Jay Schnell is a Canadian blogger, journalist, and volunteer who has been living in Ukraine for the past four years, reporting on Russia's armed aggression. His blog has attracted around 66,000 followers, including both Ukrainians and readers from abroad.
Jay is also the author of the photo book Beauty and Brutality, a collection of photos and stories from across Ukraine between 2022 and 2025.
"I originally studied psychology and counseling, and I used to work in addiction and trauma support. I was a trauma counselor at a drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility.
Later, I became interested in Latin American history and studied that as well. I lived in Colombia for a while, spent a lot of time in Mexico, traveled extensively, learned Spanish and a bit of Portuguese, and also lived in Brazil for some time.
While I was at university, I started a company providing video and photo services for businesses. I worked as a video editor, photographer, and cinematographer, and traveled around the world doing that for a while. That was essentially my job before.
I was never really a journalist before coming to Ukraine. In fact, I didn't come to Ukraine to become a journalist — it just happened.
That said, the nature of war reporting is horrifying. I never anticipated how deep I would get into it, how many risks I would take, or the things I would end up witnessing. I never imagined my life would turn out this way.
In terms of the fundamentals — reporting, writing, documenting — I was already close to that line. So in some ways, I fit into the role right away. But the job comes with a lot of difficulty. Even now, I sometimes feel uncomfortable calling myself a journalist."
Now Jay works as an ambassador for the Ministry of Development. He previously served in the Armed Forces of Ukraine as a press officer, managing media and press relations for a brigade, but is no longer in the military.
Today, he continues to volunteer, doing translation work in hospitals, helping provide adaptive clothing for wounded soldiers, and assisting Spanish-speaking volunteers from Latin America who come to Ukraine as foreign fighters.
"It's a way for me to stay involved and offer assistance without the extreme risks I faced in eastern Ukraine. Using my language skills not only helps others but also allows me to keep improving and maintaining those abilities.
I've been in combat zones and in places I definitely shouldn't have gone, often with very little training. I'm very lucky to be alive.
Sometimes I look at my life and think: how did all this happen? At one point, I even returned to Canada and enrolled in a postgraduate journalism program, where I studied investigative journalism and gained a more formal understanding of the profession.
But I still question whether I'm truly a journalist. Maybe I'm more of a blogger. It's hard to capture everything I do in a single word. "Journalist" is an easy shorthand, but if we're being precise about definitions and professional boundaries, I'm not sure it fully applies. Still, it's probably the simplest way to describe my unusual job."
In his spare time from his main work, Jay also teaches English to children.
"When you're a teacher, in some way it feels like your job is to protect these kids, to guide them and teach them things. But when they are asleep at 1 a.m. and an explosion occurs because of a Russian attack, you know that innocent little girl with the smiling face is being terrorized. It's unfair. It's horrible. It's horrifying. It makes me really angry. Being a parent in Ukraine is probably very difficult."
"I decided to come to Ukraine even before the full-scale Russian invasion. By that point, I'd already visited around 35 countries, many of them in Europe, and a lot of people had told me I would love Ukraine. I was in Estonia at the time and decided to just get on a plane and fly here. It was January 7, 2022.
I made friends right away. From day one, I had a great time. I was struck by the architecture — it felt so unique, so different from anywhere else I'd been. There was something really alluring about it. Ukraine was also very different then from what it is now in many ways.
I remember thinking, "I like this place. Maybe I'll stick around." People were talking about the possibility of war, but I didn't fully believe it would happen. I had partly bought into the prevailing idea at the time that Russia wouldn't actually invade — that it was just Western propaganda, which many people believed. And this was just over a month before the full-scale Russian invasion began.
When the war in Ukraine broke out, it felt like it was my opportunity to use my voice so I could speak up about something that I think is wrong — Russia attacking Ukraine and trying to invade its territory.
I could make videos about this, I could finally be an activist. But that inspiration and motivation generally came from historical knowledge. I think that's why it's important for us to understand history."
"I'm from Canada — from Saskatchewan — where there's a large Ukrainian diaspora. So I grew up around Ukrainian culture and certain elements of Ukrainian cuisine. Part of my family is originally from Ukraine as well, from Kherson Oblast.
I didn't truly understand much about Ukraine, its history, or its internal culture until I arrived. I think one of the biggest challenges for me at first was understanding the Soviet mentality.
A simple example would be assuming someone was angry with me or yelling at me, when in reality they were saying something completely normal — or even kind. Because of the more stoic nature of people in this part of the world, they can sometimes be hard to read. Where I'm from, people tend to be more emotionally expressive — they smile more, for example.
Over time, many of my perceptions shifted. The way I operate and see the world has definitely changed during the four years I've lived in Ukraine. And I don't think that's a bad thing. I've learned a lot from Ukrainians.
In Canada, we might sometimes be overly polite, and there's something to be said for the more direct style of communication here. The way people interact in Ukraine can, at times, be more efficient and practical than how we do things back home. I think our cultures could definitely learn from each other — but that's not something I understood at the beginning."
"I've always been open, accepting, and curious about other cultures, especially given my academic background in cultural studies. I wouldn't say that living in Ukraine changed any fundamental element of my Canadian identity. But I am very proud of what Canada has done to support Ukraine. Since 2014, the Canadian Armed Forces have been in central and eastern Ukraine, training and assisting the Ukrainian military after the war began that year.
It's meaningful to see the close relationship between the two countries."
