Finding work in Sarnia a challenge, says Ukrainian newcomer

Adjusting to life in Canada after fleeing wartorn Ukraine has been easiest for her son and daughter, says Olena Volodina.

She spoke about her family’s life in Sarnia after arriving in Canada 16 months ago, Tuesday to the Kiwanis Club of Sarnia-Lambton Golden K, a service club Volodina and her husband joined a few months ago.

In Ukraine, they helped their son with his homework evenings until 11 pm “Here, no homework,” she said.

Andher son, who just completed Grade 6, won a school chess tournament.

But for Volodina and her husband, the challenges of settling into life in Canada have included finding jobs.

Her husband, who worked in finance in Ukraine, now installs windows, doors and drywall. She is an electrical engineer, but faces a process including expensive tests to work in the profession in Ontario. She has been a math tutor at Lambton College.

“For (our children), it’s much easier,” Volodina said. “For us, it’s much harder. Language, jobs – it’s much different here.”

That may be why some Ukrainians who came to Canada have returned, she said.

Volodina said she wants to remain in Canada.

Even if the war in Ukraine were to stop today, “I don’t think it would be safe, right away,” she said. “We don’t know when it will be.”

Moving to Canada was stressful and “to move back would be one more stress,” she said. “We would prefer to stay here, especially as I see for kids it is, here, much better.”

Volodina studied English for a year in Ukraine and has continued since her family arrived in Canada after a brief time in Poland.

“I think our language is more difficult to know,” she said. “To know English is not too difficult. It’s just more practice.”

Asked by a club member if there is something the community could do to help new arrivals, Volodina said, “For me, the big challenge is with work” and more assistance with that “would be great.”

Volodina brought club members homemade Ukrainian gingerbread iced in the blue-and-yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag, and joked baking gingerbread may become her new career in Canada.

The couple already was planning to come to Canada when she asked on social media what would be available here for her diabetic daughter. A Sarnia doctor involved in helping Ukrainians settle in the community responded.

Volodina said they stayed with a Sarnia host family for two months after arriving, but now live on their own.

She showed the club video and photos of the destruction from the war in the Ukrainian city where the family once lived.

“It was terrible when the war began,” and “it hurts” to see places in their former home city ruined, Volodina said.

Many in Ukraine died in Russian rocket attacks while trying to escape the war, she said.

“What could be more important than saving a child’s life?” she asked, adding, “That’s why we are here.”

More than 150 Ukrainians came to Sarnia, and the rest of Lambton County, in 2022, according to Sarnia-Lambton’s Local Immigration Partnership.

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