Like most organizations, Yachminka Ukrainian Dance Troupe took a bit of a hit during the two years of Covid. Tyla Betke who was a dancing member of Yachminka since she was a child, has brought the group back to life. In fact, they started up again last year.
“Last year we had three different age groups and now, we’re double that,” she said.
In September and October, she put out a call for people to come and try out Ukrainian dance in the Bunge Room of the Multiplex.
“We’ve doubled in size,” Tyla said. “We have over 40 kids aged 4 to 16 years old.”
It’s lovely too, she said, to see people coming back to the group, some of whom haven’t danced in years.
“And then there’s our older group who are 18 years up to somewhere in their 40’s,” Tyla said.
“We have sixteen ladies in that group some of whom, like myself and the Lovas girls, have been there before and have danced as kids and some ladies who have moved back to town and are joining for the first time.”
“We have Bernardo who is from Chile who has joined us too and Olha who is from Ukraine which is really great.”
“She told us she never thought she’d be moving to Canada and learning new dances from other regions of her country.”
It’s wonderful, she says, to see the explosion of interest.
“I left for ten years and then came back to it here,” she said. “It’s absolutely wonderful to have 16 adult dancers on stage - I’ve never experienced that before,” adding that a number of the adult members are parents of young dancers who themselves, have never danced.
All of the age groups, she said, are making great strides.
“We had a choreographer come out from Saskatoon in October to teach the club some new dances so I think we’re really solidifying our performances.”
Tyla is very pleased that Yachminka is still able to preserve the authenticity of their dance costumes as well.
“We’ve been fundraising this year to pay for our costumes, which still come from Ukraine, she said. “With the war, our suppliers that we’ve used in the past couldn’t send packages directly from Ukraine because of the interception of mail so now they have to drive them to Poland and ship from there which is more expensive but that’s understandable.”
There have been a few fundraisers already, she said including the sale of multi patterned lanyards and of course perogies. The next fundraiser will go to pay for the adult costumes for the adult dance group. And it’s a rather unique opportunity. Yachminka will be hosting a Ukrainian Cross Stitch workshop this month. While it was postponed by Mother Nature, the new dates are Feb. 21 and 28th in the Russell Library. The Wednesday evening classes will run from 6 - 8 pm. The patterns will feature designs from many regions of Ukraine. All supplies are provided for the $40 cost. As there’s limited spots, if you’re interested text 306-370-4008.
For the kids costumes, the Russell Lions Club has given them $2,000 to help toward that cost.
While they’re growing so swiftly, they won’t be having their annual competition this year but they plan to resume that next year as well as the Malanka Ukrainian New Years Eve celebration that was enjoyed by so many. Their annual concert is fast approaching too. That will be on Sunday March 3rd at 2 pm.