Good evening, everyone. My name is jasmine and on of Harvard Bookstore. I am so excited. Welcome you to our event with megan buskey presenting her new book ukraine is not dead yet a family story of exile and return. Joined in conversation by emily channel justice, our spring event season is in full swing here at bookstore you can find our full time schedule at harvard dot com slash events where you can also sign up for our email newsletter. Tonights will conclude with some time for your questions, which well have a book signing here at this to ask the question. Raise your hand during the q a portion and our speakers will call on you. Cspan booktv is also our event tonight, including the q a. So if you ask a question, please just wait for their microphones to reach you before you ask the question and if you havent already, you can find the copy of ukraine is not dead yet. At the register in the next room. Thank you for continuing to steam. Ask it as we strive to keep our Community Safe and just a reminder to please silence your cell phones for the duration of this event. And as always, thank you for buying books from Harvard Bookstore for your purchases support events this and help to ensure the future of local independent bookstore. Now am so pleased to introduce tonight speakers megan buskey is a nonfiction writer who has contributed to outlets such as the New York Times book review that land tick the new republic, nprs all things considered. She is a former fulbright to ukraine, and she has been studying, writing about the country for two decades. She has joined in conversation by emily channelljustice director of the tamati contemporary Ukraine Program at the Ukrainian Research institute at harvard university. She has been doing research in ukraine since 2012 and is the author of without the steep selforganization political activism in ukraine. Tonight, they are here discuss ukraine is not dead yet. A family story of exile and return and this work megan buskey returns to her familys homeland in ukraine to uncover, document her familys past following the passing of her grandmother. Author well, as holton writes that ukraine is not dead yet as a model of both the power, the purpose of historical memoir to improve our collective understanding of the past while broadening our knowledge of ourselves and our future. Were so excited to host this here at Harvard Bookstore tonight. Please join me in welcoming megan buskey emily channelljustice. Thank you so much for having me here. Its very exciting. Be back in boston so im going to begin with a reading from the text. Im actually going start from the epilog, which is kind of a strange thing to read from for a book launch, but im very conscious of the fact that were were now at the moment where were acknowledging were recognizing and remembering the anniversary of, russias full scale invasion of ukraine. Most of this book was written before invasion. I actually finished a draft just a few days before the invasion started. And when i was doing the writing, really thought about the things that i was writing about as things that had happened in the past, things that were settled, things that were almost fascinating to me, in part because they so distant. The events of the past year have shown that was not the way to think about those events. And theres a number of things that happened to. My family over the past century that continue to be at play today. So kind of and an acknowledgment of that moment. I want to read this portion, which has to do with the fate of my cousin natalia. I dont think theres actually much you need to know in order to feel anchored in this, except maybe to know that natalia and i are First Cousins and we have the same grandmother. All right, so two months after the war began, i flew to italy to see my cousin natalia, who had left ukraine with her two adolescent daughters on in olga when the war started. And many counts, natalia and the girls lucky they went to italy. They had a family connection. Years earlier, the mother of natalias husband, vasily, had moved to the country and married italian man as soon as the war broke out, natalia, his inlaws, urged to bring the girls from about the city in western ukraine where they live and come live with them. A town outside bologna. I rolled into town on a bright spring morning aboard one of italys sleek regional rails, an italian, anya were at the station to greet me. There was no greater marker of the passage of time than anya, who at 14 was a foot taller than when i had last seen her a few years earlier. The town that we were staying in was, full of typical italian charm, polite piazzas. Still, after years, lush flowers tumbling from hanging baskets. But as we walked from the train station, it was ukraine that loomed. I knew the gist of natalia and the girls from ukraine, but hadnt bother for details. As refugees are busy. As we settled into their apartment on a leafy central street, natalia told me the full story. Like most ukrainians in italian, bustle had considered a russian unthinkable when it happened, vasso, who had been working a trucking gig in the eu, abandoned his job and rushed back to his family. He urged natalia to leave ukraine with the girls. By that point, martial law had been imposed and as a man under 60, he was barred from leaving the country. Natalia was deeply conflicted. She was a patriot and had no desire abandon her homeland in its hour of need. She was also loath to be separated bassel and their son roman, but she was over 18, was also required to remain in ukraine. Italias mother, aunt stefan, had turned 80 the previous summer, and like many people, categorically refused to leave. But natalia knew the environment unpredictable. And even in western ukraine, possibly dangerous. It wasnt a good place for kids. The first weekend after the invasion natalia agreed to check out the situation at, the train station and leave the travel hub closest to their home. And she events. By then it had been widely reported that the station was overrun with would be refugees as natalia suspected that they wouldnt be able to board a train and would just come back to triscuits. Still, she and the girls pack small backpacks with food, their documents, knowing that people been standing in closely packed quarters for hours to board trains. They were diapers when natalia was still in. The girls arrived at the station in libya, but it was teeming with people trying to flee. They luckily got in through a side entrance, allowed them to bypass the bulk of the crowd, quickly found themselves. Besides the railway tracks, they ran toward a group of men in fatigues who are knocking on a door of a train about to depart, turned away. The men dispersed, the family remained on the platform, uncertain what to do next. Then the door opened in italian. Girls were pulled aboard with moments of them stepping onto the train the the door close behind them and the wheels to turn. They had made it they had barely had a chance to say goodbye to vasyl the train was moving but going where this was the question, natalia on as she sought to study herself. None of the people around them had an all anyone knew was that the train was going west. Eventually natalia found a conductor. Where are we going . She asked him to poland. The conductor answered. He didnt seem to know any more than the others in comparison to many other ukrainian refugees. That weekend, natalia and the girls traveled in relative comfort. There are only six people in their crew pay car, which normally set for once they cross the border into poland. Volunteers came aboard train and offered them medication, food water and tea. About 20 hours after they left the vive got off the train somewhere in rural southeastern poland. Natalia deflected for help and hurried the girls into a waiting taxi. She asked the driver, the to take them to the nearest airport. That turned out to be a bit says im not sure im pronouncing that correctly. On her phone natalia found a flight from captivity to bologna that was leaving in a few hours. But when she tried to buy the tickets, the transaction wouldnt go through. Perhaps because of Cyber Attacks on banks, there are rumors of such disruption that day when she told me this part the story. I thought of our grandmothers moment of panic when she had to make sense. New yorks multiple airports. The moment that she arrived with my mom, olga, from the soviet union. 56 years later, here was her granddaughter, momentarily stymied while at an airport in a foreign country with her two youngest children trying to outrun moscows reach. As natalia considered to do, her phone rang. The caller was a friend, a ukrainian who happens lived in warsaw. Natalia told him i was going on. The friend offer to buy them the tickets. She sent the friend photos of their documents and the transaction went through. By 8 p. M. , 28 hours after an italian the girls of truth corvettes that arrived at the sellers home outside bologna and started a of their lives presenting with a question mark in peaceful italy. Natalia and the girls were in the habit of counting their blessings. Unlike so many ukrainian refugees, they had a place where they could stay indefinitely and an area that was familiar to them. They had the means to cover their modest expenses. The girls had plenty of experiences distance, education due to the covid pandemic, and after two week war induced break. They online lessons at their school and frisk events. They even had their most needed belongings. Bustles had started transporting refugees luggage from to italy and bissell had them suitcases packed with clothes and other for items they hadnt been able to bring with them when they left. It was delight to be with natalia and the girls. I was grateful that after so much time apart we could enjoy each days languid flow together. We went to Different Grocery Stores to pick out provisions for. Anya beat me several times at chess altogether at siblings for a garden she hoped to attend that summer. In the evenings, we watched films and ukrainian that anya found online, but sadness hung in the air. One day natalia walked me through some recent photos on her phone. They showed roman on his motorcycle. The girls doing yoga stretches on a beach near odessa family gathered and she cigarets all the 13th birthday. It says 12 terabyte it should be 13th birthday in december. Natalia played a video her unwrapping her main present guitar, her face a picture of delight. I could hear the voices of my loved ones in the background. Melancholy washed over because of covid. It had been so long since i had seen them, though knew we would meet again. It seemed a possible that our future gatherings would never be so carefree. Its nice that the reminds you of these moments, natalia said, interrupting my thoughts a moment, she added, but also hard before i gone to italy, i had gone back to cleveland and picked up watch at my grandmothers that my mother had on to. It was simple, but pretty plaited in rose gold. My mother had purchased it or my grandmother had purchased it in the soviet union, possibly at home when she was trying to spend down her spare rubles before she flew with my mom and olga to the united states. Chadbourne at all the time i thought natalia might like to have it. I gave it to her one afternoon after we finished lunch. Is this our grandmother . Natalia asked as soon as she pulled it out of the small jewelry bag. I kept it in. I nodded. She immediately to cry. I went over and put my arms around her so you can have a part of her with you now. I said. Some of her strength. I dont know how she did it, she said. The the words stumbling out. I grabbed back and looked across the kitchen table, an older whose finger, whose faces had grown somber. For a moment, i imagined us being joined by my grandmother in this little italian kitchen. What would she say to us . I wonder what wisdom was she in part from the years of hardship, destruction, violence she had endured . The answer came to me immediately. It was simple live. Thank you and thanks, everyone, for being here to celebrate the release of this book, especially in a week that so important to any of us who have been paying attention to ukraine for this past year and hopefully longer. Thank you also. I think that passage is really reflective of how the book brings the past and the present in. A really important conversation. So my questions are largely kind of oriented toward toward that past and present. How play on each other. But first, lets start for people who havent read the book, for people who maybe dont know that much about. Can you describe a little bit the draw of ukraine . What makes you keep wanting to go back and actually its funny that you read that particular passage so tresco which is a small town in western ukraine they are famous this really disgusting tasting water thats supposed to give you eternal life basically. Its the its the background of my lockscreen. Its one of my Favorite Places in ukraine. Ive been there, i think, five times. And so that i prepared this question about the draw ukraine without sort of thinking about. But that really made me smile while you reading that passage. So for people who dont have family, ukraine, whats the draw . What keeps keeps you back . Well, think the things that got me to ukraine are a little bit different than the things that kept me going back. So grew up in a ukrainian American Family in cleveland. I was very close to my grandmother, who was kind of like a third parent in some respects to me. And my younger brother is growing up, we sort of observed all of the traditions, traditional ukrainian holidays. We went to church all the time. We observe different ukrainian customs and it was really part of the fabric of my growing up. But also, my grandmother was kind of like a curious presence to me. I mean, she was very she was she was very kind of understandable in some way in the sense that she was very, very reliable, very loving and all the ways that you can kind of expect of a grandmother. But she had a she also had this foreignness about her and, also like a sense of sort of of tragedy. There was something about her that was clearly she had had a really difficult early life that came out through things like her starting to cry when she started to, talk about her experience and growing up in ukraine and russia or she was always sort of so attentive to like how much things cost. Like, even now, when im at the grocery store, im oh, strawberries are 275 now. And, you know, she was always like cooking this like copious, amounts of food for us. And my mother would be, well, she doesnt want us to starve. And its like that just like doesnt make sense to. An american growing up in the middle class suburbia. So there was all of this was like kind of mystery wrapped up into you, who she was. And another thing that was interesting was that i we had a very close family in ukraine. So my mom, one of her sisters, natalia, her mother was had been left behind in ukraine. And my grandfather was still there. And so there was a sense too, of a closeness that couldnt really be explained very easily. Like sometimes my mom would often my grandmother would send over packages to ukraine and my mom would often go around and kind of collect our clothes every. So often the things that we were wearing anymore that we had outgrown and we would send them to ukraine and then a year or so later itd be at my grandmothers house just sort of like bored, you know, trying to, to amuse myself in some. And i would come across a photograph of like one of my second cousins wearing my clothes and they like, looked like me blond hair and blue and green eyes. And it was so like weird sense of like, wait, like who is this person . And like, thats sort of me. Not so it was always this sort of it was a really rich set of questions, i think, and that was why i started going to ukraine in the first place when i was in college. But, you know, when i went there, i quickly realized just how fascinating place it was mean. Its this is a place thats, you know, trying sort of make sense of itself in the aftermath of the failure of the soviet project and all of the countries of the former soviet union. Just have such Big Questions facing themselves and and ukraine is the home of so many conflicts around language around history, around geopolitics and those questions and those conflicts have very stakes. People are really, really engaged and trying to to to represent their positions vis a vis those. And so for me as an american, it was so, so interesting to be able to go there and. And to start to to learn based on what was sort of unfolding ukraine. And then the other thing i would say, too, is that, yeah, ukraine has such a deep rich culture and history. Like the thing you mentioned about the track of its water mean theres theres just so much there its a really its a big country with its its own vernacular its its own history its own culture and you once you start paying attention and theres theres so much that can be unfolded, so so thats why you should care about. Ukraine. Excellent. And really leads into my next question, which is about how you found the story, because as you will all read in the book this is a story not only about megans family, but also about finding out more about family. Thats not just in family lore and then placing it within ukrainian. So how did you come put the pieces together of the Family History and especially, you know, were talking about a long period time of you working in ukraine. And you talk in the book about the experience, the archive itself changing a lot over time. Think thats really interesting to hear more about what are the things that wanted you that you want to keep digging for details, especially when you started to find out that might be details that you might not like that you learned about your family. And were there any specific that ultimately you feel like you never found answers to . Okay. Those are something im going to try to remind me if i dont answer one of the questions. So, you know, the impetus for this book, you know, i had started going to ukraine when i was in college and i was really interested. I didnt really start this project specifically until my grandmother died about ten years ago. I was really close to her. Id done interviews with her and wanted to to document her story and really preserve it because i was the one in my family who had really cared the most. So that sort of quickly ballooned into like a much very kind of ambitious project. And yet consulting archives, multiple countries and doing a lot of secondary source reading, which was really i super, super important. Theres a source section in this book which is contain some of the scholarship i use to kind of try. Imagine what the world had been like that my grandmother had lived in. Theres just so much great. I want to make sure that im calling out those because i wouldnt have absolutely would not have been abl