Victoria Zinevych 16, female from Donetsk

Hello, my name is Vika Zinevich and I am 15 years old and I want to tell you a little bit about myself. I was born on February 16, 2010. I am from Ukraine and live in the village of Buzova. I’m in the 9th grade, I get good grades and go to competitions. I love learning foreign languages and recently started learning French in addition to English. I am a very creative person, I can draw beautifully, make beads, draw henna tattoos, take pictures, play volleyball and I love to cook. I have also taken a lashmaker course and extend eyelashes for girls. I also love swimming and dream of visiting the ocean at least once. I love traveling around the world and a visit to the United States will be an incredibly wonderful and rewarding experience and a way to relax from daily air alarms.

Let me tell you a little bit about my family: I have a younger brother Alex, who is 10 years old, and a mom Olga who is 39 years old and dad Valery who is 42 years old. My mother works in a kindergarten and my father works as a chief mechanic in a company. Now we live together with my parents in a modular town because my house was destroyed when the enemy army entered our village in the Kyiv region. It’s incredibly hard to describe the feeling when you realize that the place where you grew up all your childhood is gone in a moment. And also destroyed our school. And for almost 3 years now, we have been forced to attend kindergarten in 2 shifts. In addition, I have two grandparents, one of whom lives in Zhytomyr region and the other in Mariupol, and they have been there since February 24 until now.

I also like to meet new people and have many friends, one of whom is my best friend. We often go out together and visit the cinema, bowling and just spend time together.

One of my dreams is to travel a lot and visit all the corners of the world. Therefore, This trip will help me take a break from the horrors of war. Make new friends, explore a new country and its culture, improve my English and gain new knowledge that will help me in the future.