{"product_id":"my-ukrainian-episodes-formative-years","title":"My UKrainian Episodes: Formative Years","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e \u003cspan\u003eI grew up in a multicultural family during the 1960s my father had landed in Montreal on November 29, 1951. He arrived in the New World at the age of 24 after having lived through the horrors of the Second World War as an Ostarbeitar, a slave labourer for the Nazi regime. My mother on the other hand had roots in Canada, going back to the period of the battle on the Plains of Abraham that took place 266 years, to the day that I am penning this description on September 13, 2025. A Scottish ancestor had been sent to fight with Wolfe's army in stead of his land owner. With the British victory, he with many were granted land by the King. Down my mother's paternal line, these were those who fled Ireland during the Great Potato Famine.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis book is a story of my formative years growing up going to school, more than my peers. As a child I didn't just go to kindergarten and elementary school on weekdays, I also attended Ukrainian school, very often on Saturday mornings. So I really knew nothing about cartoons, and together with some of my peers, who were also of immigrant parents, felt left out because we hadn't a clue about what our classmates were talking about. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy form of storytelling is very non-linear in nature. I can be at one place in time, and then a paragraph later, be recalling something that would happen in the future. For some people, this is very discombobulating, others have told me it adds authenticity to my stories.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI am extremely lucky to be alive. From what my mother tells me she had to go through a C-section in order to save my life. The umbilical cord was wrapped around my neck three times.I must have been dancing some crazy music to have gotten to that position.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI examine my years of attending Ukrainian school, which taught me a great deal. From memorization to public speaking as it was always expected of students to recite poetry at various community celebrations.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eStill in my youth while walking with my father to visit some friends he had met while working in the coal mines of western Belgium, I experienced something pretty horrid as a young boy. My father, who was my hero, was triggered by the wail of an air raid siren which had gone off as we walked by. This incident would come back to haunt me in 2022, though that will be covered in a future episode.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis book marches through my childhood, and the period of the \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003eCold War, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003ewhich included the lunar landing, unfriendly visits from the KGB in Montreal, my loss of my grandmother I'd never met, the reunion of my father with his younger sisters in 1977 whom he had not seen in over three decades.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis series of episodes culminates with two sections. The first was the single most traumatic experience in my life. It was the very sudden loss of my father due to an aneurysm, on the weekend of my high school prom. The final episode of this volume I explore a period after the death of my father. I all honesty it took nearly seven years to complete my mourning, though that is forthcoming in subsequent volumes as part of this series.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt times I interject political commentary on the current situation of Russia's unprovoked attack on Ukraine.\u003c\/span\u003e \u003c\/div\u003e \u003c\/div\u003e \u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Books Prime","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45917155721407,"sku":"1cfddf8a-777e-407e-902b-4e0b7c00750d","price":21.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0761\/7550\/7647\/files\/442d8c298fdb75042d3a200967abf30c.jpg?v=1785097302","url":"https:\/\/books-prime.com\/products\/my-ukrainian-episodes-formative-years","provider":"Books Prime","version":"1.0","type":"link"}