Peterborough born British Ukrainian setting out on charity walk to help

Dan Zenchuk (37) was born in the city to Ukranian parents - and he has not forgotten his heritage, as he prepares to take on the 152 mile, six day walk to help those in his parents home land.

The walk will take him through seven locations - with the first letters of the locations spelling out ‘Ukraine.’

There are currently fears Russia could invade Ukraine imminently, as troops have gathered on the border.

Dan said: “I have recently joined a group of Ukrainians in various parts of the country to set up an appeal called “Support Ukraine UK”, with the aim of the appeal being to provide humanitarian aid for the servicemen and women on the front line, their families and the volunteers supporting them. This also started just a few weeks ago as the threat from further invasion from Russia grew.

“We set up a Facebook page and spread the word around the Ukrainian community in the UK, initially we organised local collections of aid items from the community, with myself covering Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire. In the first round we collected 140kgs just from the community in Peterborough alone and 500kg in total.

“Through my company, Danzen Logistics Ltd, I offered to sponsor the first ton of aid to be sent. In addition to this, we started a go fund me page to raise funds to buy equipment in Ukraine also – this to date has raised over £3200 in just two weeks.

“I was really happy at the support we received but wanted to do something personal and that’s where Walk For Ukraine came from. I started looking at distances to Ukraine, between cities in Ukraine etc but with conditions worsening (and Ukraine being the biggest country wholly in Europe!) there was no feasible route. So I came up with the idea of finding a route with towns/cities that spelt out UKRAINE, starting as close as possible to Peterborough and looping back towards home at the end. The route I came up with covers 152 miles over 6 days back to back, with the daily distance ranging from 13 to 36 miles).

“I am doing the walk alone but have asked members of the appeal group to join for a leg, or part of – so hopefully I’ll get some company, particularly on the longer days!”

Dan, who now lives in Stamford, still has family and friends in Ukraine, and he said there was concern over what was happening.

He said; “I was born in Peterborough to Ukrainian parents, with my grandparents originating from towns and cities close to Lviv, in the West of Ukraine – thankfully the remaining family there are therefore some way from the front.

“We have members of the appeal team based in Lviv who are receiving and helping distribute the aid the other end and of course keeping us up to date on the situation on the ground.

“Ukrainians have had to live with this threat for the past eight years and our forefathers faced these struggles also, it has made Ukrainians a tough and resilient people – the general impression is that they remain calm whilst it feels the rest of the world are fearful on our behalf, the threat is very real but Ukrainians will defend their nation if the time comes.”

For more information about Support Ukraine UK visit https://www.facebook.com/groups/645441263448017

For more information about the walk, visit https://www.facebook.com/walkforukr

To sponsor Dan visit https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/walkforukraine