Nearly four years after Russia launched a full-scale war on Ukraine, St. Petersburg today exists in a strange limbo. Though the front lines are hundreds of miles away, drones occasionally fly overhead, airports shut down without warning and military recruitment ads are plastered over bus stops. The Moscow Times spoke to five residents of Russia’s second-largest city about how the war has transformed their everyday lives. Their surnames have been withheld to protect their identities. Maria, 32: ‘I dream of men dancing instead of killing’ Maria manages a dance school in central St. Petersburg. “Everything comes in waves,” she says, describing how student enrollment has fluctuated since the war began. “The first wave of departures came right after February 24, 2022.
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