A Belarusian who had to leave the country due to repression has opened a café in Warsaw with homemade baked goods.- At first only neighbors came, but soon Belarusians from all over Warsaw joined in, he says.
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After the 2020 elections, many Belarusians were forced to leave the country for fear of repression.Some of them found not only shelter in Poland, but also the opportunity to start their own businesses. One of them is 36-year-old Yevhen, who last autumn opened Kakao (Cocoa) café in Warsaw. There you can taste pastries and confectionery prepared by Belarusian master confectioners.

"I first graduated in Belarusian philology. For further studies I went to Poland: I defended my diploma in local government financing in Poznan and started studying tourism at Warsaw University,"- Yevhen recounts.

After graduation, the man returned to his homeland, where he and his colleagues set up a travel agency for domestic tours. Business was good, but after the 2020 presidential election, everything changed. Yevhen, like many others, outraged by the unprecedented brutality of officers of the force structures, signed an open letter to the prosecutor's office, demanding the release of political prisoners. That was enough to get the security services interested in him.

Yevhen did not hesitate and, together with his wife, decided to immediately move to Warsaw. "Temporarily" - as it seemed to him at the time, because the Belarusian hoped that the situation in the country would quickly stabilize.

Initially he got involved in helping Belarusian refugees. But when it became clear that it would not be possible for him to return to the country for a long time, he started thinking about starting his own business.

- The idea of opening a café had been following me for a long time. My wife and sister, who also moved to Warsaw, bake very well. I remember that even the neighbors used to come to visit us to try their cakes and yeast cakes So why not try to sell Belarusian baked goods in Poland? - he recalled.

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Yevhen discussed the idea with his wife. The couple, having analyzed the situation, decided to take a risk. Yevhen began looking for premises in the neighborhood where he lives. "I rode my bike around the neighborhood. I found the most suitable premise on Grochowska Street: 25 square meters after renovation. I sat down on a bench and started watching the traffic in the area. It wasn't bad,"- he recounts.

Family business

Yevhen's father came to Poland especially to help him in arranging the premises. The work took four months. It took about 50 thousand PLN to open the cafe, 40 thousand of which were savings. For the missing money, Yevhen took a loan from the bank.

"I was offered a loan for five years just on the day I opened an account for the cafe. I was surprised. I didn't think that a person with no Polish citizenship and no credit history could count on a loan. I was told that I would have to wait a week for the application to be approved, because I come from a so-called "high-risk" country, but I got the confirmation the next day," he recalls.

Yevhen is selling not only pastries, but also coffee. He learned this at barista courses. His wife and sister bake cakes and rolls.

Polish inquisitiveness

Initially, Kakao was visited mainly by neighbors, but later Belarusians from various Warsaw neighborhoods joined them.

The café offers a variety of cakes. The most popular are carrot cake with cinnamon, pear cake with hazelnuts and poppyseed cake with lemon juice, chocolate chunks and orange juice.

Since opening the business, Yevhen has realized that you have to know everything about the product you are selling: both coffee and baked goods.

He says Poles are willing to pay for the product, but they want to know what they are being offered.They ask what kind of cumin is in the bread, how much sugar is in the cake. In Belarus, Yevhen has never encountered similar inquisitiveness.

"I'm learning all the secrets.I think the Poles are setting a good example of how a person should take care of his diet and health," - he says. Demand for Kakao products is growing.The pastries are no longer baked in his home kitchen, but in a rented professional kitchen.

"About 30 people a day come to us. The average bill is 40 zloty," - he explains and adds that, so far, he is using all the profit to live and develop the cafe."I don't have any extra money" - he says.

Yevhen has many plans: to build and decorate a terrace so that guests can enjoy sweets outdoors in the summer, to buy better equipment, to open bakeries and cafes in other districts of the city as well.

But his biggest dream is to see a democratic Belarus and to return to his homeland.

However, he would not abandon the business developing in Poland. He wants to live and work in both countries, which are close to his heart.

***

This article was created as part of 'Re:framing Migrants in the European Media'. This international project, funded by the European Commission, was set up to develop mechanisms to ensure adequate representation of migrants and refugees in the media across Europe. The aim of the project is to help mainstream media create an inclusive and safe space of self-representation for migrants and refugees.

The project consists of a number of publications and events in different European cities. It is coordinated by the European Cultural Foundation (Netherlands). In addition to Gazeta Wyborcza, other participants include the Eticas Foundation (Spain), Here to Support (Netherlands), ZEMOS98 (Spain) and CoCulture (Germany).

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