‘I want to be there’: Ashland High teacher to volunteer in Ukraine

Published 10:00 am Wednesday, April 19, 2023

“What would it be like if — speaking rhetorically — you or I were receiving texts from a loved one that said, ‘Explosion in 10 seconds,’” Paul Huard said.

Huard was sitting behind a desk in his history classroom at Ashland High School Friday afternoon. It was quiet. The desks were empty, and the students had all gone home. Surrounded by books, with his hands folded beside a stack of graded papers, he reflected on the last year and where the coming months will take him.

In June 2022, he spent five weeks in Przemyśl, Poland, volunteering with the charity Nazarene Compassionate Ministries as it helped Ukrainian women and children refugees as they flocked across the Polish border. What he saw made him want to work closer to the fight itself, but the charity doesn’t allow its volunteers to venture into war-torn Ukraine.

On June 27, Huard will land in Krakov, Poland, then travel by train to Lviv, Ukraine, where he will spend five weeks of his summer vacation as a volunteer with the organization Front Line Kitchen. He will be one of many preparing and delivering food and giving rides to refugees moving from the country into the city in western Ukraine. 

“I will be a glorified Uber Eats for the humanitarian community while I’m there,” he said.

It has been difficult to watch the war from the other side of the world since coming back home, he said.

Through WhatsApp, he’s kept in contact with Ukrainian friends. He keeps an eye on Liveuamap — a website developed in 2014 to track Russian military activity in Ukraine — and he sends messages when bombs fall near his friends.

“This is from March 9, when there was a bombardment of Kyiv,” he said, holding up his phone and reading from the screen.

“‘As always, you, your mom, and all Ukraine are in my prayers. But you and your family are particularly on my mind for obvious reasons.’

“‘Kate wrote back, ‘Thank you. My mother could not fall asleep until four in the morning, reading the chat of the village in Dnieper. The most terrible thing to read in real time is, ‘Explosion in 10 seconds, get ready,’” he read.

Katerina Funikovka, 22, has extended family near the Dnieper River, close to the heaviest fighting, he said. Kyiv is her hometown.

“I am thrilled by the military success of Ukraine, the absolute underdog in this fight. But the humanitarian crisis does not wane, it’s just changed. Watching my friends deal with that, watching colleagues try to help — on the one hand I’m watching ordinary people do extraordinary things, but it remains a volunteer group for the most part,” he said.

Exhaustion is difficult to defeat for even the most dedicated volunteer force. Physical and emotional exhaustion combines with exhaustion of financial resources.

Huard, however, described an indefatigable pull to Ukraine.

“It’s difficult for me not to be there. I want to be there. So I had to do something about it,” he said of his upcoming trip.

Before he was a history teacher, Huard was a journalist with a frequent focus on military stories. When asked if his background contributed to his motivation, his answer was emphatic.

“I know how this book ends if good people don’t do the right thing. Vladimir Putin has made it very clear that other places in Europe where the Russian flag once flew are fair game for a new Russian empire,” he said.

The United States and its allies fought twice in the 20th century to defeat dictatorial or autocratic powers in Europe, he said, and it would be a shame to see a victory for autocracy at the beginning of the 21st century.

Huard said the deepest underlying pull to Ukraine is his faith, even more than his past experience in Poland or any intellectual motivations.

“The Christianity I understand tells me to love my neighbor, and this is an incredibly obvious way to do that. I’m going to try to do the best job I can with all humility. I’m part of a team. There are tens of thousands of volunteers in Ukraine trying to help. I’m one of many,” Huard said.

When asked about his own safety, he admits it’s something he’s thought about.

“I’m not a war tourist. I’m not going to fulfill a hero fantasy, nor do I have a death wish. But it is a nation at war. There is risk anywhere in Ukraine, but Lviv has not been as badly hammered as the east of Ukraine,” he said.

In Lviv, Huard will be far from the hot front lines of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. But, he said, with the Russian military consistently flouting the Geneva Convention by aiming bombs and missiles at civilian targets, it is always possible to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Hospitals, schools, train stations, theaters and apartment buildings have all been targets over the past year. 

Considering the number of foreign nationals in Ukraine, the death or wounding of humanitarian workers has remained relatively rare, he said. Focusing on the potential for disaster would drive anyone crazy, Huard said. He believes he will come home whole. 

But he has practiced putting on a one-handed tourniquet, and he’ll carry a bag with essentials like a trauma kit, flashlight, a liter of water, extra batteries and chargers. 

“I’m fond of saying I’ll keep my head on a swivel,” he said.

Preparation for the potential emotional toll has been as important as the potential for physical harm. He remembered last year watching glassy-eyed mothers move through the train station of Przemyśl. Little children collapsing on the ground, in the rain, in an exhausted sleep is a memory he can’t forget. It’s important to focus on helping the person in front of you, he said. 

Huard has devised an auxiliary form of aid for his visit — injecting a few strong U.S dollars into the Ukrainian economy.

Lviv was transformed by the war from a blossoming, off-the-beaten-path tourist destination to a main artery in the flow of refugees, he said. To boost the local economy, he’ll stay in a local hotel and spend money at local restaurants and stores while he’s there. But that will require raising money. The war has pushed Ukraine’s inflation rate to 24%. While he is investing his own money in gasoline for the vehicles he’ll be driving, Huard has organized a Gofundme page for the rest. 

“I have managed to raise $3,000. That’s all gone now, due to travel expenses — and that’s flying economy. It’s become much more expensive to travel to that part of the world than it was last year. I welcome contributions because I’m not there yet,” he said.

To donate to Huard, see gofundme.com/f/help-paul-aid-ukrainian-war-victims-this-summer