Maryna Kumeda – Lyon, France
Kyiv Post: Where are you from in Ukraine?
Maryna Kumeda: I come from a relatively small city, the regional center of Sumy in eastern Ukraine, but spent my last four years in Kyiv studying in Kyiv Mohyla Academy before leaving for France.
KP: When did you leave; why did you leave?
MK: I left a couple of days just before the end of year 2006.
As of the reason for my departure, there is not one, but a sum of circumstances and for some time a maturing wish to live and finish my university studies in some European country.
As French was my second after English language, and as at the moment I was in love with France and felt in love with Lyon during my European road trip in 2006, the choice of the place was easy – it was the capital of the Roman Gaul, Lyon.
KP: How did you end up in Lyon?
MK: After my first visit to Lyon during my hitchhiking road trip in August 2006. By the end of that year I came to live to Lyon. First, I studied French for a couple of months and then entered the university in 2007 to obtain my master’s degree.
This year, for the first time, I taught political science to bachelor students in this same university.
KP: Do you ever regret that you are not in Ukraine – why or why not?
MK: I don’t regret all the wonderful things that happened in my life. Sometimes I miss my friends and family, and wish I could see them more. But I am happy and satisfied with my life. And at this point, it takes place in France.
KP: What do you miss most about Ukraine?
MK: Family, friends, my favorite amateur theater “The Black Square” and shashliki-type of parties
KP: What do you miss least about Ukraine?
MK: Overall obsession with financial wellbeing.
KP: Does Lyon have more opportunities for you than in Ukraine?
MK: No, not per se, at least. As I have had my first professional experience here, I have developed a network and know more about this specific sector, non-governmental, functioning. But being a foreigner always makes it more difficult in an administrative way to find a job.
KP: What relatives and friends are left back in Ukraine?
MK: All my family, my childhood and university friends, as well as new acquaintances I’ve made since I left through blogging, etc.
KP: Do they visit you or do you visit them? Often?
MK: So far I’ve gotten only a few friends who’ve been able to obtain visas and come, but not my family. The three-year-long ongoing attempts for one of my best friends to visit Europe have just had another failure – visa refusal, although a couple of months ago she was in Germany, for her job.
This barrier on the margin of the European Union is the new Berlin Wall in my point of view.
