On the day of Donald Trump’s second inauguration, an air raid was in effect in Odessa for much of the afternoon. People went about their business. Street vendors continued selling coffee. Trams kept running. At Pryvoz, the mammoth farmers’ (and everything else) market, electricity went out for a while, but that seemed to have no effect on the pace of commerce; if it was slow, that was because it was a Monday.
In the two years and 11 months since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Odessa has gone through stages: months of shock and fear, followed by something akin to denial and, finally, adaptation.
Odessa is one of those cities — like, say, New Orleans — possessed of a distinct personality, a mythology of itself that fuels a fierce and joyful kind of patriotism. Odessa is rightfully proud of its sea views, its architecture, its food, its multiculturalism, its entrepreneurship and its libertine spirit, but its singular distinction is the well-turned phrase, the unsparingly hilarious joke.
