The Island remembers Ukraine

With the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Friday, Feb. 24, we asked Shelter Islander Natalie Sticesen for her thoughts. Natalie grew up in a Ukrainian community in Connecticut and speaks, reads and writes Ukrainian. She still has family living in Ukraine, and she’s been active in organizing relief and donations. She spoke with our Charity Robey about her thoughts after a year of war.

The hardest day for me was watching what was going on with the Opera House in Mariupol. All the people were hidden underneath it and written on the roof in Russian and Ukrainian was ‘Kids.’ The Russians bombed it anyway.

The biggest concern I have is for the children. It’s become the norm to hide in a bunker and be told that life goes on and they’re singing songs and nursery rhymes and they can hear bombs falling. An entire generation is being traumatized. What are the effects of that down the road?

I’ve been in frequent contact with family and friends. A lot of my family went from Eastern Ukraine to Central Ukraine to Western, but now there are attacks on Western Ukraine as well.

I helped two teenagers get their paperwork to stay in the U.S. Their mother is a doctor at the main hospital in Kiev, and she was afraid for their safety. My friend Natalya is now in Austria and working to bring in equipment for soldiers, trying to help boots on the ground. Other friends, Natalie and her husband Yevgeny, have also been instrumental in getting supplies to soldiers.

It’s sad. We are here a year later, and yes, Ukraine has support from all these countries, but they don’t have enough support. You have 90% of Russia’s army currently in Ukraine causing all this havoc against a tiny country. Thank God the U.S. is helping, but everyone is afraid of World War III.

People on Shelter Island have stopped me in town, or come to my house to ask how they could help. They want to help, even in a tiny community far away from Ukraine.