Even as Air-Raid Sirens Blare, Ukrainians Wait for the Light to Change

New York Times

12 hours ago

Fires still smoldered throughout Kyiv, Ukraine, after another record number of drone and missile attacks in the early hours of a recent Tuesday. But when an air-raid siren blasted out just before noon, pedestrians at a busy intersection did not scurry for cover or play chicken with traffic.
Mariam Mirakian, 25, waited patiently at the red light. So did everyone else. On the sidewalks of Ukraine's capital, order ruled.
'Yes, there are rockets flying and all the things, but still you can get killed by a car,' Ms. Mirakian said. 'You're just trying to live normally, trying to save as many normal things as possible, even in wartime.'
Anyone new to Ukraine notices the disconnect between the front line and much of daily life farther away. Complicated espresso drinks are still sold at gas stations; pizza and sushi are still on offer; and rave parties still rave, even if they end at 11 p.m., in time for the midnight curfew. The desire for order is core to how Ukrainians cope in this fourth year of Russia's full-scale invasion.
Traffic lights seem to be the most obvious sign of how Ukrainians hold onto normalcy. Red means stop. Green means go. There is no yellow light here, no caution, no chancing it. Even during air-raid alarms.
'Even when I walk my dog in the evening and there are no cars at all, I still wait at the curb,' said Volodymyr Yeremenko, 63, a resident of Pryluky, a city of about 52,000 people about 90 miles east of Kyiv, who had come to the capital for a doctor's appointment.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.