Lady Teacher Who Unites Ukraine

Halyna Triakina has been teaching at School No. 5 in Severodonetsk, Luhansk oblast, and taking her pupils out to a host of places for many years. The teacher and her class have visited Volyn, Ivano- Frankivsk oblast, Bukovyna, as well as Slovakia, Hungary, and Poland. Now they are preparing to go to Germany and Italy. You must have already thought that Ms. Triakina’s pupils are children of affluent parents because you know very well how much such travels really cost. But, in reality, the travels in question require no staggering sums.

“Ms. Triakina, how did you manage to organize so many travels under such difficult economic conditions? How could you in general hit upon the idea of making colossal efforts to this end without drawing any material gain?”

“It was very long ago, when I was a fifth grader, that I decided I would be a teacher, more precisely, a teacher of history. My parents worked at the Azot plant, originally a USSR top-priority construction project, in Severodonetsk. My mom came here from Kharkiv oblast and dad from Volyn. After graduating from an institute, I got married and went to faraway Chita beyond Lake Baikal because my husband was assigned a job there. The landscape was beautiful, but that was a strange kind of beauty, and I couldn’t easily get used to the new place. Waking up each morning, I thought, ‘How are things there in Ukraine?’ And once, two years or so after we had arrived at the new place, I suddenly heard Ukrainian speech: a small boy turned to me for help. He happened to have come from Poltava. I even burst into tears and had a great desire to show my pupils Ukraine, but Ukraine was far away and I decided to take my charges for a tour of closer destinations like Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Krasnoyarsk, Abakan, Taishet, Shushenskoye, and Irkutsk. We got to know area history, going on an excursion to the places of concrete events and museums.

“In 1982 our family returned to Severodonetsk. I came to the school I had once attended and later worked in as a Young Pioneers’ guide: now I was offered a job to teach history. Having come back to my homeland, I became aware of how little I knew about it. I even felt uneasy that at the time I knew the Far East better than Ukraine. Thus I hit upon the idea to show children around various regions of the country. I turned to the local Rukh branch, and they helped my fifth- graders and me to go on a Christmas holiday to the village of Kovalivka, Kolomyia district, Ivano-Frankivsk oblast. Local households took the children in. The next day our hospitable hosts took us to a church for a holiday liturgy. The boys and girls were taught carols that they easily picked up. The local residents received very warmly and rewarded generously my little carolers. The children tried to speak Ukrainian, something not always easy for them. But people showed understanding of this problem and were never irked by their Russian speech. We were seen off by the whole village, with people streaming to the school compound, where a bus was waiting for us, in order to give the children apples, prunes, walnuts, and woodcarvings. We’d been guests just for a week but did not feel like leaving; we even cried. Later, we often remembered local customs, the visit to a Kolomiya pysanka (Easter egg) painting museum, and the way we made wooden candleholders.

“The next year I asked Prosvita to help organize a trip to Volyn. I was given addresses and phone numbers to get in touch with the receiving side. The reception was such that the class had to be broken up into several groups getting off the train at different stations. We were coming home in reverse order, one at a time boarding the train carrying us back to Severodonetsk. The first group visited Lutsk and the last Kovel. The organization was perfect, with local authorities already having the lists of children to be lodged in certain households. When in Kovel, we visited the Lesia Ukrayinka Museum and a juvenile detention camp. Our hospitable hosts made such serious efforts that I never felt fear for the children whom I could not see all the time.

“The next journey was again assisted by Rukh. We were invited to Velyky Berezny, Transcarpathia, again for Christmas. But, while the previous time we had gotten to know the Orthodox Church ways of celebrating it, this time we were to see Greek Catholic customs. We were taken for a walk in the mountains and on an excursion to Uzhhorod. And again we were lucky to get a warm welcome from sympathetic and caring people. In Bukovyna, we were welcomed and shown around the area by Rivakyiv schoolteachers led by Principal Zirka Dmytriyevna. The children took part in the Malanka festivities and forged closer contacts with their peers.”

“During all those trips my children were not only looking out the bus windows: they familiarized themselves with the life of various regions of this country, breathed the air of those places, living, if only briefly, the same life with the residents of those areas. They absorbed area history through what their openhearted hosts told them. Thus did they learn to see, think, and walk on their native soil, appreciating its main wealth, the inexhaustible high moral standards and unity of our people. As we made our journeys on the exclusive basis of various personal contacts, rather than using the expensive services of travel companies, we did not need a great deal of money. But what priceless baggage the children brought home! I am pleased that my pupils’ parents share my idea, extending me support and help.”

“Ms. Triakina, how do your travels reflect on the way you teach our history in the classroom, for it is no longer possible to put textbook maxims across to children lucky enough to have seen so much?”

“In my opinion, history is life itself, and what happens today will be history tomorrow. This is why I talk about it very much in my lessons, about what I have seen or read, especially about contemporary politicians I’ve met. Some people say school and politics should not mix, but I do not think so. I often quote the saying, ‘If you don’t take interest in politics, it will take interest in you.’ I once wrote on the blackboard the list of Ukrainian premiers over the past ten years, indicating the periods they were in office. It was unnecessary to explain that a country, like a house, needs a master. I also tell my children about my meetings with Natalia Vitrenko, Slava Stetsko, Yevhen Marchuk, and many other well-known people of this country. Some of these were chance meetings, while others were on my initiative, owing to my stubbornness and patience. I am a history teacher, and I think I must get firsthand information. I have very often come to the conclusion that one politician or another projects a real-life image completely different from what you see onscreen. I think one should hear as many different opinions as possible in order to learn to draw one’s own conclusions. This is what I teach my pupils. My children have taken great interest in and wished to meet Yevhen Marchuk. I tried to organize a meeting when we stopped over in Kyiv on the way to Bukovyna, but Mr. Marchuk was too busy to meet us. However, some time later, he emerged before the pupils in his original capacity of a Ukrainian-language teacher and conducted a lesson. We heard melodious Ukrainian speech. A lesson by this kind of a teacher is called a language- development lesson. The lesson focused on the role of quality knowledge in our times and on education opportunities. The children were learning to accurately express their thoughts in their mother tongue, conduct a dialogue, reflect, and seek nontraditional solutions. The lesson ended in the presentation of Ukrainian-language textbooks as gifts, with overachievers and Ukrainian language teachers receiving books with a presentation signature. Since then, the town has been calling my class Marchuk’s, and the pupils have even hung Mr. Marchuk’s portrait on the wall. This year, when my pupils are leaving school, Mr. Marchuk promised to come without fail to attend the graduation ceremony. I am very pleased that my boys and girls have had a chance to come across a person like this, for a young individual always needs a positive ideal to look up to. The absence of a positive ideal is a problem for our society: suffice it to recall what you see every day on television.”

“Ms. Triakina, you’ve gained very interesting experience in helping your pupils develop an active civic attitude and in familiarizing them with the history of their area and the country as a whole. I think other teachers also are certain to become interested in this and you will have like-minded supporters of this approach to the transmission of knowledge. However, you have gone still farther in the literal sense of the word. You decided to step into Europe. Why have you opted for this, taking into account that it is far more difficult to travel abroad, especially under your scheme without travel agencies?”

“It is only through comparison that you can appreciate something deservedly. You should draw this comparison even if it is not in your favor. I so want my pupils to live in and be able to build a civilized world. There are very many things that require no money or special time to be had, and I mean respect for the people around you. We saw curtain lace over the windows and flower pots on the windowsills in Hungary. The young people kept asking, ‘Why don’t we have this?’ I feel depressed when we come back home. They see that living standards are far higher there, but it is very important that they should not stop asking why we don’t have this and try to change the life in our state for the better. You know I want this very, very much. I never judge anything as good or bad. The children should learn themselves to see through things so they don’t remain blind kittens in their adult life and don’t let their opinions be manipulated.

“Going to Slovakia, we passed through Transcarpathia. At that time Transcarpathia was suffering from its devastating flood. We gave teaching aids as relief to the victims. That trip was also timed to coincide with Christmas; it was our first Christmas abroad. Slovakia struck us. Everything around was flashing with festive illumination, the small outdoor Christmas trees were also decked with decorative lights. The Slovakian Greek Catholics showed us the way they celebrate this holiday. We were taken to the Tatra Mountains by nuns. We threw snowballs and had fun with the kids. During a church service, the priest spoke about worldly things, the joys and woes of the parishioners, about the necessity of helping specific people in trouble. We were so struck with this. That trip became possible thanks to one of my pupils’ godmother.

“After the trip to Slovakia, I decided to acquaint my pupils with the Catholic church. I turned for help to the Polish consul in Kharkiv. We were promised nothing but still received an invitation to Poland. We were met in Krakow by priests. We were told religion was very widespread in Poland. Almost all the windows were hung with large portraits of the Pope who, incidentally, served many years in Krakow. Then the children developed a burning desire to go to Italy and visit the Vatican. We are going to carry out this plan in the coming May. We also want to travel to Germany. To facilitate seeking support to carry out our plans, we publish the newspaper A Class Like Ours, in which we tell about all our journeys. Last summer we visited Hungary. This time we were helped by a Ukrainian-born Hungarian lady, a chance acquaintance. To educate young people as citizens of their country, you should not only show them the macroworld but also teach them to live in a microworld, that is, in their own family. It has become a tradition in our class to observe a holiday called We Relax in the Family Circle. We get together in our school cafeteria, with each table being occupied by a large family: the parents, grandparents, brothers, and sisters. The table occupants compete in the originality of their decoration, not in the contents of the meal. Their elders have a chance to watch their siblings from the side. I never say anything bad about any of the children at PTA meetings, but I try to get the parents to know as much as possible about and to be closer to their children. My motto is ‘Seek the sources of good things as well as the roots of all evil in childhood.’ I love my children so much that I am even frightened to think that I won’t see them again on September 1. Many of my pupils are going to apply to the university law school: they want to become lawyers because they think the law is the foundation of a state. Tetiana Reznik is applying to the Kyiv Institute of Management because she is an innate executive. Hanna Khatminska will eventually become my colleague: she is applying to the history department of a pedagogical institute

“Life will perhaps fling my kids to various nooks and crannies of this country, but I am sure they will never be watching the world out of the window; they will be prepared to overcome any difficulties and find solutions in the most difficult situations.”

As a follow-up to this piece, we will be delighted to receive Ukrainian residents’ stories about teachers, the people who are not only earning their daily bread by teaching but are also shaping active, thinking, and independent citizens of Ukraine in spite of today’s hardships and obstacles.