Wartime tram ride in deserted Kyiv

At the wheel of her rusty red tram, Elena Sabirova crosses a barricade, then shakes her head at the sad fate of Kiev since Russian forces invaded Ukraine.

On his right, a group of soldiers check passing cars in search of weapons or explosives.

To its left stands a skyscraper whose balconies were destroyed and windows shattered by a missile a few nights following the attack by Russia on February 24.

Behind her, passengers, huddled once morest each other, watch the deserted streets of Kiev pass by, looking sullen.

Olena Sabirova never expected to find herself on the front line one day. “It’s scary,” sighs this 45-year-old woman, 19 of whom as a tram driver.

“At least I help people get where they want to go, to the bomb shelters, to the train station,” she says. “But otherwise, it’s scary,” she repeats.

Half the residents of this once populated city of around 3.5 million people have left. Those who remained seem frightened but also deeply saddened to see their city threatened with destruction.

“I’m worried, worried regarding the city. It had been developing for so many years,” says 69-year-old Mykola Konoplytsky.

“And now they are coming and destroying it. How are we going to rebuild it? with what money?” he wonders.

A few rows ahead of the retiree, Inna Khmelievska broods over the same dark ideas.

The 34-year-old, who works in a bar, rides Olena Sabirova’s 8K tram line every day and knows some of the passengers by name.

But his journeys along the eastern bank of the Dnieper, once conducive to daydreaming, are now punctuated by the sounds of explosions coming from the front north of Kiev.

“It’s fine when there are no explosions and it’s scary when there are,” she says. “I hear them when I’m on the tram, and I hear them when I’m at home,” she continues. “The city has changed”.

– Maze of barricades –

Olena Sabirova’s tram line is one of the few that continues to run through Kiev’s maze of barricades and checkpoints.

The left bank of the Dnieper is home to the city’s dormitory districts and some of its factories. The right bank has a richer history, and is closer to the front line.

Its trams quickly stopped circulating because they allowed a direct link between the front and the district housing the government buildings.

A resident of the right bank, Tanya Pogorila’s eyes wander through the shuttered shops and rubble along her route.

“It’s the first time I’ve been out since the start of the war,” says the 45-year-old woman. “Some of my worst fears are fading now. I’m mostly scared for my child,” she said, pointing to her baby boy, hiding between her legs.

“I feel sorry for Kiev but also for the whole country”.

Approaching the roadblock marking the last stop on her line, Olena Sabirova wonders how much longer she will be able to continue driving her tram.

“I haven’t seen anything so terrible, but I hear things, the explosions, the + booms +”, she says.

“I hope the guy up there in heaven sees I’m still doing it and takes it into account in the end,” she jokes sarcastically. “People seem grateful that I’m still working.”

For Mykola Konoplytsky, the retired, Russian President Vladimir Putin will soon order an assault on Kiev, as happened for cities like Mariupol or Kharkiv.

“I think Putin is saving Kiev for dessert,” he believes.