Mr. Sandro Boesso, 65 years old, from Borbiago, in the province of Venice, studied at the Salesian middle school in Ivrea, "where I always got along well with everyone". Because of the indelible imprint of the Salesian education he received, in the last few weeks, he has worked hard to get two electric generators to Lviv, putting his efforts at the service of "Missioni Don Bosco", the Salesian Mission Office of Turin, and through it, of the humanitarian operation for Ukraine promoted in a coordinated manner by Italian Salesian entities active in international solidarity.
He, specifically, is the person who procured the two generators that arrived at their destination at the beginning of April. It was necessary to choose them to operate the Salesian house, which currently hosts the refugees, even in case of a power failure: the building with the gymnasium and the car repair services connected to the vocational school, which has become a temporary shelter; and the other sections of the same institute, one of which is destined to training in the hotel and restaurant sector, a specialization that has proved to be very useful now that so many people need to be fed.
After obtaining the best economic conditions for the generators’ purchase and followed their shipment, Sandro Boesso prepares to leave to check that their installation has taken place properly: location, connections, fuel. He is ready to go even if only for a couple of days: "Ukrainians learn quickly; if they have to be corrected they accept the opinion of an expert," he says.
Boesso shared in the restart of the Salesian mission in Ukraine after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, and so today he is once again making himself available. And he knows the Salesian facility in Lviv well because he went 12 years ago to redo the electrical systems. "I went there on behalf of 'Missioni Don Bosco' to see to the execution of the work and at the same time to instruct the local technicians on how to respect international standards."
The Italian technician spent six months going to Ukraine every fortnight to supervise the work, gradually delegating the subsequent completion and maintenance of the plants to a group of local workers. After two years, he went on yet another trip and then others, sometimes turning them into vacations with his wife and children.
He also intervened in Vynnyky where the structure of the Salesian pavilion for Expo 2015 had arrived. The visits also became sharing the lives of the Ukrainians he met. That is why today he says: "I think they will be able to defend themselves because the spirit they have is very strong. They fight because their home, their life is threatened. They don't want to become subjects. They are a people who want to be democratically free, who want to decide and do it themselves."
Further information is available at: www.missionidonbosco.org
