The Ukrainian women who have fled to Lithuania are not waiting for social payments or assistance from the state. While some go to work, others take matters into their hands and start businesses from scratch.
Natalia Nesterenko and Yekaterina Semenyuk were running a dairy business in Kyiv before the start of the full-scale Russian invasion.
“We had contracts with clients. We had a lot of work and a lot of plans,” Natalia says. “We were involved in setting up dairy processing plants and establishing dairy technology in those plants.”
When they arrived in Lithuania, Natalia and Yekaterina wanted to find jobs to provide for themselves.
“We’re not used to just sitting and doing nothing. We understood that we needed to quickly integrate into this society. We didn’t want to be dependants here,” Natalia says.
According to her, she and Yekaterina went to several job interviews but realised that they could not work for someone else after having run their own business for years. The women then decided to start a new business from scratch in Vilnius since transferring their enterprise from Kyiv was impossible.
“We decided that we could provide cleaning services, as we’re hard-working. We posted an ad on Facebook, and we received a flurry of calls,” the Ukrainian women recall.
According to them, they mostly look for clients on social media. Some people become regular clients and recommend the services of Ukrainians to their friends.
Natalia and Yekaterina said they did not expect their services to be in such high demand, so they were already expanding their business and inviting other Ukrainian refugees to work with them.
“We have never worked physical work before. Here in Lithuania, we have to do it, but we don’t regret it, we’re grateful for everything,” the women say.
Yekaterina Serdyuk fled to Lithuania from Dnipro. In Ukraine, she used to have a children’s clothing brand, which was popular among the locals.
According to the woman, she hoped to continue developing her brand in Lithuania but later settled on selling traditional Ukrainian embroidered shirts called vyshyvanka.
“Before moving to Vilnius, I wanted to buy a vyshyvanka for myself. My friends who were already in Lithuania also asked me to bring them these shirts. That’s how my business started,” Yekaterina says.
“I realised that people wanted to be in touch with their roots and show that we were Ukrainians. Lithuanians also buy vyshyvankas to express their solidarity and support for Ukraine,” she adds.
In Lithuania, the owner of a vyshyvanka shop also supports Ukrainian craftsmen who have lost work due to Russia’s war in their country.
“When I started looking for vyshyvankas for my friends, I met a lot of Ukrainian craftsmen. They were sitting without work because when the war started in our country, people stopped thinking about clothes,” Yekaterina recalls.
She says she now has orders not only from Lithuania but also from other European countries where people want to express support for Ukraine.
“This is a symbol of Ukraine, a symbol of unity with the state. Vyshyvanka helps me feel proud to be Ukrainian. My goal now is to dress as many Europeans as possible in vyshyvankas,” the woman shares.
Women from Ukraine, who started businesses in Lithuania, were now slowly adapting to a new life. Although they do not know when they will be able to return home, they say their aim is to inspire other Ukrainian women to not be afraid and start their life anew.
“When everything was wiped out, businessmen were left with huge debts. But they went to another country and started from scratch, not knowing anyone, not having any savings,” Yekaterina says.
“We are an example for other Ukrainians and our children. We will not be broken because in any situation, we will be able to rebuild our lives, and we will definitely rebuild our homeland,” she adds. (LRT/Business World Magazine)
