In an online interview with Yuliya Alekseeva Keener on March 3, 2022 once a citizen of Kyiv, Ukraine sat in her home surrounded by symbols of her native homeland. She spoke with optimism and heartbreak while surrounded by sunflowers and the Ukraine Coat of Arms. Keener is an American citizen who emigrated ten years ago from Ukraine and married an American in 2004. She became an American citizen in 2007.
While in Ukraine she earned a degree in Elementary Education. Once she arrived in America she became an interpreter for a Christian organization. She and her husband lives in Harvest, Alabama and are the parents of two boys ages sixteen and eleven. Her parents and sister also immigrated to the United States and became citizens.
While in Ukraine her mother would often ask her about marriage and she would reply, “God will send me a husband.” Her future husband’s father was a Christian missionary to Ukraine and while there he lodged with her family and she was the interpreter. Through this connection she met his son and they corresponded via email. He also made several trips to Ukraine to visit her and eventually they married. People ask Keener if her marriage was family arranged and she would tell them no, it may look that way but it was arranged by God.
Keener has family members in Ukraine and one family of her relatives owns a car and had the opportunity to flee the country. They traveled through Moldova, Romania and Budapest to Vienna; it was exhausting going through customs from one country to the next. In Budapest and Romania they were aided by volunteers who supplied them with food, clothing, and shelter. Eventually they will travel to the Czech Republic, Germany, or Sweden to stay because they have relatives there.
When Keener was asked how she was getting funds to relatives she said it was are hard because of glitches in the internet. Keener stated that, “it took nearly a day to get funds to her relatives but was able to get them there by Western Union and Money Gram.”
The Ukrainians who live in the city are the hardest hit and in the worst conditions because their homes are being bombed. Their basements are nothing compared to American basements in the home. Many times the basements are just bare brick walls and no electricity. Food and water cannot be delivered to the city and the markets. The people who live in the rural villages are doing better because they have wells and canned food therefore they have water and food. The war had not reached their villages yet. Her father’s sister and daughter live in the eastern region where the war started but moved closer to the western border as of March 3, 2000 where the bombing had not reached their village.
“It’s hard for me. It’s like I’m living in two realities. I can’t really enjoy staying comfortable in my house where I don’t have to worry about bombs. Most of my thoughts and most of my prayers are in Ukraine.”
Keener expressed her desire for more support from the Western World. She would even be thankful for more community support from churches. She is a member of the Mt. Zion Baptist Church. She has mixed emotions and compares what Putin is doing in Ukraine to genocide.