These are supposed to be the best days of their lives: playing outside, learning safely at school, laughing with friends and family.
But for the younger generation of Ukrainians, like 19-year-old Taisiia Grygorova, many of those moments have been lost. She and four other teenagers from the war-torn country took to the stage around New England this week to portray the hardships they have experienced.
“No matter where you are, people will tell you that these years are the best years of your life,” Grygorova told the audience during Thursday’s performance in Concord.
But no matter where they are, her fellow actors said, the war continues. People are still being killed, and their country is still a “target for destruction.”
“No matter where I am, I feel suffocated,” concluded 16-year-old Dmytro Pohorilovskyi.
Three years into the invasion Russian President Vladimir Putin waged on Ukraine, those headlines have dissipated in the U.S. and shifted toward the Israel-Hamas War. But as the fighting continues in Ukraine, the acting troupe embarked on a tour of New England in hopes of showing Americans the realities of war and asking for continued support.
“I think that we are here to remind people that war in Ukraine is still going on, and there’s still a lot of people being killed,” Pohorilovskyi told the Monitor before the show. “This is our opportunity to scream.”
The performance, “Voices from Ukraine: Stories of War and Hope,” was organized by local volunteers at Common Man for Ukraine, a group founded by four Granite Staters, including Alex Ray, who founded the Common Man restaurants. The organization has delivered 750 trucks of food — more than four million pounds — to the front lines and hosted trauma counseling retreats for 1,300 children impacted by the war, many of whom have lost a parent.
At these retreats, they gathered letters and statements from children, asking them to write what they’d say to either Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy or to the world. The actors, who attended the trauma retreats, spent years translating the letters into English and compiling excerpts, combined with their own personal experiences, into a musical theatre performance.
Sen. Maggie Hassan, who has supported Common Man for Ukraine since its inception, attended and said the show is a reminder of the “terrible cost” of Russia’s invasion.
“In today’s political climate, I know that you may feel like few in number, but know that you speak for the Live Free or Die majority of Granite Staers and for the freedom-loving majority in America,” Hassan told the organizers, actors and supporters in the audience. “You’re helping supply the arsenal of democracy, not with weapons of steel but with acts of care and words of hope. You may not be on the front lines in the fight for freedom in Ukraine yourselves, but through your dedication, through your performance tonight, you’re demonstrating precisely why freedom is worth fighting for.”
In addition to their New Hampshire stops in Concord and Newbury, the group also performs in York, Maine; Burlington, Vermont; and Boston and Newton, Massachusetts.
Why are kids supposed to know what is rocket, and what is bomb, and why they need to hide, and how to hide, and then to hide?
Taisiia GrygorovA
As they prepared for the show, Grygorova said the actors thought intentionally about the emotion and heart they’d need to put into their performance so audiences would understand what life in Ukraine is really like. The letters and stories include the loss of friends and siblings, the fear they feel when hearing rockets and the drive to keep living and dreaming in the midst of it all.
“Sometimes it’s hard,” Grygorova said. “Some of us are literally almost crying on the stage during the performance, but it works.”
Grygorova and another actor, Bohdana Frantsishkevych, attend university in Warsaw, Poland. They are often glued to the news, watching for updates that might impact their families. Frantsishkevych said that even though she may be physically safer in Poland, she worries about her parents more when she’s away.
“We just want to be together mentally, physically, and just to be calm, not to be worried every night,” Frantsishkevych told the audience during a question-and-answer session after the performance. “I don’t care if it’s a bomb, if it’s a rocket or drones. I don’t care if I’m near them. I know that we are safe and we are safe together. I know where they are. But when I’m in Warsaw, I can’t sleep.”
Grygorova told the audience that when she’s home in Kharkiv, a city in northeastern Ukraine, her 6-year-old brother will sometimes warn her that a rocket is coming.
“Why kids have to say these awful words? Why are kids supposed to know what is rocket, and what is bomb, and why they need to hide, and how to hide, and then to hide?” Grygorova asked. “I really want our kids to just live their life, enjoy it, play with other kids, go to school, play football on the ground — like on the grass, not in a shelter.”
The performance, and Ukraine, aren’t without hope. Throughout, the actors speak of a determination to keep enjoying the moments they have and to keep living and dreaming.
“Perhaps the glimmer isn’t gone,” Tetiana Yevstihnieieva recited to the crowd. “It’s just hidden beneath the layers of fear, responsibility and expectation. Maybe it’s still there, waiting for us to uncover it again, to nurture it back to life.”