Ripping Chain for Ukraine- Help raise funds for medical supplies

Danylo Gorenkin is raising money for British-Ukrainian Aid

Ripping chain for Ukraine · 19 March 2022

The fund raised will be spent to purchase the medical supplies here in the UK. The medical aid will be sent directly to the hospitals in Ukraine.

Story

Prelude, 13/03/2022

  • Ukrainian hospitals and doctors are in desperate
    need of medical aid and supplies which will help them treat those wounded and injured during the war in Ukraine.
  • The funds raised will be spent to purchase medical supplies here in the UK.
  • The medical aid will be sent directly to hospitals in Ukraine.
  • To help raise awareness of the war, and funds for medical equipment, I am organizing a rowing challenge with a group of students and athletes on Saturday 19th March on the South Bank outside the National Theater, London.
  • We would like to ask everybody to consider donating to this cause. In addition, we would like to invite everybody
    who is interested to take part in this challenge or support us in person at the National Theater.

Link to Facebook event: https://fb.me/e/2ghjNpUgG

To my friends and to everybody who I have not yet met.

My name is Dan (short for Danylo), and I am a research student at Queen Mary, University of London where I am studying for a PhD in structural biology.

To an incalculable number of people who are reading this, I am a tenacious, industrious athlete and teammate in the sport of rowing. It
goes without saying that together, those of you who have been a part of my 11-year rowing journey to date have pursued thousands of miles across the River Tyne, River Wear, River Thames and River Yare, through every state of sun or sleet that we experience here in Great Britain. Many others who I have not come to know personally would almost certainly have seen me race for University of London Boat Club or Durham University Boat Club within the last 6 years.

To my diligent lab friends at the Blizard Institute in Whitechapel, or previously at the John Innes Centre in Norwich and Durham University, I can be a roulette of cold focus or outgoing spontaneity and cheerfulness. I feel proud of my communities, strengthened by individuals from every corner of the Earth, and honoured that I can come into the lab each day full of hope and will- that I am able to express myself in the way that I was made to. In our world, unfortunately this is not to be taken for granted. 

I am sure everybody is well-aware of the situation that has escalated in Ukraine in the last 18 days. It is a waging of war against the country where I was born and where my extended family still live.

For Ukrainians, this is a fight for integrity. Striving to retain our identity as a nation and persevering to uphold our moral beliefs through the tests of time since 1991. It has been 18 long days since the first missile struck Ukrainian soil. The Ukrainian army and volunteers from around Europe have held off the second largest, and most violently indiscriminate military force on the planet. And so perhaps the idea of David standing up to Goliath could no longer be a one-off story. Perhaps it would turn out that a nation like this can be united by adversity, not torn apart by it as with millennia before. Perhaps there could be progress for Ukraine, not destruction. We dream on.

For my family in the City of Zaporizhia, alongside millions of civilians across the country, this invasion is a direct threat to our lives. Now is not a time of reassurance or peace for my family in Zaporizhia, nor is it so for my family and I here in London. In unison with people around the world, I feel injustice, and for what it is worth, now I must express myself. 144 million people currently face decade-long imprisonment for doing so in Russia.

I express myself best through teamwork and through sport. This Saturday 19th March, I am joining a special team of individuals whom
I had the pleasure of sharing my rowing career with in undertaking a challenge on the Concept 2 ergometer. We will set up these rowing machines on the South Bank public footpath outside the National Theater, where we will be completing relays of 100km on each machine. Non-stop, this should take around 7 hours.

I would like to solemnly and humbly ask for your donations and support towards providing medical supplies for Ukraine. My team and I would keenly like to invite everybody who reads this to come in person to support our cause, and if you are up for a physical challenge, even help us complete some of the distance. In addition, please consider sharing this event on your preferred social media platform. This fundraiser target of £500 is a start, but it is close to our hearts, and I know that many people will be aided by your generosity.

Thank you.

Dan Gorenkin

Donation summary

Total
£4,040.03
+ £552.75 Gift Aid
Online
£4,040.03
Offline
£0.00

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