A rugby fan adjusts his latex mask at the rugby sevens tournament in Hong Kong on March 29, 2014. (Photo by Philippe Lopez/AFP Photo)

A masked reveller hangs from an inflatable balloon during the first day of the carnival in Venice, Italy, January 23, 2016. (Photo by Manuel Silvestri/Reuters)

A woman wearing a mask walks past an antique store in Hong Kong, Friday, March 25, 2022. (Photo by Kin Cheung/AP Photo)

A masked reveller poses during the Venice Carnival in Venice, Italy February 17, 2017. (Photo by Alessandro Bianchi/Reuters)

Residents wearing masks rest in the shade near a graffiti of a dragon, Friday, May 27, 2022, in Beijing. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

A woman wearing a protective mask is seen behind a girl dressed in a Plague Doctor Mask in Western-Ukrainian city of Lviv, Ukraine, 22 March 2020. Ukrainian Designer Anastasia Markovska sewed protective masks looking like Plague Doctor Masks, the traditional costume of Venice Carnival, for herself and her friends due to the ongoing pandemic of the COVID-19 disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. In Ukraine had been 47 laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19, including three deaths and one recovery as Ukraine's Health Ministry announced. (Photo by Pavlo Palamarchuk/EPA/EFE)

A face mask discarded in a forest in the Taunus region near Frankfurt, Germany, Sunday, October 18, 2020. (Photo by Michael Probst/AP Photo)

Only the most intrepid urban explorers cross the tattered ruins of the old Iron Curtain to endure the excessive bureaucracy, military paranoia and freezing winds of the East to hunt for the ghosts of an empire. Rebecca Litchfield is one who couldn’t resist the haunting allure of the ruins of the Soviet Union.