KHARKIV, Ukraine 鈥� In Ukraine鈥檚 second-largest city, May was the toughest month on record since Russia鈥檚 full-scale invasion more than two years ago. Russian forces struck the city every day, sometimes several times a day.
On May 25, Russian forces hit a home improvement shopping center in the Kharkiv neighborhood of Saltivka, killing 19 people, including two children.
Viktoria Kitsenko, 53, was reviewing wallpaper orders when a hot blast knocked her over.
鈥淓verything was falling from above, everything was flying, all dust and fire,鈥� she recalled. 鈥淚 was just lucky enough to be near an exit.鈥�
Kitsenko said she was used to constant air raid sirens and explosions. But she said everyone in Kharkiv felt like a target after the new offensive began.
鈥淲e didn鈥檛 even talk about it, we just accepted it,鈥� she said. But when the strike hit her, she said, 鈥渋t still felt unexpected.鈥�
She stumbled outside, blood on her face, struggling to breathe. She thought about her daughter, who lives abroad, and her parents, who lived in the city. Her father kept calling her cellphone.
In the parking lot she saw bodies and a thick, black plume of smoke rising over her hometown.
鈥淭hey want an empty city鈥�
About half of Kharkiv鈥檚 2 million people left after Russia鈥檚 full-scale invasion. Russian troops occupied villages and land around Kharkiv until September 2022, when Ukrainian forces in a surprise counteroffensive.
But with Kharkiv only about 20 miles from the Russian border, the Russians never stopped bombing the city, and stepped up attacks earlier this year. In March, Russian strikes destroyed its two main power plants and network of substations.
The May offensive began after Ukraine鈥檚 military warned for months that Russian troops were building up on the border. Kharkiv鈥檚 mayor, Ihor Terekhov, Russian forces attacked the city 76 times last month 鈥� three times more than the previous month. Dozens were killed, and scores injured.
The relentless Russian attacks on the city eventually prompted the Biden administration to on using U.S.-made weapons to fire across the border at military targets in Russia.
The policy change was supposed to help deter the Russian offensive. Especially terrifying were the use of guided bombs, which Russian forces had been launching on the eastern front line to break through Ukrainian defenses. Unlike simple bombs, guided bombs have wings and tail surfaces for gliding. This allows precise targeting at a distance. Two of these bombs hit the northern neighborhood of Saltivka, destroying its branch of the Epicenter chain of home improvement stores.
Kitsenko and her co-worker, Olha Pobidash, returned to the store the day after the attack. Their boss was missing and presumed dead, along with 18 others.
鈥淭his war takes away our best,鈥� Pobidash said.
She wondered why Western allies promise military aid and then delay it for months.
鈥淭hey don鈥檛 feel what we feel,鈥� she said. 鈥淚f they did, decisions would be made much faster.鈥�
Pobidash and her 16-year-old daughter fled to Poland early in the war, but they returned to Kharkiv at her homesick daughter鈥檚 behest.
鈥淪he kept saying, bring me back, please bring my life back,鈥� Pobidash said. 鈥淪he lives and breathes Kharkiv.鈥�
Kitsenko said surviving the bombing changed her perception of her hometown. It no longer felt familiar. It felt dangerous.
鈥淭he Russians are trying to make Kharkiv unlivable,鈥� she says. 鈥淭hey want our city, as an empty city perhaps.鈥�
"They are fighting with music鈥�
The constant bombings in May did not bring Kharkiv to a standstill. Offices stayed open, children studied , cafes and restaurants were busy, city gardeners tended the lush, landscaped parks.
And musicians from two orchestras continued to rehearse for the Kharkiv Music Fest, an annual classical music festival.
鈥淲e are artists, and artists cannot live without a performance,鈥� said Varvara Kasianova, the 17-year-old principal violinist for the festival鈥檚 children鈥檚 orchestra.
The musicians practiced at Kharkiv鈥檚 opera theater but not on the majestic main stage. They moved underground for safety reasons.
鈥淚 live close to the subway,鈥� Kasianova said, 鈥渁nd so the way to rehearsals is also underground.鈥�
A few days before the show, the orchestra practiced 鈥淯krainian Suite,鈥� written in 1925 by American composer Quincy Porter. Vitali Alekseenok, the festival鈥檚 33-year-old artistic director, conducted.
鈥淭he main thing about people in Kharkiv is that they will fight for their city any way they can,鈥� Alekseenok said. 鈥淚n this case, they are fighting with music.鈥�
The conductor is originally from Belarus but has lived in Germany for several years. He traveled to Kharkiv just for the festival, as musicians from Europe and the U.S. used to do before the war. This year, nearly every musician in the festival orchestras lives in Kharkiv.
鈥淢y wife is worried that I鈥檓 here,鈥� he said. 鈥淏ut now I鈥檓 in the Kharkiv state of mind. You might be dead in a moment, but until then you keep working, you keep creating.鈥�
During a break from rehearsal, Alekseenok walked to a busy park nearby. Families shared ice cream sundaes, a teenage dance troupe practiced a routine, and grandmothers chatted on wooden benches, under a canopy of trees.
Suddenly, two air raid sirens went off 鈥� a sign of heightened danger. Kharkiv is close enough to the Russian border that some missiles arrive in minutes. When the air raid siren goes off, it鈥檚 often too late to go to the bomb shelter.
No one in the park left, including Alekseenok.
鈥淚t鈥檚 always like this,鈥� he said.
Soon, the conductor returned underground to lead a rehearsal of the music fest鈥檚 professional orchestra. It鈥檚 been shrinking since the war began. There used to be 20 bassoon players.
鈥淣ow we have zero,鈥� Alekseenok said. 鈥淎nd we don鈥檛 have a tuba player because three, four days before the rehearsal started, he was mobilized. Now he鈥檚 going to fight.鈥�
An underground arts fortress
The Kharkiv opera theater was damaged in a Russian attack early in the war. Its leaders created what they call an "arts fortress" in the corridors and spaces under the building.
The week of the performances, concertgoers arrived in droves, some dressed in gowns and suits. They went through security checks, then followed a labyrinth of corridors to reach the wartime stage underground.
The orchestra of adults performed first, playing Johannes Brahms鈥� Symphony No. 2 and a concerto for violin and orchestra by Sergei Bortkiewicz, a Kharkiv-born conductor of Polish descent. The featured violinist was Mykhailo Zakharov, who was also born in Kharkiv but has lived in Austria for 20 years. Zakharov returned to his hometown during one of its worst weeks just for the performance.
鈥淚 can鈥檛 tell you how wonderful it feels to be here right now, making music in Kharkiv,鈥� he said, embracing the musicians and members of the audience after the show.
A couple of days later, two Russian missiles hit an apartment building in Kharkiv, destroying the fourth and fifth floors while families were sleeping.
The neighborhood soon filled with the sounds of sirens and firehoses. Terekhov, the mayor, arrived to comfort those waiting for word on their loved ones. Police held back a sobbing man crying out for his wife and daughter.
A few hours later, the children鈥檚 orchestra brought the audience to their feet in a rousing standing ovation.
Varvara Kasianova, the principal violinist, said the performance felt like an act of resistance in a city under siege.
鈥淚t filled us with confidence and strength,鈥� she said.
鈥淭hey hit us everywhere鈥�
Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, the White House announced that it would finally allow Ukraine to fire U.S.-provided weapons into Russian territory.
The U.S.-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) on June 1 or 2 Ukraine likely struck a Russian S-300/400 air defense battery using an American-supplied HIMARS rocket system. The ISW said the Russian air defense system was located about 50 miles from Kharkiv.
In the Saltivka neighborhood in Kharkiv鈥檚 northeast, the strikes continued. Svitlana Poznikina, a 55-year-old pastry shop worker, lives in a Soviet-style high rise apartment pockmarked by shelling.
鈥淎 lot of people have left the neighborhood,鈥� she said. 鈥淗alf of the houses are empty. In my apartment building, it鈥檚 only retirees who have run out of money and have nowhere to go.鈥�
Russian forces pummeled Saltivka鈥檚 high-rises, markets and parks as they tried to occupy Kharkiv at the beginning of the full-scale invasion in February 2022. They have struck it repeatedly after launching the new offensive early last month.
Near a boarded-up apartment building, five children run around a playground and pick fruit from a neighborhood cherry tree. Their mother, 31-year-old Tetiana Kovalenko, is pregnant. She said she and her family spend nearly every night in the bomb shelter.
During the day, she says, 鈥渢hey hit us everywhere. We live on the 16th floor, so we can see what comes in and where it hits.鈥�
To stay or go
On June 10, the Institute for the Study of War wrote that the White House鈥檚 policy change permitting Ukraine to strike across the border from Kharkiv with some U.S.-provided weapons had reduced the size of Russia鈥檚 ground sanctuary by no more than 16%.
鈥淭he U.S. policy change, while a step in the right direction, is by itself inadequate and unable to disrupt Russian operations on a large scale,鈥� the institute wrote.
Russian forces continue to strike northeastern Ukraine this month, though not as often. Kharkiv鈥檚 mayor told the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Berlin on June 11 that life is 鈥渃almer鈥� since Ukrainian forces were able to target missile launchers in Russia. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his forces are gradually pushing Russian troops out of the Kharkiv region. Russia, meanwhile, claims it is advancing.
Kitsenko, who survived the attack on the shopping center, said she found it too stressful to continue living in her hometown.
She is now in western Ukraine. She鈥檚 not sure she will return to Kharkiv.
NPR producer Hanna Palamarenko contributed to this report from Kyiv, Ukraine.
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