Ukrainian families find support in Cheer Board

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This article was published 30/11/2022 (756 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Christmas won’t be the same for Luidmyla Holovina and her two sons, Valentyn and Ivan, who fled their war-torn city of Dnipro, Ukraine, eight months ago.

“It’s really it’s tough,” Holovina said, through a translator. “The Christmas holiday is the season you’re always wanting to be next to your family and you’re close close friends.”

Now in Winnipeg, Holovina said it’s painful to celebrate the holiday, knowing people are still suffering back home. Her husband, Oleksandr Holovin, 44, stayed in Ukraine after joining its national guard.

In September, he was wounded by shrapnel during a missile strike but recovered after surgery.

This is the first Christmas the family will be separated. “We’ve never gone more than two weeks (without) seeing each other,” Holovina said.

She wants to make Christmas as normal as possible for her 17- and 11-year-old sons — but it’s hard to prepare a holiday feast in a new country, working minimum wage, Holovina said.

She relies on community support.

To help meet the demand, Ukrainian Canadian Congress (Manitoba) has partnered with the Christmas Cheer Board to provide hampers to upwards of 2,600 displaced Ukrainian families.

Congress liaison Mariana Sklepowich says Holovina was the first applicant via the partnership’s special application process: an online form that newcomers can run through Google Translate.

Sklepowich says the online form reduces barriers for Ukrainian refugees who speak little to no English, because they would otherwise need to call in the request — an English service.

“Unless a social agency is helping, accessing these hampers would be challenging, if not impossible,” Sklepowich said Wednesday.

There were more than 115 such applications on the first day (Nov. 29).

Holovina said receiving a hamper will help immensely: “Any food is going to make it so we can actually celebrate.”

Cheer Board executive director Shawna Bell said the organization has increased the budget by eight per cent — just shy of $1 million — to help supplement rising food costs and increased demand this year.

Holiday hampers are usually built around one meal, Bell said, but it’s important to build packages, including toys for children, that will spread further for families that have fled war.

“We want things that really are going to help folks to be able to extend the food in the pantry and in their bellies.”

Staples pantry items include flour, pasta, rice and sauces.

“Imagine starting from scratch,” Sklepowich said. “They come with sort of the bare minimum because there’s not always an opportunity to bring a lot of things with you when you’re fleeing.”

Around 9,000 Ukrainians have come to Manitoba under the Canada-Ukraine emergency travel authorization, Sklepowich said, many arriving almost empty-handed.

The Cheer Board and war share a long history. In 1919, the Winnipeg charity “grew out of the needs of families affected by the First World War,” Bell said.

Its mission remains the same, as do some of the challenges.

“A big challenge is finding the food to complete these hampers,” Bell said. “We may have to look at providing gift cards.”

Manitobans seeking to help can sponsor a Ukrainian family through the Cheer Board’s Feed-A-Family program, accessible online.

Bell said there is a great need for donations. “We came just shy of 17,000 (total hampers) last year… I’m very, very optimistic we’re going to run around the 19,000 number (in 2022).”

Hamper deliveries begin Dec. 7 and run until Dec. 23.

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca