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Graduation party before the summer holidays in the Ukrainian "Saturday School"
Photo:
Private
Most schoolyards in Hamburg are empty on Saturdays, but not this one.
Mothers and fathers are sitting on the wooden benches at the edge, talking on the phone or typing on their mobile phones.
A small picnic has been laid out on the table tennis table.
Snacks in lunch boxes and something to drink.
All around, parents are deep in conversation.
A girl, about five years old, with flowers in her hair, has wrapped a Ukrainian flag around her like a cloak and knotted it in front of her chest.
At the Emil Krause School, Saturday has belonged to Ukrainian families for many years who live in the city and want to build a bridge home for their children.
From 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., the children and young people sit in several classrooms, staggered by year.
Volunteers organize the lessons.
The children practice speaking Ukrainian, learn Cyrillic letters, Ukrainian songs and learn a lot about the traditions in their parents' country of birth.
"We're here because I want my son to speak Ukrainian with other children," says Maryana Dukhna, 41. She came to Bremen as an au pair around 20 years ago.
She stayed in Germany, moved to Hamburg.
Her son is now seven years old.
Last summer, before the outbreak of war, she traveled home with him for the first time, to her grandparents near Lviv.
»Our child fell in love with Ukraine«
"He enjoyed country life, loved the cows and collected the eggs from the chickens," says Dukhna.
»Our child fell in love with the Ukraine.« The mother can see how happy she is.
Dukhna regularly takes her son to the "Saturday School" so that he can get to know Ukrainian customs and traditions together with his peers and can one day pass them on to his own children.
Olga Sukennyk co-founded the facility in 2001.
In some families, only one parent is from Ukraine, she says.
“German is often spoken at home, too.
That makes it all the more difficult for the children to learn Ukrainian.« The weekly lessons should help them to practice their grammar and expand their vocabulary.
'It's an advantage to know two languages.
Otherwise the children wouldn't even be able to talk to their grandparents," says Sukennyk.
Until recently, and this also becomes clear in conversations with other parents, the main thing was: The “Saturday School” helped them to feel at home in two countries and two languages.
It was a happy, carefree affair. That's how it sounds in the round at the table tennis table.
The war changed a lot.
Since Putin's brutal attack, the "Saturday School" is about much more, and it has grown significantly.
While around 70 children came to class in February, there are now around 300 a few weeks before the summer holidays. For many Ukrainian mothers and children who fled the war zone and landed in Hamburg, the »Saturday School« is an important contact point.
Many of these »newbies« are not in the small branch of the Emil Krause School this Saturday, but from the third grade onwards the children are being taught at the headquarters a few minutes' drive away.
A dark red, large brick building from the 1920s.
Here, too, many Ukrainian mothers are sitting at a table in the schoolyard, including a number of refugees.
Help when arriving in Germany
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In the middle are lots of forms that have been handed to you in German offices without you being able to understand a word of official German.
Olga Sukennyk and her adult daughter translate, explain and help fill in the form.
It is particularly important to the mothers that their children are cared for in day-care centers and schools.
You want to take German courses and find work as quickly as possible.
In addition, the children are otherwise very isolated, says a woman.
Several report that their children want to return to Ukraine.
They missed their fathers, their friends.
They are all the more grateful for the "Saturday School", which offers a piece of home and at the same time supports them when they arrive in Germany.
"We're happy to help," says Olga Sukennyk.
"That's why we've adapted our concept a bit." With the newcomers, it's not about not forgetting their mother tongue.
They're all perfect.
Sukennyk hired some Ukrainian volunteers who teach the refugee children German and help them to keep up with learning subjects such as mathematics, geography and history.
Of course, it is also about the Ukraine.
»We always say: ›Maybe‹«
Around 20 fourth-graders are sitting in a classroom on the second floor of the Emil Krause School.
A window is decorated with a yellow and blue striped peace dove made of paper.
One of the children who sit here in class on weekdays made them.
A welcome greeting for the refugees.
Katarina Tertychna, wearing a pink jumper, jeans, and white sneakers, was a primary school teacher in Ukraine.
For a few weeks now she has been teaching the "newcomers" in the "Saturday school".
On this morning in May, the group has already completed two hours.
Now it's time for math.
Some children wobble in their chairs.
A boy and a girl hug each other.
When the writing suddenly disappears from the smartboard for inexplicable reasons, the group is startled and laughs.
The mood is relaxed, easy-going, as if this were a normal lesson in a Ukrainian classroom.
The teacher knows how important this is for the children, how stressed they are.
In recent months, she has continued to teach her class in Ukraine at a distance;
on-line.
Almost every day she sat in video conferences with the students from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m.
A child lived in the subway for about a month.
Many students have fled and now live in Poland, Germany and other countries.
Some are more aggressive than usual, others very thin-skinned.
"They quickly start crying," says Kataryna Tertychna.
Her daughter, who is in the second grade, wants to go home.
“But I don't know when and if that's possible.
We always say: 'Maybe'.« Tertychna doesn't even know exactly who will be in her class on Saturday after the summer holidays.
Again and again, some Ukrainian refugees are leaving the city of Hamburg, while others are new - and can contact the Ukrainian community here.
