At a suburban Kyiv railway station, two carriages painted in the blue and white livery of Ukrainian Railways sit on the main platform, their diesel engines running as snow steadily falls. The train is not going anywhere but it is providing a vital service for dozens of people who have been left without power and basics like running water or heating.
These are Ukraine's 'Invincibility Trains', designed to boost public morale and provide some comfort as a bitter winter coincides with intensifying Russian attacks.
In one of the carriages, Alina sits watching her infant son Taras playing with toys provided by international charities who help run the service. 'It's winter and it's rather cold outside,' says Alina, which is something of an understatement. With the effect of the wind-chill, temperatures this week in Kyiv have hit -19C. It is bitterly cold.
'I live in a new building on the 17th floor, but we have no elevator, no electricity and no water supply,' says Alina. As Taras plays with his toys, she says it is also a relatively safe and comfortable place for her daughter to meet friends.
It is also a welcome distraction for Alina, whose husband works all day in a factory, but she suddenly starts to stutter and weep as she tells me about her 54-year-old father who was killed at the front two years ago in a summer offensive near Bakhmut.
As she regathers her composure, Alina says she will definitely come back here and welcomes the relief the train brings from the weather and the nightly Russian strikes.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Russia of deliberately exploiting the bitter winter to target power stations, energy storage facilities and other critical infrastructure. Kyiv's Mayor, Vitali Klitschko, somewhat controversially this week also suggested that city residents, who could, should leave Kyiv to help ease pressure on critical resources.
But despite such obvious hardships, most people here in Kyiv remain stoic and are prepared to put up with them.
For Yulia Mykhailiuk, Ihor Honcharuk, and their one-year-old son Markiian, that means heating building bricks on a gas stove to try to warm up the rest of their small apartment.
The energy crisis is not the only reason to move. Just across the courtyard from their new, temporary home, a recent Russian drone strike hit an apartment block, badly damaging several homes.
The most recent Russian attacks against energy installations in the capital and other big cities have had a cumulative effect that is much worse than before. The city authorities have repeatedly asked people and businesses not to use high-energy consumption devices because they use so much power.
But the engineer in charge acknowledged it was a temporary fix. 'It will take years and years. We are currently working literally in emergency modes,' says Andrii Sobko from Kyiv Electric Networks. 'The equipment is literally operating at its critical parameters so that at least the residents have light.'
As the war drags on, it's hard to find anyone in Ukraine who has not been directly impacted by the conflict.
Stas, an eleven-year-old, also comes down to the Invincibility Train to get warm and power for his phone. He recalls with clarity the opening day of the war almost four years ago when he could see bright flashes in the sky - a 'bright orb' - as Russia launched its attacks.
Everyone in Kyiv is putting a brave face on things. This extraordinarily cold winter, even by Ukrainian standards, will not last for much more than a couple of months, and the energy crisis will ease. What most people fear is that, despite some optimism at the end of last year, there is no end in sight to the war itself and the inevitable loss of life.
