Episode 21: Eleven Attempts: Sergéy Ulyanov on Fleeing Belarus, Ukraine, and Starting Over in LA

The Immigrant Perspective · Oct 21, 2026 · 1h 19m

Sergéy Ulyanov grew up in Minsk in a two-bedroom flat shared by six people: his mother, grandmother, grandfather, uncle, and great-grandmother. His grandmother worked as a secretary in the office of Belarus's president, and after school he would tag along, making crosswords and school presentations in a building where doors were sealed with wax stamps. He once realized that the New Year's speech the president delivered on television was one he had watched his grandmother type days earlier. When she died of cancer, Sergéy was thirteen, and his life turned overnight: a stepfather who made him…