One of the survivors of the deadly Bondi Junction Westfield stabbing attack has told how seeing her doctor’s smiling face helped her pull through.
Liya Barko was critically injured in the April 13 rampage that killed six people, and was only released from hospital one week ago.
The 35-year-old has been living on an emotional rollercoaster since that day. Alongside the horror of the attack, she also recalls the euphoria of waking up and realising she was alive.
“I just remember just so, so open smile and happy face,” she said of her doctor.
“He was so happy, I have never seen someone really so happy.”
On the morning of April 13, Barko took her first volleyball class and headed to the shops after to buy a volleyball so she could practice.
This is when she crossed paths with a killer.
“He just looked at me and he decided at that moment, and then I look at my hand, and it was bleeding,” she said.
Barko had been stabbed in the ribs, and another shopper immediately rushed to her aid, helping her into a store and closing the door behind them.
“When you are on the floor, you’re bleeding, you can see everyone’s expression and some of them were crying, they were scared … for their lives also,” she said.
The rescuer, a man wearing a green shirt, helped stem the bleeding and likely saved the 35-year-old’s life.
She was taken to intensive care where her life hung in the balance for a full 10 days, but eventually she pulled through, encouraged by the smiling doctor.
“I thought like okay, if I die right now, I’ll just destroy his shift. So I can’t die right now because he’s just so happy” Barko said.
As she recovered, and continues to do so, one question remains at the front of her mind.
“My question is how it happen, why a schizophrenic man was there outside with a knife making a normal Saturday afternoon, he just turn it into hell?”
The 35-year-old arrived in Sydney 18 months ago to study, after growing up in Ukraine and moving to Argentina.
But since the attack her studies, and her work as a cleaner, have both been put on hold.
Loved ones have started a crowdfunding page on GoFundMe to help support Barko’s recovery.
