“My wife asked, “What are you spending all this money for?’” smiles Gillies, who in late November completed what’s become his yearly charitable trip to Kyiv and Ukraine. “I answered, ‘What can I do? I’m all they’ve got.’” The ‘they’ are the children and other patients at the Malin hospital in Zhytomyr Oblast, 70 kilometres from Chornobyl. Gillies has become a regular visitor – and something like a guardian angel – at the hospital, helping the impoverished rural facility by purchasing the equipment it lacks and giving it cash. ...

Back in Scotland, Gillies, who is married and has two grown children, takes night classes in Russian and in computers –computers, because he’s interested in producing his own videos about life in Ukraine. His next project, meanwhile, involves not getting supplies into Ukraine, but getting a child out – an orphaned 11-month-old patient in Malin named Bohdan. The child, who weighs only five kilograms, requires Western medical attention, and Gillies would like to generate publicity in the U.K. press about him and get him adopted. At the same time, he’ll start raising money for his next benevolent mission into the exclusion zone. “If I can get this hospital some of what it needs, if I can help them,” he says, “then that’s enough for me.”" (A Ukrainian Hospital’s Scottish Hero)

And please note that there are many 'unsung heroes' who are not foreigners but are Ukrainian. (The following is a story involving multiple heroes. I am trying to track down the story of the young boy who saved his younger siblings by getting them out of their burning home. He later received an award from Pres. Yushchenko and his family was invited as guests to a popular talk-show. And during the broadcast, the boy's mother told the story of a man who helped them out tremendously by paying for a set of new windows needed as part of the renovation of their home, post-fire. The stranger saw a broadcast on the news, of what had happened to the family and generously donated.)

And even organizations assist: "As Head of the European Commission Delegation to Ukraine Ian Boag told a news briefing, 12 million EUR will be given by the European Commission and 1.3 million EUR by the UNDP. The main aim of the project is to promote the development of small communities, secure the functioning of the infrastructure, the health care system and protect environment. It is scheduled for 3.5 years." (NRCU) And though I could throw a fit regarding UNDP's assessment of Chornobyl, I am deeply grateful and thankful that funds are being made available.

And I look forward to the day in time, when the gap narrows dramatically between the needs of the Ukrainian people and assistance no longer required. My thanks to all who work to make this world a better place.