Almost five months since Russia first invaded her homeland, Yana Walder, a Montpelier resident raised in Kharkiv, has raised over $100,000, which she has donated to hundreds of families in Ukraine.
When VTDigger first spoke to Walder, 37, back in March, she had just helped her mom and goddaughter flee Russian bombings in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city. Her work has continued daily, coordinating with volunteers in Ukraine to support people in need, particularly single parents and pregnant women.
“It’s like in any difficult situation: You can just ignore the news, you can numb out, or you can get activated,” Walder said. “Doing something makes me feel good. Like, during this time that’s going to go down in history, I was involved, and I was active, and I’m doing my part.”
Walder supplied dozens of photos of the families she’s helped and accompanying bank transfer confirmations. The portraits are austere. Mothers — some nursing — gather their children for a selfie. Babies stare with knowing blankness. Some kids smile with faint, upturned lips. Others, exhausted, look into the camera’s lens, making themselves seen.
Walder has worked with Yuriy Muhin, a volunteer near the city of Dnipro, for the last couple of months. She sends Muhin $600 a week, which he uses to buy food and supplies. Muhin loads up his car, traveling around the region distributing goods. Together, Walder and Muhin have helped feed over 250 families, she said.
In addition to working with a regular set of volunteers abroad, Walder’s network is growing. Her work has spread by word of mouth in Ukraine. Neighbors have told neighbors about her. A single dad struggling to care for a young child found out about her from a cashier in a supermarket, Walder said. She helps people buy groceries, medications, medical care — anything that keeps people safe and alive in the midst of war.
After first meeting people in need, Walder works through a standard vetting process, video chatting and requesting documents to confirm their identities. Then, she sends money to a colleague in Ukraine, who is able to more easily transfer it between Ukrainian bank accounts.
“It feels crushing what’s happened, and how extensive the destruction is in my country and in the lives of the people that I know,” Walder said. “That feels more crushing than the time it takes to go out and try to find the money (to help).”
Money has come from across the U.S., Mexico, Canada and UK, from Walder’s friends and business contacts to strangers who heard about her work. On Facebook, she posts photos of the people she’s trying to help. Putting faces to the work she does often encourages people to contribute, Walder said.
Sometimes the money runs dry, and sometimes she has to ask twice, but donations have continued to pour in, allowing Walder to help more people every week.
Walder has built her humanitarian efforts around a full work week. She might fundraise in the evening, talk to people requesting help on weekends. Right as she starts to run out of money, another donation will come in, Walder said, springing her back into action.
While larger humanitarian aid organizations have been active in Ukraine, Walder said it’s nearly impossible for moms to receive money to take care of their children or to pay for evacuation. Lines for meager food supplies last hours, and sometimes fights break out. Moms, Walder said, cannot afford to spend six hours waiting for a loaf of bread and two cans of meat, let alone stand the physical toll such a wait involves.
Recently, Walder worked to help a young couple and their newborn flee the Russian-controlled city of Kherson. The family needed $600 — about a month’s worth of income — to pay a driver to help them escape. But that cash alone wouldn’t cut it. Stuck in a long line of traffic at a Russian-controlled checkpoint, the family’s plan was stalled, Walder said. So the mother, still nursing her newborn, hopped out of the car to negotiate with the nearby soldiers. Spinning a yarn about a quick trip outside the city to buy the baby medicine, the family was allowed to leave after paying a $100 bribe, according to Walder.
“That was their little journey, and I was definitely super rooting for them to make sure that they got out safely,” she said. The $600 took Walder half an hour to fundraise, and was life-changing for its recipients.
Uniting for Ukraine
Back in April, President Joe Biden announced the Uniting for Ukraine program, which allows Ukrainian citizens and their families to come to the U.S. for two years if they have an American financial sponsor. The goal is to welcome some 100,000 refugees.
NBCNews reported at the end of June that more than 71,000 Ukrainians had come to the U.S., with over 20,000 entering through the U.S.-Mexico border. That path has mostly ended as the Biden administration has encouraged entry through the Uniting for Ukraine program instead.
Walder successfully applied to bring her goddaughter to Vermont through the federal program, and hopes she will arrive from Austria — where she’s lived since fleeing Ukraine — later this summer. According to Walder, the application process is relatively straightforward and involves submitting a few basic financial documents.
“I would just encourage people to not be afraid to fill out sponsorship for someone,” she said, noting that she’s connected with people across the state who have been willing to offer up rooms in their homes for Ukrainians. “I think that we should be helping, because we can. We’re safe; we have the resources.”
What’s changed?
“The trauma of being on the phone with my mom when she was under bombings, it’s like, changed my memory. It’s crazy,” Walder said. “March and April are kind of like a black hole in my memory.
“I think it’s, as I understand it, just a brain’s way to protect you.”
Even with an ocean between her and her country of birth, the war has transformed Walder. Fireworks send her heart racing. So do slammed doors. It’s strange to her that, even physically removed from war, she has nonetheless been dealt physical effects.
Despite those effects, Walder remains committed to helping Ukraine, and has been inspired by the support of her broader Vermont community. The world is watching what happens, whether Putin — a dictator — is allowed to waltz into a democratic country and take it by force, Walder said. That struggle has united people globally.
“I was walking down Montpelier State Street today, and there was a woman walking down with a Ukrainian flag,” Walder said. “Our job, back behind the frontlines, is to support, to take care of the people, to take care of the refugees.”
