Normally, we mainly share photos of participants and volunteers during our activities, but Welcome to Utrecht is celebrating its 10th anniversary, so it’s high time we introduced ourselves! Today it’s the turn of the Ukraine team: Hellen, Daria, Tanya, and Ricky.

Hellen is co-founder of Welcome to Utrecht. “What we did when we started in 2015 is what we’re still doing now: making sure refugees feel welcome in Utrecht, that they feel at home. I see that this is difficult for quite a few Ukrainians. They often don’t want to be here and miss their homeland terribly. But belonging somewhere (I prefer to use the English word ‘belonging’—I haven’t found a Dutch equivalent yet) is crucial to building a new life and network, even if it’s only temporary. The feeling of being part of a city, its inhabitants, its cultural life, learning to speak the language, being together with Dutch people; I see that this can give people self-confidence, hope, and energy. And as a refugee, you desperately need that.

Daria, who herself fled from Ukraine to Utrecht in 2022, can attest to this. “When I first arrived in Utrecht, I received support from Welkom In Utrecht. With my language buddy, whom I am still in contact with three years later, I practiced Dutch, my children went to the kids’ club, and I went to concerts.” Daria is a professional musician and plays the bandura, an authentic Ukrainian string instrument. “Music and culture are very important to me, now perhaps more than ever. Everything that is happening in Ukraine is terrible. People are going crazy because all they can think about is the war. A concert, theater, doing fun things. It’s important to be able to relax mentally.”

My colleague Tanya came to the Netherlands before the war. “When the war started, I thought: What can I do?” Welcome to Utrecht gave her an answer. ‘I don’t just have a job, it’s much more than that. Offering activities, giving attention, the fact that so many people in Utrecht listen and want to help. I can see that this means a lot to Ukrainians. I may not have fled, but I also found it difficult to enter a new world at the time. So it’s nice when you get a little push. An organization like Welcome to Utrecht can make all the difference.’

Ricky sees this too. She wants to do something meaningful for refugees. And she gets a lot in return, she says. “People are very grateful. And I learn a lot of new things. Ukrainians value their culture and traditions very much. Singing Ukrainian songs together, embroidering vyshyvanka (Ukrainian folk patterns on blouses). That is valuable to them. We Dutch don’t have that as much.” She learned from Tanya that in Ukraine, it is also normal for women to receive a bouquet of flowers from their husbands on their birthdays. This is not necessarily standard practice in the Netherlands. “On my birthday, Tanya gave me flowers because she knew I wouldn’t get any from my boyfriend. We had a good laugh about it.”