My Ukrainian Family

Most people that know me don’t know that I am Ukrainian. Like Ukraine’s history, my Ukrainian family's story is long and complicated. To keep it short, I will start with World War II.

My grandparents were captured by the Nazis and brought to one of the thousands of forced labor camps in Germany. They survived the war but became DOP (displaced occupied persons), unable to return to Ukraine and unwanted by all. They waited five years in the camps to be sponsored by other Ukrainians they met and who had preceded them to America. They settled in Chicago with two small children, my Aunt Daria and my mom Irene.

But back in Ukraine, my Grandfather left behind two children born before the war, Maria and Ilya. My mother stayed in contact with them until my grandfather died in 1971. Then for many reasons, they lost touch through the years. My mother, in her 60’s, started to try to trace back her family tree. About five years ago, she found her sister in their family village, and her brother had already passed. We had made plans to visit Ukraine in 2020. Then covid hit, and we made plans to visit again this year.

It was going to be a homecoming of sorts. My mother has never set foot in her own country and has never met her relatives in person. We were excited, we talked to all our cousins by zoom in and out of Ukraine, and this year was the year. Last year we even went to Venice to find my 1st cousin, that settled there 15 years ago after the fall of communism.

That brings us to the present. Now all of our cousins are…. well no need to explain you have seen the news and photos and so on. If they can make it to the border, we are trying to get them out, at least the children and the women.

My first cousin Volodymir, his wife and one of his daughters Natalia with her kids, Yuri 9 and Elizabeta 5, have made it out. In the freezing cold from Lviv to Poland, they crossed the border in two days, a 79 km drive roughly 1:30 minutes in normal circumstances. Then they started the drive down to Salerno, Italy, where I live. The five of them slept in the car for two nights, not speaking the language of any of the four countries they had to pass through to get to me. We had little contact with them since their cell phones don't work outside Ukraine. But they reached us at the end of the 5th day, exhausted but relieved.

We still have four cousins and their families in Ukraine, along with my mother’s sister Maria, now 87. She is in the countryside with her nephew and is not healthy enough to make the trip in these conditions. We are hoping to go back and get her when the weather and border are better.

As we get more and more of the family out, we need help. Volodymir and his family are staying with us, but if the war goes on, we will need to find them their own place. They also couldn’t bring much with them, so they will need the essential things of life. My family is pitching in, but we need to reach out for help at this point. The big problem is that they need time to learn the language before getting jobs. Volodymir is a construction engineer, and his wife Tatiana is a plaster restorer. Natalia is in tourism. She started a company in Ukraine, but now it is closed. We are also hoping for government assistance, but that may not come for months.

Taking this into account, we are collecting for day to day expenses such as

Food

Clothing (they could bring only winter clothes)

Housing

Personal items

Transportation costs

School supplies

Language tutors for the kids so they go to school

I want to thank everyone in advance for your generosity. I am fortunate that in the horrible situation my mother was born into in 1947, she was able to get passage to the United States as a little girl of 3 years old. When we met my cousins in Venice last year, they told me they had a nickname for my Mom growing up. Looking at her pictures and reading her letters, they called her “An Angel Princess” and they fantasized about how extraordinary her life was in America.

After the fall of communism, the west of Ukraine and especially Lviv, where my family is, is a beautiful modern city. Booming with opportunities and a high quality of life. They are looking forward to returning and rebuilding their lives as soon as possible. And my mother hopes to set foot at least once in her country and finally meet her family.