Where Russia ends in the East, a half-rotation of the earth and eight time zones away from Moscow is Kamchatka. Nearly 400,000 people live in an area as large as Germany. Most of them in Petropavlovsk, a city that was never designed to stay. A road link to the mainland does not exist. Who wants to get there, has to fly or take a ship.
The peninsula is one of the most remote places of Russia. In Soviet times Kamchatka was a closed military zone, base of the Pacific Fleet and center of the fishing industry. Visitors were allowed only with special permission. Foreigners were not allowed at all.
Lured by high salaries and benefits people moved for a few years into the isolation but nobody stayed for long. After Perestroika the artificially subsidized industries collapsed. The people were left with nothing. Who had the chance to leave went away forever, who stayed had to take charge of his personal fate. The area is regularly hit by earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Nowhere else in the world there are so many active volcanoes as in Kamchatka.
Through the decades of isolation Kamchatka has become one of the most interesting wildlife areas of the world. Huge brown bears roam around tundra and taiga, the fish life is unique in the world. A slowly growing tourism offers people a new perspective.
What's life like in Siberias forgotten East ? Why do people move away now no more? How important is the unique nature for the inhabitants of the peninsula?
Andreas Lünser visited Kamchatka and asked its people, what exactly keeps them here - at the end of the world.
Documentary: Kamchatka - Life in the Shadow of the Volcanoes (2013)
Direction: Andreas Lünser
Production: Spiegel TV
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