Ihor Tyslenko carefully lays out his fishing gear. He takes each item out of a separate compartment – hooks, floats, sinkers, and bait. The 41-year-old man pulls the compartments out of a camouflage backpack bearing the insignia “Military Intelligence of Ukraine.” This backpack has seen the scorched, occupied villages of the Kharkiv region, explosions, battles, and blood from wounds during the Ukrainian counteroffensive. But today, Ihor is not a scout, but a fisherman. The tourniquets and tactical goggles in his backpack have been replaced with artificial-colored fish lures.

Ihor has had nine concussions and tried therapy several times.

“My last psychologist nearly lost his mind,” said Ihor. “Psychotherapists can’t handle me.”

The man smiles slyly, wearing a T-shirt that reads: “I live on my God-given land.” Yet it would be wrong to say that the former scout isn’t taking care of his mental health.

“This is my therapy. I calm myself down, I bring myself back to life,” says Igor Tyslenko as he squints against the bright sun shining off the pond in Obukhiv near Kyiv.

Around him, in the quiet and calm, several dozen men, some wearing camouflage, are setting up their fishing rods and nets. Officially, a sport fishing competition for veterans called “The Circle of the Unbreakable” will start soon. But really, this is how their therapy begins.

You, nature, and the one who gets your jokes

The “Circle of the Unbreakable” fishing competition is held with help from the public organization “Fishermen’s Club of Ukraine” for veterans of the Russo-Ukrainian war all over the country. Today, Kyiv Oblast is hosting them. So, on a hot August Saturday at a pond in Obukhiv, 30 men are competing to catch the biggest fish.

The fishing is slow and not very good. There are almost no big fish, and the small crucian carp keep slipping off the hooks. Only a bright redfin splashes in the participants’ nets. So, every catch turns into a joke.

“Hey, guys, I caught a frog.”

“Well, of course, you’re a sapper.”

Men’s laughter rolls across the pond. The soldiers also call the Soviet OZM-72 anti-personnel mine, which pops up during detonation, a “frog.”

“I’m already pulling out my tenth red-tailed one. I’m on a roll today.”

“Yeah, we know you’re on a roll, you’ve got four kids.”

Another burst of laughter. The men, who have spent the last three years in the fiercest sectors of the front, feel at home here. They’re not at war, but they’re still among their own.

“The main thing that brings us together at events like this is that there are people here who understand your jokes, jokes that civilians often don’t get,” says the slim, fit 39-year-old Vadym Voropai. “Here, there are people you like being with, and at the same time, there’s nature and peace.”

He has a perfect military bearing. You notice that first, and only then, the cane he leans on.

Before the war, Vadym was the commercial director of a construction company and went deep-sea fishing with his best friend every Friday. Fishing left his life for almost three years. And the friend Vadym had fished with for 30 years, sadly, is gone forever. He was killed in Klishchiivka, a small village in Donetsk Oblast known for terrible battles. Vadym himself was badly hurt there. He got out of the battlefield with two tourniquets on his legs, crawling on his hands alone. He carried a grenade to blow himself up and avoid being captured.

“I was in places in Klishchiivka and Bakhmut where, forget about fishing – you couldn’t even go to the toilet and had to take pills to go two days without going,” said Vadym. “It took me a very long time to get back to fishing and normal life. I had a long recovery because both my legs were broken. It wasn’t until more than a year after my injury that I could just walk up to a body of water. And little by little, I started fishing again.”

Before the war, Vadym caught a 32-kilogram catfish while fishing underwater. He pulled it in with a rope, just like Santiago in “The Old Man and the Sea.” But now his life feels more like Hemingway’s war stories.

A man who, both in war and in life, is used to giving it his all, won today’s competition. But after the awards ceremony, he talks with his comrades not about fishing, but about veteran support projects.

“War has changed us forever. But there are things we can control, and one is how we heal from what we’ve been through. Many guys shut down after coming back from the front. But that silence is dangerous,” says Vadym. “In that silence, thoughts come that pull you down. That’s why it’s important to join these meetings and outings, because here you see you’re not alone. Shared talks, activities, and time pull you out of dark memories and deep sadness. That’s how you start to come back to life, step by step.”

Vadym says this and releases his biggest catch of the day into the water. A school of small, shimmering fish darts off in all directions. Not a single one sinks to the bottom.

Not just fishing

NGO “Fishermen’s Club of Ukraine,” which hosts competitions for veterans, was founded several years ago in Donetsk Oblast. It was 2018: Kramatorsk, though affected by the war, was still an active industrial city surrounded by lakes and rivers. A group of fishermen who wanted to protect wildlife and promote the “catch and release” idea came together to hold a competition. And that’s where it all began.

“The anglers didn’t come alone. They came with their families: in-laws, godparents, wives, children. And we had to entertain everyone,” says Yuliia Borysova, one of the NGO’s founders, laughing at the fond memories.

Yuliia is a community activist from Druzhkivka in in Donetsk Oblast. Cheerful and active, her life is all about volunteering and fishing. So, back then in Kramatorsk, to keep people entertained, Yuliia started finding community groups to run games, workshops, yoga classes, or art lessons during the competitions. And also, private businesses that would sell food and drinks. That’s how the competitions became festivals.

A year later, a local association for people with disabilities asked the club to hold a competition for its members. Then came Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) and Joint Forces Operation veterans, who started the “Defenders and Children” event. At that time, veterans of the war in eastern Ukraine taught fishing to children from orphanages and boarding schools. After that, the club decided to open a free sport-fishing school for children. That’s how the festivals grew into a social project.

“At the children’s festivals, we saw that mostly moms bring the kids to the activities. Dads are hardly involved at all,” said Yuliia. “Our director, Yaroslav Boiko, was deeply moved by this, and he decided we needed to create a parenting school to promote gender equality. That’s how we started TATO Hub (Dad’s Hub). We began holding events, talks, and workshops for families there. Young people and local volunteers joined in.”

So, the social project grew into a large and active community group. Over four years, the “Fishermen’s Club” became more than just a group with shared interests. By early 2022, they were monitoring the health of the region’s lakes and rivers, combating illegal fishing, supporting children’s development, encouraging youth volunteering, and organizing fun activities for veterans. And at the same time, they never forgot where they started.

“At the end of February 2022, the water bodies near Kramatorsk had just frozen over,” said Yuliia. “We were planning a winter fishing festival. We already had gifts ready and partners invited. We were supposed to start on February 24. But instead of an awards ceremony, explosions and evacuation awaited us that day.”

Saving Those Who Save

From the start of the Russian full-scale invasion to Ukraine, the NGO’s whole life, growth, and usual activities stopped. The nonprofit group switched to “emergency response” mode.

By noon on February 24, the team had arranged buses to evacuate civilians from eastern Ukraine and, within a few days, had delivered food, water, clothes, hygiene kits, and everything else needed to the frontline area. So, the group that started as a hobby became a strong volunteer groups on the front lines in the east.

“We evacuated thousands of people and delivered tons of humanitarian aid,” said the NGO founder. “We even used passenger cars from Ukrzaliznytsia to bring aid. In the first months of the full-scale war, we gave out about 15,000 tons of aid to over 600,000 people in Donetsk Oblast. We worked without stopping.”

The core team of the “Fishermen’s Club” moved to Khmelnytskyi to coordinate operations from a safe location and to receive and resettle displaced persons, many of whom had been swept across western Ukraine. But Yuliia remained in Kramatorsk until the very end. And eventually, she made the difficult decision to leave for her children’s sake.

“When the events in Bucha came to light, it was a shock to me, revealing the true hell of the Russian occupation,” said Yuliia. “I have two children, my own teenage son, 14 years old, and a 19-year-old niece in my care, the daughter of my sister who was killed. I realized I had to get them out of the front lines.”

In Kramatorsk, the NGO lost some of its equipment and documentation because of the war. But members of the organization set up several branches in Lviv, Uzhhorod, and Khmelnytskyi, as a massive wave of evacuees flowed through these cities. The entire year of 2022 passed at a frantic pace, and attempts were made to save as many people as possible.

“It felt like we were burning out,” says Ms. Borysova. “We were always chasing after people, helping them, but the values that were part of the Club’s mission were fading in the chaos of war.”

That’s when Club members learned that, under the Stiykist’ Programme of East Europe Foundation, they could send in a project proposal to help develop their organization. Since summer 2022, the Foundation had been giving grants to support civil society organizations. The Stiykist’ Programme was started to support CSOs and media during the war.

Organization took a chance: they applied and got a grant. Their project focused on moving the organization and holding events to help displaced people adjust and keep their mental health.

“We were so happy when we got the funding,” said Yuliia. “I just couldn’t believe we’d finally found a team interested not only in evacuation but also in our growth. I was excited that we could work on important projects, focus on mental health, and keep growing.”

Thanks to the funding, the “Fishermen’s Club” started new projects in Khmelnytskyi. A grant of 750,000 UAH helped them rent an office, launch youth programs, and host a series of training sessions, workshops, and excursions for displaced people.

“Working with EEF was very easy. The grant also gave us trainings. We’ve grown a lot while working with the Foundation,” says Yuliia.

She adds: “The main value of the Stiykist’ Programme was that it helped the Club see itself from the outside, recognize its strengths, remember its core values, and move forward.” So, the old saying, “Give a man a fish, and he will be full for a day. Give a man a fishing rod, and he will be full for a lifetime,” worked out for the fishermen themselves.

Back to the Roots

Today, the “Fishermen’s Club” has over a thousand members. Their offices operate in the west, east, and center of the country. And this year, the organization naturally began returning to its roots, hosting fishing competitions. But, as always, not just sports events, but ones with a social component: for veterans, displaced persons, and everyone who needs warmth, support, rest, and peace.

Ihor, a former scout, learned to fish back when he was just starting to walk. For him, fishing is a state of serenity that he felt as a child alongside his father on the shore of a pond in the Kirovohrad region. The war and his injuries robbed him of this source of peace.

“My dad is no longer with us,” says Ihor. “Many of my friends have died. It was hard for me to return to civilian life. It took half a year before I gradually started getting back into it, going fishing. Now my son runs to the pond with me. This is what calms me, what brings me back to life.”

Ihor smiles and skillfully casts his fishing rod. Now all his attention is focused on the red dot of the fishing float; thoughts of war fade away.