Ukrainian refugee in Edinburgh says she 'feels like a child again' thanks to host family
| Author | Oleksandra Gumeniuk |
| Published date | 25 June 2022 |
| Publication title | EdinburghLive (Scotland) |
Julia, 24, comes from Chernigiv, a city in northern Ukraine. She told Edinburgh Live of her harrowing journey to gaining her new life in Scotland. She said: "My family and I were staying in my home town for two weeks and all of the sudden the city started getting bombed especially at night since it is pretty close to the border with Russia."
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At first, her family was not planning to flee the city. Shortly after, the water supply, central heating, electricity, and mobile signal were all cut. "The last straw was the stadium by our building that got destroyed," she said.
Like any other person of her age, Julia had huge dreams, career and personal objectives, but she says it all 'went down the drain' after February 24. After she moved her family to a safer region in the western Ukraine, Julia found out about the Homes for Ukraine scheme.
She said: "I just knew that I should go. The main challenge of the program was to find a match - host family. The application itself was easy. Looking for hosts was difficult." Her mother composed a message asking for her daughter to be brought to a secure location. The feedback they received was overwhelming - more than 100 responses. Then Julia started her search for the host family.
"When I first talked to my now host family, it just felt right. I am 24 but I feel like a child again. I feel safe and protected," she said.
Julia suggests that all the Ukrainians who want to come to the UK but are feeling hesitant about joining Homes for Ukraine should text and video chat with a few host families just to ensure everyone is on the same page.
She added: "I also recommend discussing finances. Some families would expect you to pay for the groceries, some would not." However, Julia and her family claim that the government's organisation of this program was not as efficient as they hoped.
Courtnay McLeod, Julia's host mother and her legal UK sponsor, says it was an obvious choice for their family of five to provide shelter for one of the Ukrainian refugees. I signed up for the government scheme. It became clear quite quickly that scheme is going to be very slow and not very efficient," she said.
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