Meet the Voices
We (that’s us, Hannah and Kaitlin) have really only been friends for a couple years, our friendship growing just like our Ukrainian bead collection — it grew fast, and it grew big.
Odesa, 2018
Though we knew of each other before the Year That Changed Everything (when we lived in Ukraine to train with Ukraine’s top folk dance ensembles), we were basically on a friendly hello here and there basis. We’d see each other at dance festivals or Ukrainian events in Winnipeg, catch up a bit about our lives, ask for a grad dress seamstress recommendation. (Yes, the same person made our high school grad dresses — maybe we should be crediting her, Benny, with the start of our friendship.)
But it wasn’t until Ukraine when we realized we would be BFFs and eventual podcast co-hosts — not that we knew that at the time, but maybe somewhere deep in our subconscious we did.
In Ukraine, we’d spend afternoons with the other Canadians we were with (this was all part of Cobblestone Freeway Tours Our Year in Ukraine program), exploring cities, getting lost in cities, sitting at coffee shops to write in our journals and to study Ukrainian, hanging out at each other’s apartments to laugh and cook and dream.
Back in Canada, though we didn’t see each other every single day (на жаль, it’s a pity), we still saw each other often, with at least one scheduled hang out per week since we both dance with Troyanda Ukrainian Dance Ensemble.
Our About page has a brief introduction to who we are, but we wanted to share a bit more about where we come from and where we’re going.
Hannah Picklyk
I have no idea where I’m going, but I can let you know where I came from.
I came from Rod and Bonnie. And before them, Sylvia and Emile, and Jean and Walter. And before them, Stella and Dmytro, Michaelena and Vasyl, and…
OK, so you don’t care about my family tree. But it kind of matters.
I grew up in a Ukrainian-filled household. I’ve been told my infant years were spent in a playpen on the side of dance rehearsals, my toddler years were spent keeping me from running through those rehearsals, and as soon as I was old enough, I was kickin’ up my (twist) heels in them. Born to parents who met through Ukrainian dance and fired up a troupe of their own, some say Ukrainian dance was bound to be part of me.
Ukrainian dance wasn’t always my focus, though. For 18 years, I was set on becoming an optometrist. In little 4-year-old Hannah’s eyes, the optometrist was the only cool doc (concluded once she could finally see through her big, round glasses from said doc). So science was my direction. In the second year of my degree, I started craving a more dynamic career path. I began researching nursing and then psych nursing. After 3.5 years, I completed my science degree, majoring in biology, and decided to take a term off to decipher what was going to be my next step.
During my university years, I never really stopped with the Ukrainian stuff. I had an instrumental role in reviving the University of Winnipeg’s Ukrainian student group and became involved at the national level with SUSK. I continued Ukrainian dancing (with Selo Ukrainian Dancers and Verba Ukrainian Dance Company) and instructing, among doing the other “usual” Ukrainian things, like celebrating Ukrainian traditions during holidays, creating Ukrainian-inspired artwork, annually attending Canada’s National Ukrainian Festival, listening exclusively to Ukrainian music, naming pets after Ukrainian words. You know, the usual things.
Then, I went and lived in Ukraine for a year. The one we refer to as the Year That Changed Everything. And here I am — not an optometrist, not a nurse, and instead pursuing nothing to do with science.
Sometimes I think about my science background and wonder what path that would have taken me down, but it forever ends in me seeing myself as a round peg in a square world (but to be clear, I have never once regretted my science studies). The decision to move to Ukraine may have seemed impulsive to some, but it was one from the soul — it was exhilarating, life-giving, open, exciting, clear, and automatic. Although preparations to move, missing family, and adjusting to life in a new country were difficult at times, it always felt right.
Troyanda Ukrainian Dance Ensemble’s 40th anniversary show, 2019
Since returning, I’ve stepped into a larger role helping my parents instruct and run the Selo Ukrainian Dancers, adjudicated a couple Ukrainian dance festivals, been invited to teach choreography and run dance workshops out of province, and accepted a position at Oseredok Ukrainian Cultural and Educational Centre — a Ukrainian museum, archive, gallery, and boutique. The only science I’m doing these days is mitosis.
My year in Ukraine taught me that I thrive on emotional experiences, meaning overly planned, scheduled, and repetitive events lose my interest really quickly. It was a period when these emotional experiences pierced so deeply, and my passion for my culture took over (literally — I once fainted during a Volyn state ensemble concert rehearsal … oops).
During and since then, I often run out of words to illuminate my experiences, and I need other ways to share them. Sometimes they get expressed through choreographing dances, rearranging my room to artfully display my collection of Ukraine-related items, painting a T. Shev. portrait, or, if creativity is really flowing, launching a platform and podcast.
Like I said, you don’t particularly care about my family tree. The names are just names to you. But those names are where I have come from and why my Ukrainian culture has become part of me. They’re why I didn’t choose to continue with science. And somehow, in a roundabout way, those names are the reason for vsi.
A note from Kaitlin about Hannah: Hannah is Vsi’s resident comedy writer. Sometimes I’ll write a general outline of something for Vsi, and I’ll ask Hannah to give it a little oomph of humour. Here’s a direct quote from Hannah when I said sometimes (OK, all the time) I have a hard time being funny on the spot, especially about myself: “To make something funny, I just take a regular metaphor and make it stupid.” Words to live by.
Kaitlin Vitt
I’ll just start with my life as of three years ago, because my life pre-Ukraine doesn’t matter.
Just kidding — of course it does.
My main connection to my Ukrainian background was, and is, through dance, inspiring me to learn more about the music, traditions, and culture of Ukraine. I started dancing when I was five, a time when I was incredibly shy and a bit of a teacher’s pet (those characteristics didn’t change all that much throughout the years). Eventually I became an assistant instructor, learning from those who taught me, and then I had my own classes. Today I teach some of the littlest dancers — the funnest dancers — at Rossdale Ukrainian Dance School.
I joined Troyanda Ukrainian Dance Ensemble in 2010 and have travelled a bit with the group, including to Eastern Europe in 2014. At the end of the trip, I visited Ukraine for a few days and met some of my relatives for the first time. Though I was there for a short time, the people, culture, and overall feeling had me dreaming of when I would be back.
At that time, I was completing my bachelor of science — hey, Hannah, maybe we should start a science podcast — but realized I didn’t want to pursue it as a career, at least in the same way. I was less interested in doing the science and more interested in learning the meaning behind it. So I finished up my degree then switched paths, majoring in journalism at Red River College’s Creative Communications program.
While in college, I wrote a book called Planted: Stories From Manitoba’s Natural World. It shares creative non-fiction stories from eight Manitobans inspired by nature in some way. It connected my love for science, writing, and even Ukrainian culture — in the book, I mention how my interest in nature grew after I started to fully appreciate the pidpenky (honey mushrooms) next to my parents’ house.
So I wrote this book. I graduated college. And then I moved to Ukraine.
I guess it didn’t happen quite that simply, though it really wasn’t a tough decision. The Big Three in my life have always been science, writing, and Ukrainian dance. I did the science degree thing, I did the writing thing, and I was ready to focus mainly on dance.
I heard about the Our Year in Ukraine program around March 2017, learned a bit more about it, thought about it (for two minutes), and decided it was exactly what I needed. I was ready to get out of Winnipeg for a bit, I was excited to learn more about the country of my ancestors, and I was excited to push myself in Ukrainian dance.
While there, I wrote a blog to keep family and friends up to date on what I was doing, but it became a lot more than that — it was an excuse for me to explore, to do more research about the places I was in, and to share about my experience in a country not well known by some.
I also wrote a monthly column about a Canadian’s take on the Ukrainian lifestyle for What’s On, an English-language magazine based in Kyiv.
Though I missed family and friends while in Ukraine (really, I did), I felt so alive, like I wasn’t just going through the motions. I was writing. I was dancing. I was exploring. I was learning.
Since moving back to Canada, I’ve worked for various magazines in Winnipeg — right now, I’m an editor at a company that produces trade magazines, plus I freelance here and there.
To keep the Ukraine part of my soul (so, 99 per cent of it) happy, I do a few fun Ukraine-related things, besides dancing and instructing dance. I write for Oseredok’s culture page in the Winnipeg Free Press (you better believe Hannah is my star editor for that).
Benefit Concert for Bukovets Secondary School, 2019
I also am an English proofreader for Ukraïner, a website that posts stories from across Ukraine. But these aren’t stories you’ll find in many other media outlets. The Ukraïner team travels to villages, towns, and cities, sharing stories from everyday people, plus a few celebs, as a way to preserve Ukraine’s traditions and to promote its culture. Going on a Ukraïner expedition is basically my dream. Here’s hoping.
I still keep up with my blog, posting about Canada’s Ukrainian diaspora and maybe a story or two from when I lived in Ukraine. Though my blog and Vsi cover similar topics, different mediums mean a different way of approaching the story.
All these little Ukraine-themed odd jobs I do keep me connected to Ukraine. Each time I sit down to write whatever, I’m learning something new about the topic (or, let’s be real, many unrelated topics to what I’m writing but something still Ukrainian and something still cool). It makes me curious about some other aspect, so I try to learn a bit about that. And that opens up this new topic, and so on, and so on.
That’s what we’re thinking will happen with Vsi too.
We’re starting out with what we’re starting out with — simple as that. We’ll share some stories about our experiences training with folk ensembles in Ukraine, and we plan to interview some Canadian and Ukrainian instructors, dancers, and ethnographers. And each episode we put out will open up our brains to new ideas, for the show and for our creative lives in general.
I guess it’s about time I re-name my life’s timeline to pre-Ukraine, Ukraine, post-Ukraine/pre-Vsi, and Vsi.
A note from Hannah about Kaitlin: If I could rent or lease one of Kaitlin’s traits, it would be her innate desire to genuinely connect with people instead of trying to “be a hit” with them. In the most chaotic scenarios (picture a small apartment living room filled with twenty-somethings flailing their bodies to Ukraine’s Top 40), you can find Kaitlin chatting with someone on the side, eyes totally engaged, listening intently to the answers of her thoughtfully posed questions. In between busting out her own moves, she makes time to connect. She is a master listener and, in turn, a master storyteller.
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