OLGA DANYLIAK

Social Worker

Date and Place of Birth: 1936 in Toronto, Ontario.

Date of Interview: July 11 2016

Place of Interview: Toronto, Ontario

Interviewer:  Kassandra Luciuk

Length of Interview: 00:58: 23

(Excerpt):

The thing that happened after the Second World War, the people who came over were very politically conscious and you had the Melnykivtsi and the Banderivtsi, right? My parents … I remember my father saying, “We’re just Ukrainian. We’re not either of that.” Because we weren’t caught up in that political thing in the same way. But the Ukrainian National Federation, the people who came to it, tended to be the people who supported Melnyk not Bandera, right, and so there were two categories of that. And, actually, when you’re saying was I aware of it, yeah, I was aware of it. We were aware of it. But we, you know, we really, in the say, university students club, later on in that, those things kind of died away. Like, you know, I think these were very much after the war, people who were really politically conscious. We belonged, I think, from a social-cultural and religious point of view. The political part of, I think, our family life was when my father, when my parents had come to Canada and tried to establish themselves and their own identity here. But it was there. I mean, you could talk about that one for a long time if you’re…

I did marry somebody who was later on, he was very much involved in Ukrainian theatre and they were based at Christie, which was the Banderivtsi, right. And he worked with Homin Ukrainy [Voice of Ukraine], which was the Ukrainian newspaper. And I can remember the first time I…he invited me to come to Christie Street, to the Banderivtsi. I think they were having a rehearsal or something there. And I thought the ground was going to open up and swallow me up. It was crazy, these prejudices that we had. Like, you know, instead of Ukrainians being caring for each other and being united, we were kind of, like, you were this or you were that. First of all, we went through it on a religious basis. Like, you wouldn’t marry an Orthodox or the Orthodox wouldn’t marry the Catholics and there was that whole thing. And then it was also that, you know, you married your own kind, like, you know. It was prejudices. But as the years went on all of that began to disappear.

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