This is Home: Luba Lukhanina, a Ukrainian refugee in Poplar

Luba Lukhanina, who fled Ukraine after the Russian invasion in 2022, reminisces about her childhood along the Dnieper River, the importance of traditional Ukrainian vyshyvankas, and the ‘cultural bomb’ of the East End.

When Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February 2022, Luba Lukhanina’s life was turned upside down.

Waking up to the sounds of bombing became a daily occurrence, and seven days later she fled to Romania with her husband, five-year-old daughter and nine-year-old son. 

Lukhanina, now 37, had spent her entire life in Cherkasy, a city in central Ukraine. There, she completed two Master’s degrees—one in graphic design and the other in practical psychology. In 2016, she opened a nursery called Happy Beehive, which she ran until the Russian bombardment led to its closure.

She was forced to leave the house that she and her husband had lovingly built themselves. ‘We built it from the ground, so it was our project. I love our house; I think I miss it the most,’ she told me.

After a three-month stint finding safety in Romania, Lukhanina, her husband and children settled in Poplar, thanks to the kindness of friends of friends of friends who gave up their cottage between Bow Locks and the River Lea to help the uprooted family.

‘To be a refugee is very hard. I’m still accepting this status in my life,’ she says. ‘It’s a very hard thing to accept in your life that you’re actually not a citizen. It was very easy to get this status — it took us like 15 minutes to cross the border, and you’re a refugee.’

After living in the East End for two years, Lukhanina’s sense of identity has begun to shift. Ukraine remains her ‘motherland,’ she says, but she now feels at home in the East End. When a colleague remarked that English had become her second language, it meant a lot to Lukhanina.

Lukhanina works at Poplar Union, an arts and community centre on Cotall Street, where she has found a genuine sense of community. Until August 17th, she’s got an exhibition at the creative hub named “Fragile: A Journey of Resilience,” delving into her fractured identity as a refugee. It features striking photographs of herself with her mouth and eyes wrapped in safety tape, reminiscent of cargo being shipped.

We spoke to Lukhanina about nostalgic memories of Ukraine, her most treasured traditions, and her discovery of Call the Midwife on Netflix.

What was your childhood like?

I was born and raised in the same city, in the middle of Ukraine. It’s a city named Cherkasy. My childhood years were quite tough because I was born on the edge of the collapse of the Soviet Union, and after that for the next ten years, it was really hard for the country.

We were struggling to find normal food, and my mother was struggling to find a normal workplace, so that age was quite hard. I have my sister, she is 16 years older than me, and till my school years, she was living with my grandparents in Moldova. And then my mum, because of the conflict between Moldova and Russia, she decided that my sister needed to be with us, and then she moved. She was 22 years old.

I was one of the people who didn’t believe in war. I thought, ‘It just can’t happen. Like, we are living in 2022.’

Luba Lukhanina

In Ukraine, we have our biggest river, The Dnieper, and my city is located on the right bank of the river. So if we are talking about the smell of a home, it’s the smell of the river. It’s the very particular smell that you can smell only when you’re at home. 

Childhood is quite different here; because I’ve been here for two years, I see how kids, specifically in London, are raised, and it’s so different to how I was raised because we had a lot of freedom.

My favourite thing was [playing] with secret treasures in the ground. We would dig holes in random places and put in some kids’ treasures — it could be flowers or small drawings — and then we covered them with small, broken [pieces of] glass and the soil so that no one could see them. Then we would return to look and see if [the treasures] were still there or not.

You left Ukraine when the war started in February 2022. What were your memories of that time? 

I was one of the people who didn’t believe in war. I thought, ‘It just can’t happen. Like, we are living in 2022.’ Yes, we had a conflict before, in 2014, and Crimea and so on. So I knew that we had a conflict, but I was not sure about the escalation of this conflict, that it would be a full invasion.

So for me, it was a big shock on the morning of February 24, when I woke up from the explosions. It’s the hardest memory in my life. I just want to vanish it from my memory — that’s hard, but it can be done.

We left Ukraine on the seventh day of the war. The first seven days, I was so shocked that I just couldn’t bring myself together and bring all the thoughts together — what to do and what next. Because we were not expecting this, and we were not sure when it would be over. 

I’m now thinking that if I was alone, maybe I wouldn’t have left Ukraine. But I had a big responsibility for the kids. Every single time when the air siren was on, I was looking at them and thinking, ‘They can’t live this life,’ because it is so harmful for them. And immediately, we were trying to explain to them what was going on, but a very simple explanation because it’s quite hard to explain what war means, what to expect, and what not to expect. 

But it was February, it was really cold, and we were forced to hide in a basement in a shed. And every single time with the air siren, I was forced to take the kids, dress them warmly, and go with them to this basement in a shed. It was really small, one meter by one meter, and there’s four of us there waiting for the siren to end.

 How has the war impacted your politics?

You need to understand that connections between Russia and Ukraine are very tight. I’m speaking two languages fluently, my native languages — Russian and Ukrainian. My mum was born in Russia, she’s Russian, and she lived her whole life in Ukraine, and my father is Ukrainian. But we have so many connections between the two countries, we have relatives, friends, and so it’s very hard.

It’s very hard not to hate everyone who is speaking the Russian language. For me, it took time to keep in some form my hatred of the country and the language because of what they were doing. 

How they invaded Ukraine and how they bomb, how they destroy, how they were killing people, children, and bombing hospitals, civilians. It’s raising so much hate in me that sometimes you’re thinking that you can’t hate more, but you actually can.

Two weeks ago, they bombed our main hospital in our capital —  the hospital for kids with very rare and serious diseases. For example, half of this hospital is for kids with cancer.  And when you’re looking at the pictures and the videos of how this hospital is destroyed, and you’re looking at these kids with cancer, completely bald with no hope, that’s raising another wave of hatred. 

But in time, I realised that not all Russian-speaking people are the same. Sometimes it seems very easy to say ‘Not all the people who speak in this language are bad,’ but to have these old memories and this situation in your life, it’s blocking you from realising that not all are bad.

The war has actually raised in people love and proudness for the country and for the traditions, and a lot of people switched to Ukrainian language completely.

Luba Lukhanina

How has the war affected your sense of identity?

The war is raising art in people and our sense of identity. I think after our independence in 1991, it was like like step by step, going back to our roots, going back to our traditions, but it was very slow.

But now, the war has actually raised in people a love and proudness for the country and for the traditions, and a lot of people switched to Ukrainian language completely. 

It was really interesting, because for us in Ukraine, it was okay to speak two languages. A lot of people were speaking Russian languages, a lot of people were speaking the Ukrainian language. But [there was an] immediate switch and some people were struggling because they have more Russian family. But it is like an awakening — a big, huge awakening of traditions and culture. 

In the past two years, we now have a lot new Ukrainian brands. It is very interesting because the businesses, especially the small businesses in Ukraine right now, are struggling because of the economics. It’s blackout in the country, so now we have only four hours with electricity during the day.

So it’s a big challenge, especially for small businesses. But we have a lot of new small businesses, like jewellery, clothing, arts. A lot of new artists from arts and crafts to songwriters and poem writers. It’s a process of awakening of traditions of proudness to be Ukrainian.

Can you tell me about Ukrainian traditions?

Ukrainian tradition is mostly based on folk art. We have a lot of embroidery in our tradition and we love to decorate things, so we have pottery and people love to decorate their houses, especially in the villages. We have our special, traditional gowns — the vyshevanka — meaning embroidered shirt, so a lot of vibrant colours in our embroidery.

We have quite a lot of well-known artists. As Ukraine was a part of the Soviet Union for many years, and before that a part of the Russian Empire, sometimes you see the very famous artists and they say ‘Russian,’ but actually they were born in Ukraine. For example, Malevich and his famous Black Square, he was actually born in Ukraine. So, for me, he’s a Ukrainian artist. 

So even now, in the Tate gallery where Malevich’s pictures are, they have an introduction saying ‘was born in the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and in brackets, modern Ukraine.’ For me, it’s very important to know this.

We didn’t celebrate Christmas for many, many years because Christmas was not good for the Soviet Union, so the country celebrates mostly the New Year, not Christmas. It is still the tradition to celebrate more on New Year, and on Christmas Day we are usually visiting our grandparents. 

But we have a lot of interesting holidays based on ancient traditions and in the summer we have a holiday when we make head wreaths from the grass and then put them into the river. It’s girls looking for a husband – so there’s a tradition to put your head wreath into the river, and whoever finds it will be your husband. 

Are you hoping to eventually get UK citizenship?

The war is still there, so definitely not now.  It was not easy for my kids to learn an absolutely new language in two years, and I’m very proud of them.

They’re doing absolutely amazing. My son just finished primary school and his score in SATs English was 115 out of 120. 

I myself just finished local college and did a GCSE exam in English as well. I’m waiting for the results.

I saw my teacher that morning before the exam, and he said to me, ‘I’m not wishing you luck, because success is in your blood. So just go.’

I was really pleased with that, it means a lot to me when people believe in you, because we don’t have friends and family here. You just sometimes feel so isolated. It’s very strange that you’re in London, it’s such a big city and so many people are here, but you actually can feel isolated and lost. 

What does East London mean to you?

It’s very interesting because Ukraine is quite plain in nationalities and in traditions. We’re all Ukrainians. I think 99.9 per cent of Ukrainians are white people with the same culture, tradition and so on. So we know each other well and nothing new.

But here, it’s such a cultural bomb. From the traditions of weddings to arranged marriages and to the arts, you’re like, ‘Oh wow.’

I’m invited to the wedding of my colleague. She’s British-Nigerian, and the wedding will be in Nigeria. It’s a traditional wedding, and I’m invited and very honoured to be a bridesmaid.

For me, the culture is so different and so interesting. And I’m not scared about the culture. I know from some of my friends about Ukrainians, that they’re keeping community only for people from Ukraine. And some people are scared to go out and to get to know the traditions because it’s so different — sometimes people are actually scared. 

I’m not, I’m so interested. I’m asking a lot of questions and it’s so interesting for me to get to know this new community.  

As all my life has been in art, so I have a new hobby here. I’m visiting museums and it’s my dream to work in museums. So far, I’ve visited 37 museums in London, a few of them six or seven times, like the Tate or V&A because they have specific exhibitions. I love East London. I love Docklands a lot. Docklands is my favourite because it’s so historical.

It’s amazing, and I remember how I discovered a series on Netflix called Call The Midwife. That’s my new favourite. I bumped into the series accidentally, I never knew about the book. And then I discovered the whole, like, 10 seasons, and I was shocked. Because Chrisp Street Market, I live actually like 10 minutes from here. 

The series was amazingly good for understanding the area and understanding the history of the community.

If you enjoyed this piece, you can find another article from our ‘This is Home’ series about an Italian in Mile End, Sylvia Difino