Snizhanna Otych on fleeing Ukraine, food from the home country, and enduring the pain of Russia’s war

Lunch with Roderick Benns

It’s Feb. 24, 2022, at about 4:30 a.m., when you hear the first bombs fall.

You had already made a pact with your partner, knowing this might happen. If Putin’s war arrives on your doorstep in Ukraine, you are both willing to drop everything and flee.

Forget the fact that you had just bought a house in Sumy, in eastern Ukraine, a river city with industries, universities, and 18th‑century churches.

Forget that family and friends are nearby, the kind of support system that just makes life easier.

Forget that your careers once mattered or that you love your country.

Instead, just remember.

Remember to do whatever is needed to save your four-year-old daughter from the terror and madness of war.

New Days

Snizhanna Otych, 29, and I are at The Pie Eyed Monk in Lindsay, reliving the shock of war and the hopeful promise of something new in Kawartha Lakes.

“We took about 30 minutes to get ready,” when those first bombs fell, she says, taking me back four years ago. “It was our plan that if war would start, we don’t need to be thinking about anything. We just need to go, because our first need is the safety of our child.”

While she was a leading agronomist at the Ukrainian Institute for Plant Variety Examination, her husband, Oleksandr, was a police officer for 13 years in Ukraine. But he had also been thrust into the role of soldier in the past, given Russia’s invasion had already started with its illegal occupation of the eastern Donbas region in 2014. He was sent there to fight that same year, getting an early look at the ugly war the Russian leader foisted upon Ukraine.

They thought about moving to the other side of the city, or even the other side of the country. But ultimately, they were worried Russian forces would one day encircle everything.

With Otych driving and her husband navigating, they headed for Poland like the hundreds in front of them and the hundreds behind.

“We could hear the bombs going off in different places as we drove. So it’s not safe. And everyone is just trying to live, thinking about their own safety. It was every man for himself, every woman for herself.”

Otych reflected on the older relatives they were leaving behind. Older generations, closer to 70, “they don’t want to change any part of their lives. What can they do if you cannot work physically in another country? Yes, you would not survive. My great grandma said ‘it doesn’t matter where I will die, here or there, it doesn’t change anything for me.’”

In Lviv, in western Ukraine, not far from the Polish border, Oleksandr helped her and their daughter, Ivona, get on a train bound for Poland. There were no seats available, so she stood, sometimes holding her, for more than 18 hours. Oleksandr headed back to eastern Ukraine to continue the fight against Russian aggression.

“We were parked too tight all together, I don’t know how many people were on this one train.”

It was an experience she will never forget, she said, mainly because of the profound sense of feeling like she did not belong.

“When you go to another country, you start from zero. Like everything you left behind, it doesn’t matter, right? You are no one in a new place. You don’t know the language, you don’t know the mentality, you don’t know the traditions.”

She draws a distinction between fleeing to a strange country and choosing to immigrate somewhere. The latter choice means one has time for research and to get personal documents in order.

But arriving in Poland “was just so fast, and here you just don’t know…you don’t know anything.”

While she came to love Poland – “a very nice, beautiful country, good people” – the Polish people were afraid, too. “In that moment, they were worried that war could be started there, too.”

For Otych and her family, Poland was not far enough away from war.

When a friend sent her a message and asked if Otych wanted to go to Canada, she didn’t know anything about this nation, other than that it was friendly, mostly English and was the second biggest country in the world.

But excluding the Arctic closeness, it was far away from Russia.

After spending a half year in Poland, Otych and Ivona arrived in Lindsay in December of 2022, thanks to the sponsorship of Fairview Baptist Church and St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. A local couple, Christine and Ron Gilson gave Otych and her daughter a place to stay in their home for about four months. After that, she was able to get her own apartment with the churches continuing to support them by helping with rent, at first.

“I would like to say thank you to them for this opportunity,” said Otych. We are deeply grateful for all the support we received.

Otych knew virtually no English when she arrived. Her husband would not be able to join them in Lindsay until exactly two years later, in December of 2024.

“He remained a soldier until he was able to reunite with us in Canada,” she explains.

Given her agronomist background, Otych worked at Hills Florist for her first job in Lindsay.

“It was amazing that they gave me the chance,” she says.

But she has found the job market in Kawartha Lakes often means knowing people well and speaking English as fluently as possible.

As for their path to staying here, Otych said there is no guaranteed future for them in Canada. They are not refugees, having arrived under a special program that grants them documents quickly but this does not offer a permanent residency path. To stay longer, she will need to find a suitable job, gain enough experience, and then apply for residency.

Just recently, Otych successfully applied for a non-certified secondary occasional teacher position with the Trillium Lakelands District School Board. And her husband now has a full-time job as a carpenter.

“We’re like many international students, in a similar situation — not refugees, but also without long-term security.”

Ivona, who will turn nine next month, is doing well in school. Fluent in Ukrainian and English, her parents have also enrolled her in French Immersion, too. She also understands Russian, “but we are not speaking in Russian.”

“It doesn’t make sense to use that language now. Sometimes when people ask if we speak the Russian language, I say sorry, I can speak Ukrainian or English. I can’t understand you. Not all Ukrainians think this way, but it’s our position,” she said.

Otych says they feel that their daughter “should know the one reason why we are here.”

“Russia. It’s not that Canada isn’t a great country. But I want her to know why we left Ukraine.”

Since her husband had to stay in Ukraine for so long, as a solider, they felt it important to communicate honestly with her. “She knows everything, even about weapons and drones. We can talk with her clearly and don’t hide anything.”

“Believe me,” says Otych, “the children who are staying in Ukraine…they know stuff that should not be known.”

It’s an easy segue here to talk about the destabilization of the world in many countries. I ask if it’s disappointing to listen to U.S. President Donald Trump, considering they came to North America to escape conflict.

“He’s so stupid,” says Otych, becoming more animated. “He’s a stupid old man. For me, there is nothing different between Putin and him.”

The Ukrainian immigrant says she doesn’t understand why people here would follow Donald Trump and right-wing politics in the U.S. “I don’t get it. Like how can you trust him, or believe in what a dictator is saying?”

She worries about her home country being able to resist the illegal Russian invasion, especially when the U.S. is creating so much instability through the words coming out of the mouth of its leader. She wonders if Ukraine’s stand will be forgotten with all the other geopolitical distractions.

Otych believes the lack of military equipment will eventually catch up to Ukraine, despite European and Canadian help. “It’s just not enough, because (our country) looks like it’s fighting the Second World War.”

Drone warfare has changed everything, with Russian drones able to bomb Ukraine every day, hundreds of thousands of times since conflict began, she says. While Ukraine has some drones, too, Russia has more, and they are more sophisticated.

Otych’s parents relocated to western Ukraine for safety. They are a foster family and help care for children who, for different reasons, cannot live with their biological parents.

“My mother has also adopted several children who no longer have parents. She is a math teacher and continues teaching online because some schools remain closed in areas where it is not safe enough for students to attend in person.”

But her in-laws still live in a small rural village (Severynivka) in eastern Ukraine.

“They have a farm and do not want to leave their animals or their home. Their village is being bombed frequently, but for many people in their 60s it is very difficult to start life over in a new place, so they choose to stay despite the danger,” she says.

Here in Kawartha Lakes, Otych has worked to bring a little bit of the taste of Ukraine to her new home. She bakes custom cakes such as Napoleon and Medovyk. Napoleon is originally a French-style cake, she says, but has become very popular in Ukraine.

“Medovyk, however, is a truly traditional Ukrainian honey cake with a long history and is known for its rich flavour and delicate layers.”

She focuses on making desserts with reduced sugar, so they are not overly sweet.

“In addition to cakes, I prepare a variety of pastries and Ukrainian baked goods, always trying to share a part of our culture through food.”

One of the most popular items she makes is pyrizhky — soft baked buns made from slightly sweet dough that can be filled with either savoury or sweet fillings. “They are very comforting, homemade-style foods that many people enjoy.”

She also prepares varenyky (perogies) made with a variety of fillings. Otych has found one of the most popular here is potato with cheddar cheese.

Otych also shares her strong feelings about a few recipes and their origins. I learned that perogies, cabbage rolls, and borscht were all Ukrainian, first and foremost, despite variations existing across Europe.

In 2022, UNESCO officially inscribed the “culture of Ukrainian borscht cooking” on its list of intangible cultural heritage in need of urgent safeguarding.

Ukraine requested an accelerated review because the war was disrupting the transmission of culinary traditions, community gatherings, and even the ability to grow local ingredients. UNESCO agreed and fast‑tracked the inscription.

Although she did a few pop-up events with her baking at Burn’s Bulk Food in downtown Lindsay, right now she bakes by order and occasionally for community events.

“I have passed the required inspections and follow all regulations. In the future, I hope to work from a dedicated commercial kitchen rather than from home.”

We talk again about the geopolitical situation for the world and for Ukraine. I want to know, does she still have hope for her home country?

“It’s hard to say. I know that it’s not possible to come back to my country. I don’t think it’s possible, because war will not stop.”

She changes the subject to her gratefulness for what they have here.

“I want to really say thank you to both of the churches. I know that without them, we wouldn’t be here.”

Afterword

After this interview, early in February, you learn your close friend, Anastasia, was struck by a Russian drone. She lived in Sumy, the city you had fled four years earlier.

You learn Anastasia, 31, and a mother of three, drove her father home after he had been released from military service for medical treatment. After safely dropping him off, she was driving back home to her children when a Lancet drone struck her car near a bus stop in the village.

The drone hit the front windshield on the driver’s side, and you find out her car caught fire.

She did not survive.

And you realize that faceless drones do not always distinguish between military and civilian targets, and that ordinary families continue to suffer the consequences of war.

Anastasia was more than your close friend, for you are the godmother to one of her daughters. You are now reliving the war once again. And you are heartbroken with loss.