I am a Russian-speaking Ukrainian. I am ethnically half-Russian, as my father was born in Siberia. I spent much of my life in Donetsk, a Russian-speaking area of Ukraine. Now I live in Kiev. My kids speak Ukrainian in school and with many of their friends, and we speak Russian at home. When my son's fourth-grade teacher talks to me, she speaks Ukrainian. I respond in Russian. We don't even notice that our conversation is in two languages. I understand Ukrainian but don't speak it as easily as I speak English. I just never had any pressure to learn it. In Lviv, in the western part of Ukraine, most speak primarily Ukrainian, but even there, I never had anybody look down on me for my Russian. In the eastern and southern regions, many people speak Russian, and there is absolutely no forced "Ukraineization."
@highlight
Ukrainian Maia Mikhaluk has been documenting the unrest in her country
@highlight
She says the situation in Kiev is tense as Russia moves its troops to the Crimean Peninsula
@highlight
She wrote a passionate essay in response to Russia's military intervention in Ukraine
But when I moved out of the area of aggressive Russian information, I quickly realized I can speak Russian in @placeholder or Lviv and no one will ever be upset with me!