LC graduate leads with heart, voice

What Bogdan “Theo” Mynka found upon arriving in America two years ago was a world of opportunities he never imagined possible.

World Relief brought him, his father, stepmother and two half-brothers to Spokane from Ukraine, where his father had been persecuted for religious reasons. He had only been living with his father for a few years, having spent most of his childhood traveling with his mother and older brother doing missionary work. His mother is currently a missionary in the Philippines, and his brother a missionary in Bosnia.

His mother, who had taught Russian language and literature, home-schooled her sons most of the time they did missionary work in Bosnia, Croatia, poverty-stricken areas of western Ukraine and other locales.

“We brought the message of hope and God’s love,” said Mynka, 18. And even though he is strong in his own faith, while attending a Muslim school for a time in Bosnia, he came to appreciate other cultures.

Although his life on the road through six countries lacked comfort, he learned many skills, including the ability to speak Russian, Croatian and English, in addition to his native Ukrainian. He even placed third in a national competition in various aspects of English while living in Kiev. Now about to graduate from Lewis and Clark High School, he’s excelled in AP French as well.

He was always exposed to literature, and about two years before coming to America began reading the classics – Dickens, Austen, Shakespeare and others. He recalls being deeply moved by Jack London’s semi-autobiographical “Martin Eden,” which “left me in tears. I didn’t know words could do that.”

At LC, he learned that AP classes were available to him, so he dove in – AP calculus, English literature and language, comparative governments and French. “I’m the guy who stays up all night studying.”

Singing was always part of his missionary work, especially in Muslim areas where messages of God’s love and hope were best delivered a bit more indirectly. And when it was suggested that he could do something with his voice at LC, he jumped into that as well.

“Before I came to the United States, I never thought about my voice,” Mynka said. “I never knew there was an option to do something with it.”

In addition to singing with vocal groups at LC, he performed the role of the baker in LC’s production of the musical “Into the Woods” and was also in this spring’s production of “Thoroughly Modern Millie.”

And now he’s hoping to major in vocal performance or music education in college, something he also hadn’t realized might be possible in his life. With loans and a few scholarships, he will be able to enroll at Washington State University this fall. He continues to apply for scholarships, but some of those opportunities are limited because he is not yet able to become a citizen (a requirement of many kinds of financial aid). But he is undaunted.

“Even as an immigrant, you’ve got to give it a try,” he said. “We’ve had hardship all our lives; we’ve sort of majored in it. I’m very willing to work for anything I might achieve. I just want a chance.”