Ukrainian skaters' migration to other countries

Sylvia

Sylvia

Flight #5342: I Will Remember You
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This post was published on April 6, 2020 by "an independent website dedicated to Ukrainian figure skating":

Ukrainian skaters' migration | Skate Ukraine

skating.com.ua skating.com.ua

For starters...

At 2020 U.S. Nationals:
Yaroslav Paniot - Senior Men (2018 Oympian for UKR), coached there by Vyacheslav (Slava) Zahorodnyuk (his website: https://www.slavaz.com/ )
Vadym Kolesnik, Yehor Yehorov - Junior Dance
Anastasiia Smirnova & Danil Siianytsia - Junior Pairs
Also:
Volodymyr Horovyi - Novice Dance Final (= Volodymyr Gorovyy: http://www.isuresults.com/bios/isufs00106037.htm )

At 2020 Canadian Nationals:
Mark Bardei - Senior Pairs
Nadiia Bashynska - Junior Dance
 
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This is interesting.

I know Nadiia Bashynska has said her family moved to Canada for the lifestyle, not just skating (and her partner moved from the UK to skate with her). She was supposed to get her citizenship at the end of March but it was delayed with what's going on right now.
Yeah, I moved to Canada purely because my dad just didn't want to stay in Ukraine, purely because of a lot of different things that happened to my family in Ukraine.
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But she also mentioned a bit about the Ukrainian skating federation in that interview, and it sounds like that was a part of her and Peter choosing to represent Canada.
Mainly, I think you [Peter] moved because of me, and I moved because of the lifestyle. If you look into Ukraine and the history of all the skaters, there's a lot of good skaters that moved away to different countries. It's sad, but there's not a lot of potential, like these countries like Canada, America, Germany, other countries, you have a little bit more potential, in terms of funding...
Click to expand...
 
Other international skaters born in Ukraine are Aleksei Bychenko (Israeli single skater), Devid Narizhniy (Russian ice dancer), Maksim Spodyriev (Polish ice dancer), Olga Mikutina (Austrian single skater), Denys Strekalin (French pair skater), and the Nosovitsky siblings (ice dancers for Israel).
 
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there is also an issue of coaches leaving Ukraine... for example Alysa Liu's former coach Laura Lipetskaya and her parents are from the Ukraine region of the former USSR territory. There is another coach at that Oakland rink and he is also from Ukraine...
 
Jayar said:
And she's been here for more than 25 years.
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"More than 25"? more like "more than 40"..... :D Efim and Bella Lipetskies (Laura's parents) with Laura's older brother Tolya (Anatoly) came to USA/Calif. in 1979 three and a half years after my family came to North Cal in 1975. As i said above her family came from Ukraine region in USSR.

Laura learned to skate in USA, and became a coach in USA (initially just to try). She studied at UC Berkeley, and now besides ice training, hold Marketing & Real Estate Agent professions (which is not known to me if she still practices the later or not).

But Ukraine lost a future skater and a coach by making it so difficult for families like Lipetsky and many more to live in their own land/country. I know Laura as a skater did win much, but her skates were still better than any Ukrainian ladies of her times.
www.youtube.com

Laura Lipetsky - 1995 U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Ladies' Short Program

Providence, Rhode Island, USA - 1995 United States Figure Skating Championships, Ladies' Short Program - Laura Lipetsky
www.youtube.com www.youtube.com

This was "exit of the soviet jews" times, we were all jews and all left USSR partially because of autocratic socialist system and partially because of anti-semitism.

While major cities like Moscow and Leningrad (today's St. Petersburg) had mostly administrative form of anti-semitism (limited quotas and control of opportunities in education, employment and sports), in the cities and towns of Ukraine it also came to cases of violence and verbal abuse in public and in private between neighbors, co-workers and even friends.

Even today, some skaters' families who left Ukraine and moved to Israel for example, did not do it so their kid can skate there, but in order to avoid anti-semitism.

I recall Bychenko telling his story that although he was the best male skater in Ukraine at that time, the Federation did everything to hold him back. So he switched to skate for Israel.

It is true that exits of athletes from Ukraine are mostly for "better life and opportunities or a partner or financial", but for athletes and families with jewish roots the change of country has to do with much more than the above reasons.
 
Tinami Amori said:
"More than 25"? more like "more than 40"..... :D Efim and Bella Lipetskies (Laura's parents) with Laura's older brother Tolya (Anatoly) came to USA/Calif. in 1979 three and a half years after my family came to North Cal in 1975. As i said above her family came from Ukraine region in USSR.

Laura learned to skate in USA, and became a coach in USA (initially just to try). She studied at UC Berkeley, and now besides ice training, hold Marketing & Real Estate Agent professions (which is not known to me if she still practices the later or not).

But Ukraine lost a future skater and a coach by making it so difficult for families like Lipetsky and many more to live in their own land/country. I know Laura as a skater did win much, but her skates were still better than any Ukrainian ladies of her times.
www.youtube.com

Laura Lipetsky - 1995 U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Ladies' Short Program

Providence, Rhode Island, USA - 1995 United States Figure Skating Championships, Ladies' Short Program - Laura Lipetsky
www.youtube.com www.youtube.com

This was "exit of the soviet jews" times, we were all jews and all left USSR partially because of autocratic socialist system and partially because of anti-semitism.

While major cities like Moscow and Leningrad (today's St. Petersburg) had mostly administrative form of anti-semitism (limited quotas and control of opportunities in education, employment and sports), in the cities and towns of Ukraine it also came to cases of violence and verbal abuse in public and in private between neighbors, co-workers and even friends.

Even today, some skaters' families who left Ukraine and moved to Israel for example, did not do it so their kid can skate there, but in order to avoid anti-semitism.

I recall Bychenko telling his story that although he was the best male skater in Ukraine at that time, the Federation did everything to hold him back. So he switched to skate for Israel.

It is true that exits of athletes from Ukraine are mostly for "better life and opportunities or a partner or financial", but for athletes and families with jewish roots the change of country has to do with much more than the above reasons.
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Could she please come back for a while?
 
Sylvia said:
Ukrainian-born Olympic figure skater for Austria Olga Mikutina's photos from a rally (in Vienna?): https://www.instagram.com/p/CafTykQtZsu/
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Miriam Ziegler has a couple of Instagram stories at a similar (or maybe the same?) rally (for those who can't see Instagram stories, there's video of lots of people with candles singing, waving Ukrainian flags and placing the candles into a large heart with a message saying 'yes we care' and the Ukrainian flag): https://www.instagram.com/stories/miriam_ziegler/2783135094057604816/

The Austrian figure skating fed. also posted a message sharing their condemnation for the invasion, giving their support for Ukraine and stating their intention to not send athletes to any events in Russian or Belarus: https://www.instagram.com/p/CahuNSqqHCM/
 
Roman Sadovsky 2 days ago: https://www.instagram.com/p/CadAKH-uReI/
Madness…unfortunately it’s always the innocent and least involved people that pay the price. I was always aware of the tensions, but never in a million years did I anticipate things to escalate so quickly. And among those innocent are my family and relatives in Ukraine. I won’t go into details for the sake of privacy of myself and my family, but trust me when I say I know the nightmare that millions are experiencing right now. It’s difficult to watch and do nothing, in my bio is a link where you can find resources to help those suffering the consequences of war. You’d be surprised what a dollar here and there could do for these people. Stay strong, and don’t lose hope ???? #ukraine #ukrainewar #slavaukraini
Click to expand...
Roman's IG bio has this link: https://solo.to/ukr
 
Ladida said:
Are there any news about the skaters? Were they able to leave or are they still in Kyiv?

​

Click to expand...

I'm helping to coordinate evacuation, and here are some status updates on skaters you might've seen this season:

NameLocationStatus/defailsLast contact
Ivan ShmuratkoUkraineKyiv6.03.2022
Anastasiia Shabotovanot in Ukrainesafe1.03.2022
Maksym NikitinUkraineKharkiv6.03.2022
Oleksandra NazarovaUkraineevacuating5.03.2022
Sofiia HolichenkoUkraineDnipro5.03.2022
Artem DarenskyiUkraineDnipro5.03.2022
Anastasiia ArkhypovaUkraineevacuating5.03.2022
Anastasia Gozhvanot in Ukrainesafe5.03.2022
Yelyzaveta Babenkonot in Ukrainesafe5.03.2022
Mariia Andriichuknot in Ukrainesafe5.03.2022
Taisiia Spesivtsevanot in Ukrainesafe5.03.2022
Violetta SierovaUkraineevacuating6.03.2022
Ivan KhobtaUkrainenear Kyiv5.03.2022
Mariia Holubtsovanot in Ukrainesafe6.03.2022
Kyryl BielobrovUkrainecentral regions6.03.2022
Fedir Kulishnot in Ukrainesafe6.03.2022
Kyrylo MarsakUkraineevacuating6.03.2022
Andrii KokuraUkraineLviv6.03.2022
Kyrylo LishenkoUkrainenear Kyiv6.03.2022
Hlib SmotrovUkraineevacuating6.03.2022
Kateryna Kononenkonot in Ukrainesafe6.03.2022
Anastasiia FomchenkovaUkraineKharkiv,
will be evacuating today		6.03.2022
Myroslava TkachenkoUkrainewestern region6.03.2022
Andrii Kaprannot in Ukrainesafe6.03.2022

One of the coaches from Kyiv was in Irpin, hiding from russian forces in basement with other people. We've lost contact, but the connectivity is lost with the whole city. There was an evacuation attempt today, under the fire. Tomorrow will be another attempt.
 
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