'Bomb exploded my house': Ukrainian U of S wrestler starts fundraiser to bring family to Canada

A wrestling scholarship at the University of Saskatchewan brought Bohdan Titorenko to Canada four months ago, leaving his parents Alexander and Ireina and two younger siblings Anfasa and David in their hometown of Zhytomyr, Ukraine.

Titorenko has been forced to watch his homeland invaded by Russia from halfway across the world.

“It’s really hard, because every day more explosion, more explosion and who knows what can happen, Third World War,” he said.

Titorenko says his father, who’s fighting in the war, described to him over the phone the moment his house was turned to rubble.

“Bomb exploded my house, it’s destroyed, I don’t have a house anymore,” he said.

“It's super hard, it's super, super hard when you hear. It’s financial, but it's okay, financial, it not matter. Matter is like, civilian people die. Russia is killed civilian people.”

He says his mother and siblings have fled to Poland, and he’s started a GoFundMe to help pay for them to come to Canada.

“It’s going to be like $10,000 and more. Like you know it's just I try to raise, I have just $1,000 right now, but it's not quite enough.”

Titorenko says it was his responsibility as the family’s oldest child to come to Canada for education while pursuing his dream of becoming an Olympic wrestling champion with the Huskies.

If not for that responsibility, he says, he would be fighting in Ukraine.

“I still have my grandmother in Ukraine. I still have my aunt, I still have my cousin in Ukraine. All my friends fighting right now for Ukraine,” he said.

“Easy change my destiny, for my parents be here, I could be better in Ukraine right now, fight for my country. I am easy sacrifice my life for my parents' life, and for my family life.”