US First Lady Jill Biden, accompanied by Romanian First Lady Carmen Iohannis, visited a school earlier this morning where they spoke to Ukrainian and Romanian teachers, spoke with Ukrainian mothers and met children.
After her visit to the Uruguay school, Biden spoke briefly with reporters before boarding a plane about the emotional impact of her visit to the school and the courage of the mothers she met.
“It was so emotional, wasn’t it? I think the Ukrainians really know we’re behind them,” Biden told reporters.
“You can see; those kids really suffered,” she added.
“In many ways, the teachers are the glue that helps these kids deal with their trauma and deal with the emotion and give them a sense of normalcy,” Biden said.
In a classroom, children told Biden that they were drawing their hands and making cutouts from copies of the Ukrainian and Romanian flags. At one point, a little girl approached the first lady who was holding her handprint of the Ukrainian flag. Biden asked her to share her message, and a translator next to the girl said she said, “I want to go back to my father.”
Biden sat down at a table to talk to a group of children who, according to their teacher, were drawing what the world would look like without war.
The first ladies also had a listening session with educators and refugees.
Anastasia Konovalvoa, a Ukrainian teacher who fled to Romania in March, was among those who shared her story.
“I crossed the border with my 3-year-old son and all I thought about was how to save my child from a city that was being bombed,” she said. “Thank God the Romanian people were here. I don’t think even the Romanians expected that they could be this great, because you don’t expect that from people.”
“We’re behind you,” Biden told her. “I hope you know that,” he added later, “I think you guys are the awesome ones, really.”
Biden also thanked Iohannis and said the Romanian people are “heroes”.
After the listening session, they went outside where the students sang the Romanian national anthem, followed by the Ukrainian military marching song.
Biden is now on his way to Slovakia.
This message also contains information from pool reports.
