"I felt very strongly about supporting Ukraine because I felt like they're an independent sovereign country and it was important to help defend their democracy," said Deb Elek from Wake Forest.
Elek is a veteran who says she felt so strongly about Ukraine after Russia's invasion that she thought about leaving life in North Carolina to join them.
"My plan was to go and put on a uniform and go fight with them, but my family, my neighbors," said Elek. "Really. There's other ways you can help Ukraine."
On Friday, that meant lacing up. Proceeds from the skating fees at Polar Ice in Wake Forest are going to relief efforts in Ukraine.
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For many, it's personal - Misha Shvets came to study at UNC, now juggling life and work with bomb alerts from where his family still lives.
"The reality is the bombings only get harder, the weapons only evolve. My mother, who is in the city of Dnipro, is saying that the last bombing was like she had never experienced before, even though it was a few miles away, it felt like it was in her backyard," he said.
Shvets said over three years later, as Ukraine sometimes fades from headlines and support has been rocky, for them, it's very much real.
"Even though we bring you this beautiful art and we're smiling, we are also fundraising and we are shipping medical and humanitarian aid back home so that people who are wounded can survive," he said.
Some from their group, Ukrainians in the Carolinas, make several trips a year to help deliver supplies to Ukraine.