Stepping out of the Brighton Beach subway station, you might find some of the signs that greet you difficult to read — unless you’re fluent in Russian. The streets, too, are crowded with a buzz of foreign tongues. That’s because Brighton Beach is home to an enclave called Little Odessa, a nickname coined in the 1970s, when large numbers of immigrants, many Jewish, from Russia and other then-Soviet states began to settle there. In this photo essay, The Observer explores the neighborhood, full of displays of the residents’ cultural heritage that has been preserved throughout the years.