When Keen Heick-Abildhauge moved to Russia six years ago, his friends back in Denmark bombarded him with questions about his new home. Are there bears running wild in the streets? Is it freezing? Is everyone drunk?

He decided that he needed to create something that answered these questions. "I am not a good writer, but I can take pictures," he told Business Insider. So he photographed the people: "Not Putin, not vodka, just the people I saw every day, living their lives."

To do this, he attempted to meet and photograph Russian people ages 1 to 100. He found people through friends as well as on the street, introducing himself and learning more about their lives. He said he found Russians to be "humble, kind, and extremely generous."

Heick-Abildhauge hopes that viewers of his series will realize the similarities between themselves and the Russians. "We are the same," he says. "We dream, we love, and survive."