Suzanne's Mom's Blog

Do you know the legend of the Jongleur de Notre Dame?

My francophone blogger friends should correct me if I get this wrong, but the way I remember it is that a man wanted to present a gift at the statue of the Virgin Mary but was desperately poor. He had a different kind of gift, though — a talent for juggling. The story goes that he juggled with all his heart and soul in front of the sculpture, and it gently bowed its head to him.

That’s the kind of miracle that feels real.

Today people are donating money and whatever talents they have in order to help Ukrainians invaded by Russia. First off, John, my son, who continues to employ optical engineers in Ukraine for remote work.

Another Massachusetts resident, Dean Cycon of Dean’s Beans Organic Coffee, is going with his wife, Annette, to Poland to work with World Central Kitchen, which is feeding thousands of Ukrainian refugees. Dean and Annette both have forebears they say were chased out of Europe by Russia. Their story is detailed at the Greenfield Recorder, here.

Boston doctors, interviewed here, made YouTube videos to teach ordinary Ukrainians how to treat war wounds. According to the Washington Post, “The video is less than 40 seconds long — but its creators say it could help save lives in Ukraine.

‘The data we know from the battlefield is that a significant amount of deaths are preventable with taking these steps,’ Eric Goralnick, an emergency medicine physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. …

“Goralnick is the doctor shown acting out the tutorial in the short video, which provides a list of actionable steps written in Ukrainian. Another video, about 4½ minutes long, features a more detailed, step-by-step narration in Ukrainian by Nelya Melnitchouk, a Ukrainian-born oncology surgeon at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.” More.

The nonprofit group End Hunger New England is pivoting from mostly local needs to help Ukrainians, too, but according to the Christian Science Monitor, the group was stumped about how to deliver the meals so far away. Then a Boston-based shipping company, BOC International, stepped up. “It’s handling all the logistics,” the Monitor reports, “No charge.”

Along with Asakiyume, I myself have joined a crowd of editor-types to help media people in Kyiv clean up translations of events so the Ukrainians can share the latest on Anglophone social media.

I am so grateful for this opportunity, which Asakiyume, a friend I met 25 years ago when we were both copyediting at a management magazine, offered me.

How it works: bilingual Ukrainians translate local news into English the best they can, then send it to colleagues to check as well as to “proofreaders,” mostly American. As proofreaders, we try to make the English sound more natural.

The organization we are helping works 24 hours a day. I know I’m getting more out of it than I am giving. Talk about real! If I want to sacrifice, I ought to sign up for the sparse 2 a.m. shift.