Nazarii Pavlina arrived at Kelowna International Airport on Tuesday morning with red roses and a Ukrainian flag in hand.
The Kelowna resident was there to greet his sister, Nadiya Novosad, and two nephews, Eduard,17, and Yan, 12, who have fled their war-torn homeland of Ukraine.
“I can’t wait, I just want to see them,” Pavlina said just moments before the trio arrived.
At 9:55 a.m., the eastern European family of three arrived to a heartfelt reunion.
“I don’t have words, it’s so nice,” Pavlina told Global News of seeing his relatives.
Novosad said she’s happy to be safe on Canadian soil.
“I feel it’s good, I feel it’s very safe for me,” she said.
Her son, Eduard, echoed the sentiment.
“I feel good, there’s a lot of people that are good … friendly,” Eduard said.
The family is from Lviv, where they fled when Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.
“She said we left everything, house and many stuff,” Pavlina said as he translated what his sister said.
That includes her husband, as men have been ordered to stay behind and fight for the country.
“I am very worried about him,” Eduard said of his father. “You’re scared for your dad. Yes, yes and my family, my grandmother, my uncle.”
Novosad said saying goodbye to her husband was extremely difficult, but he insisted they get to safety.
“Every day, every night, every minute my heart is in Ukraine,” she said.
After 48 hours at the Ukrainian-Polish border, the family finally entered Poland, where they spent the next 20 days.
They said a Polish family took them in, housed and fed them until they were able to fly to Canada.
When asked about the carnage in her homeland, Novosad struggled to hold her emotions.
Her brother translated as she choked up, describing her thoughts on the invasion.
“She said we have a bad neighbour in Ukraine, but we love people, we love Russian people,” Pavlina said. “We’re peaceful people, you know. We don’t want fighting, we don’t want war.”
Novosad said her home in Lviv is now being used to shelter refugees from the east, which is under heavy bombardment.
As for the future, Novosad said she hopes for peace and to be reunited with her husband, hopefully in Canada.
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