Ukrainian refugees find familiar hospitality in Golden Triangle
In the span of 10 months, Krystyna and Maksym Samoilenko and their two sons, Mikhail and Denys, have been through a lifetime’s worth of heartache and loss.
It all started in the early morning hours on Feb. 24 roughly seven and a half miles outside of Kiev, Ukraine. The couple awoke to their house shaking as if they were experiencing an earthquake.
It wasn’t an earthquake, but the world they knew was shattering around them.
“We were always thinking our home was very safe because it was near a military station, so there were cameras and good roads everywhere and had internet and electricity at all times,” Krystyna said, as she sat Tuesday in a plush red chair in the children’s room at the Starkville-Oktibbeha Public Library, far away from the horrors playing out in her home country. “But it was a bad place to live because we were the first to know the war had started. … We heard bombings and saw a big light. Our house was moving, and we were very scared.”
The four Samoilenkos arrived in Starkville at the end of October and are living with Joeann and Stephen Foster, and their 11 children, on the Fosters’ family farm.
In two short months, Krystyna said Starkville already feels like home. Some of her cousins from Ukraine joined them in the Golden Triangle Saturday, though they are looking for their own living space.
Krystyna said the people in Mississippi remind her of people from Ukraine with their hospitality and willingness to help those in need.
“They all hug me, and they feel like my family,” Krystyna said. “I feel at home here. People in Mississippi are so great. … In Ukraine when we see some people who need help, we always go and ask how we can help.”
Getting out of Ukraine
For a month after the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine War, the Samoilenkos stayed underground in a church in the Ukrainian mountains. Krystyna said it was cold, and they had to sleep with their winter gear on.
After bouncing between Poland and Germany searching for safe haven, Krystyna and her two sons went to Belgium, while Maksym stayed behind in Ukraine to volunteer at the church helping others fleeing their homes.
She was seven months pregnant when she was in a car accident that fractured her whole right side. Following the accident, she was in and out of the hospital and saw various doctors battling a language barrier and illness.
In broken translation, one doctor in Belgium, who only spoke French, told Krystyna that her daughter no longer had a heartbeat. Eventually doctors had to induce labor to deliver her stillborn infant. With a broken right arm, Krystyna held her small daughter and had trouble believing she wasn’t alive.
“I called my Ukrainian doctors who were very far away to ask them what to do because I didn’t trust the doctors in Belgium, and they told me I needed to birth my daughter naturally like I did my sons,” Krystyna said. “We found someone who would do it naturally, and she was so beautiful. She was smiling, and she had everything — nails, eyes and her little hair. I couldn’t believe she wasn’t alive because they gave her to me in her clothes, and they gave her to me like they did with my boys. In Ukraine, if your child died, they’d firstly ask you if you wanted to see them. This time they just showed me her like, ‘Look at your beautiful little girl.’ They put her in my hands, so at first I didn’t understand.”
Shortly after delivering, Krystyna was back in the hospital with sepsis, and members of the Ukrainian church in Belgium where she found refuge helped her and her sons with basic needs. Eventually she petitioned to get Maksym to Belgium from Ukraine.
One of the ladies at church told Krystyna the United States was allowing Ukrainian refugees if they had a sponsor family, and she should go to Facebook to tell her story to try to get an American sponsor. At first Krystyna was apprehensive, and the first person to reach out to her was trying to scam her for money.
“The lady from church told me she read about the Uniting for Ukraine program the U.S. government started, and it would be great because we all know English,” Krystyna said. “She told me, ‘God will help you. Just write on Facebook and find some Ukrainian group and try.’ Of course I believe in God, but I don’t believe in Facebook.”
Still, another contact through Facebook put Krystyna in contact with the Fosters. After a video call with the family, she was comfortable bringing hers to Starkville. They touched down in Birmingham in October and have since lived in the Fosters’ mother-in-law suite with a living room, bathroom, one bedroom and a curtain dividing the boys’ twin beds.
The U.S. government is allowing Ukrainian refugees to stay for two years, which also includes allowing them to work, through the program Uniting for Ukraine. Maksym, who described himself as 60-percent fluent in English, was a dental technician in Ukraine and is looking for similar positions in the U.S.
Last week, Maksym traveled with Stephen Foster to Louisiana to pick up a Mini Cooper, the same type of car the family had in Ukraine, and they worked to get it running again. The Samoilenkos are looking for a place to rent once they have a solid income.
Their two sons, Mikhail and Denys, are being homeschooled and Joeann is helping them become fluent in English because she has a background in teaching English as a second language.
The Samoilenkos’ cousins will soon join the family in Starkville. Krystyna said right now winter weather is beginning in Ukraine, and those still living in the country are only left with one hour of power a day so it is unbelievably cold.
In just 10 months, the Samoilenkos lost the life they built in their home country and had to flee. They’ve lost their home, their car, family and friends, but thanks to the Fosters and the kindness of others, they’ve been able to find safe haven in Starkville.
The Fosters
Joeann and Stephen Foster heard about the opportunity to help Ukrainian refugees from a friend from church, Rodney Mast, who also is sponsoring a family. He put together YouTube videos and documents that helped people understand how to help like he did.
The information included how to fill out the paperwork with the U.S. government and how to get plane tickets for the refugees.
“He has a whole Google Drive that has ‘what documents you need, this how you get it, and here are samples of the letters I’ve written,’” Joeann said. “You’ll have a lot of questions as you go through the process. It’s not hard to get everything together. It just takes time. We expressed interest in helping in August, and the Samoilenkos arrived in October.”
Since picking the Samoilenkos up from the airport, the Fosters have integrated them easily into their family. They’ve worked to package up boxes for Operation Christmas Child and taken family photos together. They also enjoyed a Thanksgiving together with a Russian family friend.
Ukrainian refugees find familiar hospitality in Golden Triangle
