Aid from Winnipeggers ready for Ukraine

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This article was published 10/05/2022 (916 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

From diapers and wet wipes to flip-flops and canned fish: a 12-metre freight container has been packed with goods headed to war-torn Ukraine from big-hearted Winnipeggers.

Staff at Sts. Vladimir & Olga Cathedral helped to gather the humanitarian aid, which will be shipped to Gdynia, Poland, on Friday. Once there, the Ukrainian arm of the Catholic relief federation Caritas Internationalis will take it across the border to be distributed across Ukraine.

“All those in need of everything we’ve prepared,” said Yaroslav Paches, 20, the church’s administrative assistant.

The Ukrainian Catholic church on McGregor Street had been collecting the goods in its parish hall since late February, with the help of community groups and individuals who wanted to help the victims of war in Russia.

“Our community answered. Our room upstairs was filled, everything was scattered. It (took) weeks and weeks of packing into boxes so we can ship something organized… and we’ve only finished cataloguing it,” Paches said.

“Everyone’s hurt from what’s happening in Ukraine — all of us have family… in Ukraine and we want to support them as much as we can.”

Olha Mala, the church secretary, noted it wasn’t just the church community and Ukrainians who decided to help.

“People… (who’ve) lived in Winnipeg all their life and know there’s a Ukrainian church at 115 McGregor — they were just coming and dropping off cheques and donations,” said Mala, who immigrated from Ukraine three years ago.

“They were very generous,” she said. “People from everywhere.”

Her family was affected by the war in towns near Kyiv: her mother escaped, alongside her father, aunt and two cousins, while her grandmother refused to leave Bucha, where civilians were slaughtered by Russian forces in March — she’s still there.

“It was hard to even accept someone’s words of ‘I’m so sorry’ — but later, when you understand you have to live and look forward, you realize that so many people are so helpful, so kind,” she said.

Then the church had to find a way to ship the goods to a war zone.

“The problem was there were a lot of restrictions in regard to shipments to Ukraine, so we had to look for other options. Our option really was to Poland,” said Paches.

He got in touch with a Vancouver company, Manitoulin Global Forwarding, which had already sent humanitarian aid from Western Canada and was happy to assist.

Walmart Canada, Paches noted, gave the church $15,000 to for shipping and incidental costs, while other churches, Ukrainian schools and River East Transcona School Division helped collect aid.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @erik_pindera