Alex, a queer Ukrainian from Kyiv, has been living in Berlin since March 2022 "for the obvious reason." I had the opportunity to sit down with Alex at an ORAM event for LGBTIQ Ukrainians in Berlin.
"For the first month, I was completely lost like many Ukrainians who were forced to leave," they shared with me. "I was privileged because I do languages, including German. There was a need for German language teachers for Ukrainian youth," they told me.
Alex became a teacher at an integration class that summer. "Integration classes differ from a regular class because there can be young people of different ages. From 11 to 18 years old, and at some schools, young people can be 19, 20, or 21. Some of [the students] are already looking for jobs, and some are too young and looking forward to being good students," Alex said.
Conversations with their students from communities most impacted by the war are etched into Alex's memory. One story Alex reflected on was that one of their teenage students melted ice to bring drinking water into Mariupol, a flourishing city, before Russia's invasion. "One can truly see the horrible face of war through the eyes of the young person," they said.
"This is the story of a lost childhood," Alex said on the experiences shared with them by their students. "They are more mature than they are supposed to be at their age...they behave the way the adults behave, and that's not what it's supposed to be."
Alex acknowledges that Ukrainian refugees have certain privileges compared to other refugee communities in Berlin. "For white presenting Ukrainians, we have white privilege, which gives us more opportunities than other non-white refugees. And coming from a country next to the European Union, we have this geographical and political privilege," they shared.
Despite being "privileged refugees," Alex shared first-hand accounts of their students' challenges and discrimination they’ve faced. "Some of the [Ukrainian] children shared several stories where German students said, 'You don't belong here,' 'you are wild people,' 'we don't need you'... Being a refugee is never a choice, even for a privileged refugee," Alex told me.
I asked if it's important for Ukrainian youth living in Berlin to learn German, and Alex said it's necessary. "It is a necessity not only to help [them] build [their] life but also to advocate for and make your community more visible."
Alex speaks confidently about their approach to teaching German to Ukrainian children in a friendly and non-forceful way. "I don't like the approach to forcing people into language because that's not what you should do to people who experience occupation or war. The people you force to learn a language in this manner will hate the language and the country, especially when people want to be home," they said.
Instead of forcing their students to learn German, Alex focuses on teaching connections and parallels between German and Ukrainian. "They find the German words emerge in Ukrainian and how Slavic (Ukrainian) words appear in German. Now they feel like more of a close connection to German. They feel like German can be a superpower."
"I see the pride in my students' eyes when they say, 'I had a conversation with those German kids today, and I think it went well.'... It's an amazing feeling when you see how people blossom in the language," Alex said when I asked about the favorite part of their job.
Thank you, Alex, for your work in educating Ukrainian youth refugees in Berlin. Please donate to help ORAM support more LGBTIQ Ukrainians in Berlin like Alex.
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