Shoptenko revealed details of her romance with the foreigner she married

38-year-old Ukrainian dancer and choreographer Olena Shoptenko shared details for the first time about her new partner, who has become her third husband. She also talked about how she met the foreigner and how their relationship began.

“Christian is an Austrian who is becoming Ukrainian, as I jokingly call him. He works in security and risk management. To put it simply, his job is to help people and organizations prepare for various risks and overcome crisis situations. For many years, he worked with large companies and humanitarian organizations in very challenging regions of the world, including Ukraine—long before we met,” she said in an interview with Marie Claire.

According to her, her husband currently works in Vienna at the ICMPD—an international intergovernmental organization that addresses issues of migration and migration policy. In addition, Shoptenko’s husband runs his own consulting firm.

“But what’s especially important to me is what he has done and continues to do for Ukraine. He didn’t just work there professionally. He also independently funded and implemented humanitarian projects in Ukraine, investing his own money and time, because he genuinely cares about the country. I simply couldn’t be with someone who held different views,” the choreographer stated.

Shoptenko added that Christian is “very inquisitive”:

“He dives, rides a motorcycle, loves to travel, and can talk for hours about history and different countries. He has an incredible sense of humor, very similar to mine, so we’re never bored together.”

Speaking about how and when they met, the dancer explained that it happened about four years ago at one of the New Year’s events for Ukrainian displaced children in Vienna.
 

“I was leading a dance workshop for the children, and Christian was a co-organizer of the event. And interestingly, even back then, we were both there with our own children: I was with my son, and Christian was with his daughter. My father was also at that event; he was visiting me in Vienna at the time. But our relationship didn’t start right away. We began spending more time together and dating about six months after we met. Christian proposed to me about a year into our relationship. But it took us much longer to actually get married. In other words, two and a half years passed between the proposal and our decision to get married,” Shoptenko shared.

The dancer spoke about this in an interview with Marie Claire.
 

Shoptenko got married in secret and introduced her husband.