Went to visit family in Ukraine, was told to delete my TikTok account.

I live in Belgium and went to Ukraine last week to visit my family. <br><br>I’d been 12 years old the last time I’d been in Ukraine, and I remember it being underdeveloped, so I imagined everything would be improved by now. Upon arrival in Kyiv though, the roads were cratered all over the place, and the houses were something else. <br><br>So I went to visit my granny and my cousin. I like renovating, so I was eager to help them out with the house. I saw that they were repurposing old plastic bottles for water, and asked why, and they said that the plastic bottles were safer to drink than tap water. I imagined it would be an old house that had been built poorly, and asked the same about the next house, and the one after that too. They all confirmed that their tap water was not safe to drink. I brought up that it sounded like the entire town had been built poorly, and they laughed and said it’s true. <br><br>Then I took out my phone to take a selfie with my uncle, and he said wait, delete your TikTok app before you take that picture. I asked why, and they said because their experience in Ukraine has been that Russia controls TikTok and they use it to track Ukrainian users and launch airstrikes at them. I asked them if it was just Ukraine, and they said no, that they’ve heard that it’s also going on in the rest of Europe. I tried asking around about it and people said it’s going on worldwide and that’s why the US is considering banning TikTok. <br><br>I also saw the general attitude between Ukrainian, Russian and European people. Russians were very aggressive at Ukrainians, and often very aggressive at Europeans too. Ukrainians seemed to be on edge and stressed out, and Europeans seemed to be like “oh it’s bad but it’ll be fine”. <br><br>I have to be honest, I’m like 30% Ukrainian, and I never felt like Ukraine was part of my identity until I got there, and now I’m just genuinely worried about it and it’s bothering me. I don’t know how to explain it, it’s like the country is just…, mildly put, failing miserably. It feels like it’s in a terrible state. <br><br>Sorry if this belongs elsewhere, but I just don’t really know how to voice my concerns without being accused of being Russian.