A baby boy born to Ukrainian parents in the U.K. has gone viral for his amazing mop of thick, floppy, white-blond hair. After his birth, he was likened to former U.K. prime minister Boris Johnson and gained a worldwide fan base. Twenty months on, there’s a second baby on the way, and the family can’t help but wonder if they will welcome another adorable celebrity lookalike.
Tatiana Doronina of Kyiv, 36, lives in London, England, with her husband Ruslan Barabash of Kamenetsk-Podilsk, 44. Their toddler, David, will turn two in March 2023.
The couple’s second baby is due the same month.
“The intrigue is actually what kind of baby I will have,” Tatiana told The Epoch Times. “All our families are wondering ... my friends, they’re joking, ‘Oh, maybe your second baby will look like the current prime minister!’”
David Alexander Barabash was born a week past his due date on March 1, 2021, which is also St. David’s Day. Weighing 8 pounds (approx. 4kg), his size was not the only surprise. Brunettes Tatiana and Ruslan were instead astounded by his full head of thick blond hair.
“I was like, ‘Do you have any blonds in your family? Because I don’t!’” Tatiana recalled asking her husband after David’s birth.“All the doctors were like, ‘Oh my god, what a baby! We’ve never seen this kind of baby before.’ Even if babies are blond, they usually have thin hair.”
Immediately, comparisons to Boris Johnson began. Ruslan even suggested that they name their baby Boris, but Tatiana wanted him to have his own identity. She chose David after reading about the significance of St. David, the patron saint of Wales, and loved the name.
Three days after David’s birth, the couple found out that Ruslan’s mother was born blond, making her the only family member to carry the blond gene which was passed on to David.
Tatiana described David’s hair as so thick that it even repels water. “When we try to shower him, he’s like a goose. The water comes off the top. He’s like an umbrella, his hair is never wet!” she said.
Tatiana was even interviewed by the media. At that time she had no idea that his pictures would spread so far and wide. However, David became famous not just in the U.K. but across the world and his story has been picked up by different media.
“I was stressed, I think I lost three or four kilos,” Tatiana said. “There was a moment when I actually was a little bit scared, because people were obsessed with it. He was like a little superstar. I covered his hair so people wouldn’t notice.”
Tatiana limited her photo uploads but soon grew fond of David’s Instagram following and their sweet comments.
“The majority [of comments] were actually very cute ... ‘What a beautiful baby!’ ‘What hair!’ ... people started to put their babies in comparison with famous people. It was amazing, it was funny,” she said.
But David has always been unfazed by his fame. “He’s not hungry for attention,” Tatiana said.
Tatiana moved to London at 30 to study at Regent’s University. Now an expert in luxury brand management, and CEO and co-founder of the British-Ukrainian Business Women Association, she met construction expert Ruslan at a bar in 2019, the night before a big run.
“I was chatting, chatting, chatting, and then I was like, ‘Oh my god, it’s five in the morning ... at 9 a.m. I have to run a 5k!’” she said. “Actually, I did it. Then he wrote to me and I said, ‘I just did my 5k already.’ He was like, ‘Oh my god, I just woke up! What kind of woman are you?’ He was impressed by that.”
However, for the next two months after they initially met, Tatiana got busy with her life and didn’t answer Ruslan’s texts. As soon as she got some spare time, the couple met and began dating.
Within three months, Ruslan had proposed to Tatiana in Paris. Within five months, the pair had tied the knot. Two months later, they were confined to their home in lockdown together. Another year after that, Tatiana was pregnant with David.
The baby boy’s luscious locks grew long before Tatiana and Ruslan took him for his first haircut. Tatiana said: “The problem was that people thought he was a girl; every time, everywhere, ‘Oh, such a beautiful girl!’ That’s why I decided to cut his hair.”
Coincidentally, Boris Johnson resigned as the U.K. prime minister around the same time.
“It wasn’t because Boris resigned, but at the end of the day it was kind of symbolic,” Tatiana said. However, even after his haircut, Tatiana said David continued to look like Boris Johnson.
Today, the proud mom describes her toddler as a “very interesting boy” who is handy around the house, loves to help his dad build furniture, and can draw using both his hands. He is learning to speak both English and Ukrainian and has a voice “like an angel.”
David is still white-blond and is growing fast, which baffles his parents, neither of whom is tall. Tatiana, a former model is also open to her son joining a baby modeling agency and is no longer worried about David’s lookalike status.
