This week on Chronversations: A conversation with Dasha Krachun, a sophomore international student at Columbia, about the current state of Ukraine.
TRANSCRIPT:
0:08: Welcome back to The Chronicle Conversations.
0:11: I’m your host, Aaron Guzman.
0:13: This week on Conversations, February 24th marks the 3rd year anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine.
0:19: The United States has paused military aid for Ukraine after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with United States President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on February 28th.
0:29: Sophomore Dasha Krachun talks about her experiences being an international student here at Columbia, and how the current conflict in Ukraine affects her and her personal and student life.
0:40: I was born in central Ukraine, the city called Dnipro, but then my childhood was spent in Vinnytsia, also central Ukraine, and then I moved to Kyiv for the last 5 years of my life in Ukraine, so I’m kind of central Ukraine, I’d say, yeah.
0:57: I’m feeling mixed, I would say.
1:00: I’m really excited about the school year and the projects I’m working on are really new level for me and so the education school stuff is going really well.
1:11: However, on the other part of my life, I’m struggling to focus on education and the projects because of the events that’s going on, so it’s mixed feeling.
1:21: I’m happy on one of the sides, and I would say angry on the other side.
1:25: Like, I want to act and focus on bringing peace to my own country, and I’m the type of person who’s really connected to my motherland.
1:37: I really miss Ukraine. I moved here 5 years ago, and every single day I’m thinking about Ukraine.
1:44: Dasha also talks about what others can do to continue showing their support for Ukraine and highlights the importance of remaining resilient.
1:52: What would really help the situation is actions, speaking up about the situation, not being afraid to protest, not being afraid to speak loudly about what’s going on and not ignoring the situation. I saw so many people online, like, posting messages, like, I’m sorry Ukrainians will let you down.
2:10: I’m sorry that all this is happening.
2:13: It’s great to be empathetic and sympathize with Ukrainians, and we’re so thankful for that, but we’re at the point where we cannot give up and if we stop being resilient and just let all of this negativity and really bad turbulence affect us emotionally, we will eventually give up and they will, we will not be resilient anymore and we will not be able to fight and stand for ourselves.
2:42: So that’s why my message would be to keep spreading the truth and especially for those people who are not familiar what’s going on in Ukraine at all, or for those people who support Trump and support his actions and for those people who spread Russian propaganda specifically about who invaded Ukraine, when was it invaded, some people said Ukraine, Ukraine is not a real country.
3:08: It’s important to recognize the genocide and that Putin is a war criminal.
3:12: She also mentions the amount of pressure that she feels from the current administration here in the United States.
3:18: I’m not feeling safe.
3:20: At all with the administrations that we’re going with, I disagree loudly and aggressively with what Trump has to say and have said already.
3:31: I definitely support support President Zelenskyy with what he said when he was in Washington, and it makes me feel unsafe and it makes me want to act again.
3:40: I don’t want to say loud words about what’s what I feel like is going to happen, but some part of me really wants to associate what’s going on in the US right now with Russia, like, I see similar stuff going on.
3:57: People are banned from protesting, specifically college students, human rights are taken away, women rights are taken away, we’re cutting off fundings for so many things, we’re adding tariffs to other countries.
4:13: We’re just isolating America and the narrative of Make America Great Again sounds just as the Great Holy Russia.
4:21: That’s all for this week.
4:23: Make sure to stay up to date with campus and metro news at ColumbiaChronicle.com and sign up for our newsletter at ColumbiaChronicle.com/newsletter.
4:31: And don’t forget to check out our Three C’s podcast where we tell you about the three biggest things you need to know at Columbia for the week.
4:37: I’m Aaron Guzman, thanks for listening.
Copy edited by Matt Brady
