You’d think they were talking across town and had been friends for years.
Juiliette Mueller and Vika Kucher talk every Saturday via Zoom. They catch up on the week’s happenings and find out what might be coming up next week.
Call them modern-day pen pals. Juliette, 16, is from Amherst, and Vika, 14, lives in Ukraine.
They had a lot to talk about Saturday. Last week was a momentous week in Ukraine. President Joe Biden visited Kyiv on Monday, and Friday marked a year since Russia invaded Ukraine. Since then, the country has seen thousands of civilians and soldiers killed.
Millions in Ukraine fled to other countries, but Vika and her family stayed in western Ukraine.
The girls started talking remotely last June. The friendship is through a program by ENGin, a nonprofit that links youth in Ukraine who want to practice and improve their English with those who are willing to talk with them for a cross-cultural connection.
Juliette and Vika talk about whatever comes up.
Saturday Vika told Juliette about an app on her phone. It tracks air raids and incoming missiles. And at the end of the day, the app shows which areas in Ukraine got bombed, and the number of times.
If she’s at school for the air raid, parents come and pick up their children. And if the attack is close by, students and teachers run into a bomb shelter in the basement.
“I think she’s very brave because I know I would be very scared,” said Juliette, who is a junior at the Buffalo Academy of the Sacred Heart.
But they don’t always talk about the war.
“For Juliette, this is a way to bring peace to a place that was wracked by war and fear,” said Bridget McGuinness, a campus minister at Sacred Heart. “Juliette is an example of ways in which we underestimate the value of heart to heart connection in our world.”
The first few weeks, Juliette said, “it was a bit difficult, because she definitely had a lower level of speaking English than she does now.”
But the awkwardness…
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