Brothers,
To get a message to Dennis, especially messages of encouragement and prayer, please send it to baurg@verizon.net. They will be pasted together and sent to Dennis, where he will have the option to reply all instead of answering 15 separate emails. The manly, hairy chested men of Mighty 33rd Company, (who hiked up to scenic 8-4 for four years in a row), appreciate the great support to our selfless Brother Dennis.
On Apr 3, 2022, at 15:09, Dennis Otoshi wrote the below:
- “Classmates, Brothers-in-Arms, my friends,
Thank you for your thoughts and prayers. I appreciate all the offers of direct help and assistance for both myself and the Ukrainian people. The biggest problem with logistics is getting the supplies and foodstuffs into the country. You can’t get here from there. Massive amounts of supplies are awaiting transshipment from bordering countries. Many charities are now only accepting cash, because the cost of shipment has become prohibitive. The areas of most need are in the east. You have probably heard and seen the carnage in Mariupol. Odesa is next in the crosshairs.
Every time a humanitarian convoy is agreed upon, the Russians break their word and start sending mortar rounds our way.
If you wish to donate any money, may I recommend that you donate to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and Nova Ukraine. The last charity is an organization that I am a member of. Donating directly to the Ukrainian Red Cross is possible, but the Russians keep hacking the site and have been trying to redirect funds. Sean Donovan asked if it is possible for anyone to volunteer personally. The process through the Ukrainian government is slow and arduous as most bureaucracies go. They have been overwhelmed and many medical professionals I know who volunteered are still in limbo. I have been an American Red Cross volunteer for eleven years now and I used that affiliation to gain acceptance into the Ukrainian Red Cross, thus bypassing the Ministry of Health.
We in Kyiv are now breathing a temporary sigh of relief as the Russians have temporarily withdrawn from their efforts to take the capital. According to intel the enemy forces are being redeployed to the east in the areas in Donbas, Donetsk, and Luhansk. Putin needs to take Mariupol before the May 9th Victory Day celebration in Moscow so that he can say he has a victory. Meanwhile, he has left death and destruction in the areas that his troops have withdrawn from. I will be traveling to Irpin in the next few days and will take photos to share with you. We are awaiting clearance from the Ukrainian Army engineers, as the Russians have laid mines and have booby trapped buildings and bodies.
The Ukrainians are brave and resourceful people. Morale is super high. Keep them in your prayers, but also say a prayer for all those in Russia and Belarus who have dared protest against their autocratic regimes. Many have disappeared and we may never know what happened to them. I have not heard from my friend in Minsk for a few weeks now. Last thing she told me was that she was going to an anti-war rally.
I will survive this and I promise to bear witness before God to all these crimes against humanity.
Respectfully,
your classmate Dennis”