Illona Fountain, who was born in Kyiv, Ukraine but has been a U.S. citizen most of her life, is getting the word out for a fundraising event this Saturday, March 19, at Pittman Park United Methodist Church to help people made refugees by the Russian military invasion.

“I have many friends and family that have immigrated here from Ukraine or remain there,” Fountain wrote in an email. “I feel an urgent need to help the people that are suffering there now … specifically the huge numbers of people that have become refugees.”

Open to the public, the event is slated to last from 8 a.m.  until 2 p.m. at the church at 1102 Fair Road, Statesboro. In addition to accepting donations through the church, volunteers will hold a raffle of items donated by individuals and businesses. Checks should be made out to Pittman Park United Methodist Church, she said, and receipts will be given upon request for tax deduction purposes.

Although Fountain has been an American for all of her adult life and a Bulloch County resident for almost 25 years, the current news from Ukraine feels personal to her, as she described in an interview.

“Normally I don’t get emotional, I’m very composed, but when I come home and watch the news now, I just start crying,” Fountain said. “I have to put myself together, especially for this weekend to talk to people.

“But everyone in Bulloch County and the surrounding areas has been very gracious,” she added. “I’ve had college students, young adults, call me and just ask me questions, and they’re just amazed, and when I tell them what’s going on as far as the people in Russia don’t know what’s going on, they’re like in shock.”

Born in the USSR

When Fountain was a child living there in the 1970s, Ukraine was a different place politically. It was one of the 15 “socialist republics” of the now long-defunct Soviet Union, of which Russia was by far the largest, all governed the Communist Party.

Originally Illona Kagan, Fountain was born to a Russian-speaking, Jewish family in Ukraine. She was only 7 when she arrived in the United States with her parents in May 1979.

Her father, a chemist, left the Soviet Union on a work visa, and they traveled first to Italy and Germany, staying a few months in each, before flying to the USA, where her parents applied for citizenship. As a minor child of parents who became naturalized citizens, she automatically became a citizen as well.

They settled in Atlanta, where Illona grew up and married a man from Bulloch County, Philip Fountain. She moved here with him and their two children in 1997, and he is also taking part in the effort to help Ukrainian refugees.

Ilona Fountain has something in common with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is Jewish and also grew up speaking Russian. Ukrainian is the country’s official and most common language, but a large minority of Ukrainians use Russian as their first language. Fountain retains her ability to speak Russian but converted to Christianity.

Her father died in 2020 from COVID-19 complications, but her mother and her aunt still live in the Atlanta area, and they and Fountain maintain contacts with some relatives and friends in Ukraine.

“We do have some family and friends in the Kyiv area,” Fountain said. “The last correspondence that we had from my uncle – it was him and his wife and his daughter, her husband and their three kids – they left and went to Romania. He wanted to stay back; he’s 73. The last correspondence that my family had from him was on March 1st.”

She said the man she referred to as her uncle is actually a distant cousin.

Putin vs. Zelensky

When Fountain’s mother called a childhood friend who now lives in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and told her what was going on in Ukraine, the woman in Russia did not believe it, Fountain said. This reflects the very different version of events people in Russia are getting from their media after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government outlawed even calling the war a war.

Fountain said that Putin “unfortunately has put Russia back 50 years.” She called Zelensky “such a great leader” because of his courageous defense of his country and said she wishes America would do more to help.

Saturday’s drive will be the second event for relief of Ukraine that Pittman Park UMC has hosted. The first was on March 5.  The church works with the United Methodist Committee on Relief and its fund for direct assistance to people in Ukraine and those who have fled Ukraine to seek safety in neighboring countries.

“We’ve talked to these people, we’ve got their credentials, so it is a legit thing,” Fountain said. “Any proceeds, be it cash or check, that come made payable to the church will be given to that organization.”