We're following up on our first episode about the Ukraine War that featured a Russian civilian with a counter-episode featuring a Ukrainian guest from the capital city of Kyiv - Alexey Siniavtsev.
It is a strange and amazing world we live in now, that through the power of the internet we have all crossed paths. Alex saw clips from our first Ukraine war episode on Tik Tok and reached out to offer additional context, which is how we were able to secure him as a guest for this follow-up episode. Born during the last years of the Soviet Union and raised in Kyiv, he truly brings one of the most impactful perspectives we could have asked for on what's going on on-the-ground with the war.
Alex provides additional context into Ukraine's past democratic revolution efforts including nuance behind the events that led up to the Crimean annexation, we discuss how the people of Ukraine have rallied together in these dire times to look out for and help one another, how he sifts through the complete overload of information to find out what's really going on, how he sees the Russian people, and how we can all help the Ukrainian people by simply continuing to talk about the war and connect the images we see on our screens with the real people behind them.
Resources provided by Alexey:
(War background + short news explained): https://www.instagram.com/svidomi_eng/
(Most reliable western news source - "close to the truth"): https://www.nytimes.com/news-event/ukraine-russia
(Documentary about 2014 protests in Ukraine): https://youtu.be/yzNxLzFfR5w
(Ukrainian & Russian language only - analysis by Alexey Arestovych, Ukraine's president office adviser): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXJwhPAug9k&list=PLHBacZjYq-jwRvdgyycHdsg1ixEn222LP
(Russian only - analysis from Conflict Intelligence Team, Russian independent media): https://t.me/s/CITeam
(Official Ukrainian Army donation link + short summary of what's going on): https://war.ukraine.ua
(Trusted volunteer foundation donation link): https://savelife.in.ua/en/
(Story on his friends who hid in a basement for 2 weeks and narrowly escaped Russian bombing of Bucha): https://vancouversun.com/news/ukrainian-couple-basement-russia-invasion-bucha
(Find & support Ukrainian artists): https://www.instagram.com/artists.s