells EL MUNDO from

, where he has arrived after a hellish trip from Poltava.

"We went with the 3-year-old son of a colleague"

"I was sharing a room with a roommate and I thought

: 'What is all this?' My phone started ringing, I had a lot of missed calls from my parents and they started telling us that Russia had invaded the country

how to get out of there."

But getting out of Ukraine has become an almost impossible mission for many over the past seven days.

"

. We had a meeting at the team stadium, but everything was going very slowly, so some teammates and I decided to leave for fear that the bombing would increase. A friend's representative

, but on the way we heard that the border was collapsed, that it would take more than 24 hours, so we turned around towards the Hungarian one.

We were traveling with a colleague's 3-year-old son, so we couldn't waste any time."

Between Poltava and the border with Hungary there are just over

.

An odyssey in the midst of war.

"It was further away, but in theory it took less time. The problem is that at gas stations

, with endless queues, and we had to stop every three hours. In addition, we had a

and we were several hours stopped, with

, with the buildings burning, the smoke that could be seen everywhere and very cold", Amilcar recounts.

"

and after exchanging the car for a van driven by a Ukrainian, we arrived close to the border.

As he was not going to pass, he left us and we tried to cross on foot, but

.

And the cars in line

to get on, there was no humanity, they saw that we were with a small child and they did not empathize.

There were people making a business out of all that."

his father's war

The intervention of the Croatian embassy was key for Amilcar and his companions to set foot on Hungarian soil.

"We have been very lucky, because if it hadn't been for that we would have stayed at the border."

A friend's father was waiting for them on the other side, and he took them to the airport.

Mission accomplished.

Now he is already planning his return to Spain, where his parents are waiting for him and where football will be in the background for a few weeks.

"

. I was playing for English team

before, until my agent suggested the Ukraine thing. I had an injury and couldn't play, but I scored my first goal with the first team on December 11, just in the last game that was played," he recalls.

Some of his team will end up in the army: "I have 18-year-old friends who

, their house is burned by the bombing, they cannot leave the country and they are forced to".

The one in Ukraine is not the only war that Amilcar's family has experienced, whose father,

, fled the civil war in Guinea-Bissau.

"

, that's for sure. I'll look for a team in Spain or Portugal, I want to be close."

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Know more

• Ukraine

• Hungary

• Russia

• War Ukraine Russia

FootballYuriy Vernydub, from winning a soldier for Ukraine at the Bernabéu: "He went to look for his family and joined the defense of the city"

Ukraine-Russia warEurope will respond with the biggest sanctions in its history

War in UkraineThe Spanish-loving social activist: "I am with my weapon in my hand defending Kiev from the Russian invasion and I will go to the end"

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