An Introduction to Ukraine - Milena Naymark

This Forum of the Humanist Community in Silicon Valley (www.humanists.org) was held on 03/03/2024. To see all of our Forum videos, please visit vimeo.com/hcsv.

In this wide-ranging lecture, Milena Naymark will look at Ukraine in several ways.

Geography and basic facts

History

Demography and language

Culture, including music, folklore, and cuisine

Famous scientists and achievements

Modern history, including the current 10-year war

Prospects for the future and hopes.

In addition to telling and showing us about Ukraine, Ms. Naymark has offered to cook some Ukrainian dishes to share with us.

Milena Naymark was born in Kyiv, into a Ukrainian, Polish, and Russian mixed family. As a child, she studied piano, voice, and music theory. She competed as a figure skater until she was 14, and joined archeological expeditions most of her life.

For her education, Ms. Naymark received a Bachelor of Math with honors at the National Math and Science Lyceum, Kiev. She earned a Masters in Architecture from National Art Academy, Kyiv, and studied in the PhD program in Architecture at the Moscow Prototype and mass Housing Institute.

Ms. Naymark spent her professional life in New York, New York for 14 years, and two years in Berlin, Germany. In New York, she worked as an architect focused on mass transit, healthcare, and schools and public buildings.

Starting in 2005, she worked in healthcare design at Kaiser Permanente and Stanford Medicine in California.

Currently the Head Architect Northern California for Kaiser Permanente, she lives in Woodside.

In the charity realm, Ms. Naymark co-founded Nova Ukraine, a Ukrainian-focused charity which was Number Two in the US from 2013 to 2022. She founded YOUkraine in 2023, where she still serves.

(Note: The opening and closing music in the video is Copyright (c) 2017 Brian J. Davis All Rights Reserved)