Ukrainian refugee starts anew due to family’s Holocaust kindness

Alex Bogancha lay in mattress, stressed as he and a buddy talked on the cellphone about whether or not Russia would invade Ukraine. It was earlier than daybreak on Feb. 24, 2022. He hadn’t slept. Warfare was all he might take into consideration.

A couple of hours later, a thunderous explosion answered his query. A Russian missile struck close to his residence in Kharkiv in jap Ukraine.

“It felt prefer it was proper outdoors my window,” the 18-year-old mentioned.

Bogancha, his mother and father and his 14-year-old sister rapidly loaded their canine, Lorik, and some days’ price of garments into their automotive. They joined a sea of site visitors heading west.

“Everyone was scared,” Bogancha mentioned. “Nowhere appeared to be protected. We didn’t know what to do.”

For almost every week, the household saved driving, sleeping of their automotive. Ultimately they reached Austria, the place one other refugee helped them get an condominium. “We have been fortunate to discover a place to stay,” Bogancha mentioned.

They have been grateful to have made it out, however Bogancha’s father, Andrii, fearful in regards to the future for his son, who had been in the midst of his freshman yr at Kharkiv Nationwide College. The daddy had hoped a fast finish to the warfare would permit the younger man to proceed his research, however the preventing saved going.

Then got here an surprising provide of assist in a WhatsApp message from a girl 6,000 miles away in Tarzana. She knew one thing particular in regards to the household’s historical past that will alter the course of his son’s life.

“I by no means believed in future,” Bogancha mentioned. “However after this example, I’ve modified my thoughts.”

An 80-year-old debt

The day was bitterly chilly as Zhanna Arshanskaya Dawson desperately knocked on the door of the Bogancha residence.

It was winter 1941. Dawson, 14, had trudged for miles within the snow, holding quick to 5 sheets of music, Frédéric Chopin’s “Fantaisie-Impromptu,” tucked below her clothes and her father’s last phrases in her ears: “I don’t care what you do, simply keep alive.”

That day, Nazi troops had rounded up Dawson and her household and despatched them, together with different Jews, on a 12-mile march towards a ravine on the southern fringe of Kharkov, as the town was then recognized. Only a mile from the vacation spot, Dawson’s father bribed a guard with a gold pocket watch to let his daughter escape.

She fled, hiding in a crowd of onlookers, by no means to see her mother and father or grandparents once more. They, together with about 16,000 others, have been executed on the sting of the ravine, often called Drobitsky Yar.

Dawson sought refuge on the residence of a non-Jewish classmate, Nicolai Bogancha. She hoped his household — whom she knew as “good-hearted folks” — would let her in.

When his mom answered the door, she pulled Dawson inside to security.

Two days later, the Bogancha household heard that Dawson’s 12-year-old sister, Frina, was close by, hiding with one other household. They took her in too. Frina, who died in 2019, by no means revealed how she escaped.

For 2 weeks, the ladies hid in an underground fruit cellar at any time when they have been spooked by an surprising noise or go to.

However the sisters have been precocious piano gamers and native celebrities. Everybody knew they have been Jewish. What if a neighbor noticed them? They wanted a brand new plan.

They adopted new birthdays and names. Zhanna grew to become Anna and Frina grew to become Marina. The Boganchas helped them devise a narrative to clarify why they have been instantly orphans — their imaginary father was a Russian military officer killed in motion, and their mom had died in a bombing.

The Boganchas organized for a horse cart to take the ladies to the town outskirts. From there, the ladies made their strategy to an orphanage, the place a piano tuner finally heard Dawson play. He launched the 2 women to a theater director who was in control of entertaining German troopers. The sisters carried out for them all through the remainder of the warfare, securing their survival.

Years later, after the sisters immigrated to the U.S., after they attended the Juilliard College of Music in New York, and after Dawson married and commenced to show music at Indiana College, she advised the story to her son, Greg Dawson, who wrote a e-book about her expertise, “Hiding within the Highlight: A Musical Prodigy’s Story of Survival.”

“I used to be not taking part in for them,” Dawson advised her son. “I used to be taking part in for my mom and my father and for the music. For Beethoven, for Mozart, that’s who I used to be taking part in for.”

The e-book turns into key

In 2013, Marina Orlovetsky of Tarzana was given a replica of the e-book. She learn it in a single sitting.

“I simply couldn’t cease studying it,” she mentioned.

Orlovetsky, 61, grew up in Kharkiv too, however didn’t know the Drobitsky Yar tragedy occurred in her hometown. Her Soviet-era faculty books by no means talked about the phrase “Holocaust.”

For her, Dawson’s story was key to unlocking the true historical past of her birthplace. She got down to discover her and found Dawson was dwelling in Atlanta. After recognizing her cellphone quantity on-line, Orlovetsky known as, and the 2 spoke in Russian for almost three hours.

“She advised me all the pieces,” Orlovetsky recalled. “That was how our friendship started. I used to be fascinated by her story. It was like a part of my life.”

A few months later, she met Dawson and her son at a Holocaust Remembrance Day occasion at Chapman College in Orange County. At 86, Dawson had been invited to carry out her signature piece — Chopin’s “Fantaisie-Impromptu.” She did so, effortlessly, from reminiscence. The 5 pages of sheet music she had carried along with her when she fled the Nazis have been protected at her son’s residence.

A couple of years later, Orlovetsky stumbled upon an article in regards to the Holocaust that Andrii Bogancha had posted on Fb. His final identify caught her consideration. His ancestors had saved her buddy on that bleak day in 1941.

She despatched him a message: “I simply advised him, please settle for my greatest respect for you and your loved ones,” Orlovetsky mentioned.

She then adopted up with a present basket, which included a replica of “Hiding within the Highlight” and a CD with recordings of Dawson’s piano performances.

A village of strangers band collectively

Orlovetsky and Andrii Bogancha saved in contact through the years. As warfare as soon as once more approached Kharkiv, they exchanged messages. She stayed in contact all through the Boganchas’ escape, then made her provide of assist.

As soon as Andrii Bogancha accepted, Orlovetsky reached out to Greg Dawson and his spouse, Sweet, for help. That they had been volunteering with Ukrainian Moms and Kids Transport (UMACTransport), which helps Ukrainian refugees come to the U.S.

“I’m a son of Holocaust survivors,” mentioned one of many founders of the group, Michael Bazyler, a Chapman College legislation professor.

Bazyler’s mom would discuss rising up in a peaceable Ukraine — till “abruptly being bombed and working away along with her household.” The Russian invasion has felt like “a repeat of the horror story,” he mentioned. In one other coincidence, he was the one who had invited Dawson to play Chopin on the Chapman live performance the place she and Orlovetsky had first met in individual.

UMACTransport volunteers secured Alex Bogancha’s admission to Santa Monica School, and an area filmmaker, Andy Lauer, agreed to be his monetary sponsor.

“I’ve an 18-year-old son. What if he was instantly displaced?” mentioned Lauer, who hosted a Ukrainian household of 5 final spring. “For me, it was private.”

Michael Solomon, whose spouse of 32 years died of most cancers final yr, provided to let Bogancha transfer into his poolside guesthouse in Santa Monica. “It simply felt like the best factor to do,” mentioned Solomon, 72.

Greg Dawson booked Bogancha’s flight. Orlovetsky shopped for requirements.

“All of the items simply got here collectively,” she mentioned.

Rebuilding with ‘such type folks round us’

On a moist January afternoon, 9 months after she despatched her WhatsApp message, Orlovetsky stood amid a gaggle of well-wishers at LAX clutching a plate with a loaf of bread and salt — a welcoming gesture.

Once they noticed Bogancha making his means by way of the terminal, the group cheered enthusiastically and waved American flags — then took turns embracing him. Orlovetsky FaceTimed Bogancha’s mother and father to allow them to know he’d arrived safely. His mom sobbed as he smiled and waved.

“He’s right here!” Orlovetsky mentioned in Russian. “He’s lastly right here!”

Bogancha was dissatisfied that he by no means received an opportunity to fulfill Zhanna Arshanskaya Dawson, who died at 95 simply days earlier than he arrived, however he’s rapidly settled into his new life: He walks quarter-hour to highschool — his backpack slung on his shoulder, the varsity’s emblem on his sweatshirt. The surf and sand are lower than two miles away. The view is starkly completely different than in war-stricken Kharkiv.

Any day now, Bogancha’s mother and father and youthful sister predict to obtain approval to affix him in L.A. He hopes to take them to Disneyland.

“I believe we simply must be grateful for all the pieces that we will, in order that we will stay,” he mentioned. “We have now such type folks round us.”

Alex Bogancha sees his new momentary residence, Michael Solomon’s guesthouse, for the primary time. As he walked in, he saved repeating “wow.”

(Francine Orr / Los Angeles Occasions)

Since being in L.A., he’s eaten at In-N-Out Burger — a ceremony of passage — gone on hikes in Malibu, taken the bus on his personal to discover Hollywood and walked alongside the Santa Monica Pier. He’s discovered consolation by training guitar and befriending different Ukrainian refugee teenagers by way of the messaging app Telegram.

Dawson had dementia for a number of years earlier than her demise, so her son wasn’t in a position to inform her in regards to the Russian invasion or how the household had been in a position to reciprocate after the kindness the Boganchas had bestowed on her many years in the past.

However the occasions have prompted Greg Dawson to mirror on his personal legacy, together with the delivery of his granddaughter, who wouldn’t be alive if not for the dangers that the sooner era of the Bogancha household had taken.

Michael Solomon, left, and Alex Bogancha at a welcome social gathering at Andy Lauer’s residence. Michael Solomon is offering Alex with housing and Andy Lauer is his monetary sponsor.

(Francine Orr / Los Angeles Occasions)

As soon as all of the Boganchas arrive in California, Greg Dawson, who lives in Florida, plans to host a memorial service in L.A. for his mom — and invite the village of strangers who helped the 2 households reconnect.

“What a disgrace it’s that she is just not in a position to see this a part of the story. The way in which it comes full circle,” he mentioned. “It’s additional redemption of all the pieces they went by way of and all the pieces the Boganchas did for them.”

As for Orlovetsky, who served because the bridge between the 2 households, she says she “simply did what each regular human being would do.”

“I simply need to make them really feel that each good deed will probably be [paid back] 1,000 occasions extra while you do one thing good.”

Greg Dawson, left, at Lake Lily in Maitland, Fla.; Alex Bogancha walks residence from Santa Monica School.

(Sydney Walsh / For The Occasions; Francine Orr / Los Angeles Occasions)