BERKELEY (KPIX) – The Fourth of July holiday pulls at the hopes and struggles of Ukainians. A Fulbright scholar checking out from Ukraine with her spouse and children prepared to return residence this thirty day period right after celebrating Independence Working day in the U.S., but now ideas to continue to be a further yr, grateful for a protected location to reside when her dwelling place continues to be at war.
“These four in addition months have genuinely been devastating for me and my loved ones, it’s so challenging,” reported Nataliia Goshylyk, a viewing professor at Berkeley as a result of the Fulbright Scholar system. “It can be all above Ukraine and so quite a few persons are suffering, your close friends and your kin, they are all struggling.”
Goshylyk has been learning how sustainability is reviewed on social media and loved residing in the Bay Space to focus in on this subject matter for the previous year. She life with her husband and two small children, who were established to return to Ukraine this 7 days soon after visiting Washington, D.C. to see Independence Working day celebrations. These options were produced just before the war started. Now, the loved ones will now continue being in California since Goshylyk acquired a new educating chance at Berkeley for another 12 months.
“That could possibly have been a coincidence you may well say but at the exact time I know that I have been functioning challenging to get right here on Fulbright,” she explained to KPIX 5. “I’m however processing that I guess. I’m still attempting to fully grasp wherever am I, and why is this taking place.”
Making use of her time in the U.S. to embrace the country’s society and find out from these all-around her, Goshylyk has also stayed energetic in the Ukranian group. Her relatives has attended rallies versus the Russian invasion of her household region. Outside of her operate at the university, she has also spoken on panels to support educate Individuals about Ukraine and its tradition.
“The 21st century is not the century in which everyone can sit again and rest,” Goshylyk mentioned. “We have to be united and we have to have an understanding of our typical ground.”
She appreciates the desire between People to learn about Ukraine. She hopes the current conflict in her household and the troubles toward democracy domestically force everybody to feel critically about how to retain flexibility and not to take it for granted.
“What the words ‘the land of the free’ and ‘the property of the brave,’ what do they mean to you specially,” she requested. “Which is not the time to sit back and relax and we have to function, we have to just take action.”
