It seems like another world now, but before Russia invaded their country, just three weeks ago, Ukrainian kids and American kids participated in the same sorts of activities.
They tussled over soccer balls. They swung from monkey bars. They bounced around on tennis courts.
And, they kicked and chopped in karate classes, same as the children at Orange County Shorinji Kempo.
On Saturday morning, March 12, a passel of young martial arts students trotted around the school’s north Huntington Beach neighborhood to support and help their counterparts 6,000 miles away.
Money raised in their jog-a-thon will go to affiliated Ukrainian dojos, which are classrooms for the instruction of martial arts.
Ukraine native Tatyana Bukrinsky, a Huntington Beach resident whose two children take classes at OC Shorinji Kempo, came up with the idea. “I’ve been trying to think of every way possible to help,” she said.
Bukrinsky floated her brainstorm by the school’s sensei, Pankaj Rastogi, who, she said, was “totally on board.”
Six dojos around Ukraine specialize in Shorinji Kempo, a Japanese martial art that’s similar to kung fu and blends defense skills, mental training and healthy living. Rastogi will wire the money raised in their collective jog-a-thon – estimated at some $1,500 in total – to fellow senseis in Ukraine, who are expected to use it to get food and other necessities to local families.
“People are in terrible need of diapers and medications,” Bukrinsky said.
The mission is personal. Bukrinsky has watched in horror the heartbreaking images of her hometown, Kharkiv, just 22 miles from the Russian border.
On March 1, a missile struck Freedom Square in central Kharkiv, destroying government buildings and an opera house. Other missiles have hit high-rise apartment complexes, universities and a cathedral. Dozens of people have died, many of them civilians.
“My childhood memories are being wiped away,” Bukrinsky said. “The place where I played chess, destroyed. The place where I played tennis, gone.”
Bukrinsky, 40, moved with her family to the United States when she was 14, and has visited Ukraine a couple of times since.
“I left when I was old enough to be able to remember a lot about Kharkiv,” she said. “We lived in a five-story building that shared a big yard with four other buildings. All the children played together. I had many close friends.”
Her husband, Alex Bukrinsky, 42, who hails from Kyiv, immigrated to California in 1989. He is the sales manager for a biotech company; she works in healthcare compliance for Kaiser Permanente.
When they learned that their homeland was under fire, both were incredulous.
“There’s just no reason for it,” Alex Bukrinsky said. “I don’t understand.”
His wife couldn’t fathom that Russian President Vladimir Putin would actually follow through with his threats.
“I paid attention only peripherally until it happened,” Tatyana Bukrinsky said. “Friends started posting about waking up to the sound of bombs. Just the thought of children hearing bombs is impossible to comprehend.”
Most of her family members and friends have been able to flee Ukraine into Poland and the Republic of Czechia.
However, Bukrinsky does know of families separated from male relatives. The government ordered men ages 18 to 60 to remain and defend Ukraine. “I can’t imagine what it’s like to go to another country and leave your son behind,” she said.
Bukrinsky said she’s experienced at least three stages of grief: “I have transitioned from disbelief to pure anger to trying to figure out how to help people there.”
That third state of mind is what provided the motivation for Saturday’s jog-a-thon. Daughter Vivienne, 7, and son Adrian, 5, joined about 50 other kids in the run.
Not only does the fundraiser help children in Ukraine, Bukrinsky said, it gives kids here a sense of awareness and purpose.
“They are too young to understand the war. But they can understand helping other people,” Bukrinsky said.
“We are all better off when we help each other.”