Olha and Vitaly from Ukraine Rebuild Campaign

Hi, my name is Dean Dzurilla. My wife Nicole and I need your help supporting a sweet Ukrainian family of 5 restarting their lives in the US. They are urgently relocating from Ukraine to Austin on March 29, 2022, because the war has devastated their home. Your generosity will pay for a vehicle, housing, food, clothes, and care for them and their three children--ages 11, 6 and 10 months. We don't know how long they will live in Austin but likely for a while. If so, they're going to need a lot of our help.  All funds raised will be sent directly to the family in full. I’m including our friend's harrowing story below.

Thank you in advance for your generosity and support.  You're making an amazing difference.  Together, we got this!

 

The backstory as told by our Ukrainian friend Vitaly...

 

"On February 12th we started our trip from Irpin (a small town near Kyiv) to Western Ukraine. The reason was escalating tensions and information about a possible invasion of Russia. At that moment it didn't look realistic. However, taking into account that many embassies were evacuated from Kyiv (including the USA), I've decided to treat it seriously and to be on the safe side with the possibility to cross the border to Poland quickly. On the announced invasion day of February 16ths, it didn't happen. And we were a bit tired of this trip already. That's why we've decided to go back home on February 23rd. We arrived in the evening.

 

I woke up from some strange noise at 5:30 am. The sound was similar to claps. I couldn't sleep. Then I decided to check the news. That was a regular habit last 2 months. And my heart froze. I read that multiple cities and towns were attacked by Russian rockets. The full invasion started. In 60 minutes all our things were packed back to the car and we were driving to the west.

 

At 5 pm we were near the border in the queue. At 12am the border guard told that martial law was announced and that men from 18 to 60 are not allowed to cross the border. I and my wife Olha decided to return to our friend in western Ukraine (Ternopil region) and at 5 am we were there.

 

The next day I and my friend Serhii decided to send our families to Poland because the risks were very high. The goal was to send them to a safe place while we remain in Ukraine. It was a very hard decision.

 

So on the evening of February 25th, we started our trip to the border again. The queue of cars was 7 times bigger than the day before. It was approximately 10 miles and around 7 000 - 10 000 cars. While waiting I got the information that men with 3 or more kids can cross the border. The hope of going together appeared again. We slept in the car for 6 hours and the queue was not moving much. Then we got one more positive piece of information - if the family has a kid under 12 months - they can go without a queue. So we drove almost to the border without waiting. I had in the car 2 woman and 5 kids. And closer to the evening we were in Poland. Polish customs officers were giving food and almost working like waiters. They were giving food to each Ukrainian who was arriving knowing some people stood for more than 30 hours (next days people were staying 3-4 days in the queue).

 

Now we are safe in Poland and planning our further trip to the USA. We're going to visit Austin and stay there. I'm grateful for your prayers and kindness. It's very important for us now. I'm so grateful my kids don't know what is going on in Irpin, Bucha, Gostomel, Kyiv, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Mariupol, and other towns. Also that they don't have to sleep in shelters hiding from bombs.

 

The light will win over the darkness.

 

-Vitaly"