Sidorov light keeper

History of light keeper Victor Sidorov with Lighthouse im.M Shpanberg Shikotan Island (Southern Kuriles)

Anecdote about a beacon, an aircraft carrier, and a parrot.
At night - flashing lights in the sea - is an aircraft carrier ... Straight ahead the ship a little fire. Captain - aired: Hey, you! Straight ahead! If after five minutes do not roll up, naedyatsya on you the whole place will be left! In response to the silence. The fire still burns ... Captain again in the ether: hey, a schooner! Clean your pot to the side! .. In response to the silence ... Captain for the third time - remove or naedyatsya! .. The fire is not extinguished, lit just before the aircraft carrier. In the broadcast voice - said light keeper at the lighthouse: besides us with a parrot, there is no one else. And if you do not swerve off course naedet directly to our lighthouse ...
Viktor Sidorov said light keeper at the lighthouse on the island of Shikotan M.Shpanberga.
23 photos via photopolygon





Lighthouse M.Shpanberga. It was built in 1938-1943godah. The height of 18 meters. The Japanese had several dwellings, stables for several horses - all transportation on the island took place on the basis of the horse. From the village traveled the same way as do the light keeper in our time - foot (9 km, about 2.5 hours of good walking with a backpack behind the products), less on cars. In winter, when the road sweeps and approaches to the lighthouse - can only go skiing ... Lighthouse - perhaps the only surviving in the Southern Kuriles Japanese construction ... A similar lighthouse is only on the island of Sakhalin.
He's 53 years. And a simple Russian surname - Sidorov. Originally from the Lower Nowogrod. Since 1978, the Southern Kuril Islands. In the main professions - bulldozer. He told me in - a difficult period of perestroika, when all the Kurils were sent home state to fend for themselves, and each of the locals survived as best he could - he was only saved by the fact that dug on his bulldozer to the landfill that in earlier times dug - non-ferrous metal . Unearth metal rented ... At the same time someone else, says Victor, was engaged in poaching on the coast. Order on the islands were not, there was no money.
Six recent years, Victor is the lighthouse. Relative isolation and remoteness from the authorities - these are the reasons why he took a lighthouse. No romance. In this place and at this time, he says, it is pointless to look for. 15 days bezvylazno - voluntary watch on the edge of the world. The lighthouse itself is located on a promontory Crab. Prior to the actual end of the world - the cape of the same name - five minutes walk away. Every morning begins with a look just at the edge of Cape Light. Such is the attachment.



Defector
He told the story about the guy who came in earlier times on Shikotan. No romance - only mercantile considerations - the desire to earn ... Feature man - saw prophetic dreams. Strong earthquake 94go, he predsskazal for the year ... Burst land - were his words ... The land on Shikotan really burst, and the island, according to locals, fell into the water and a half meters ... The second time he saw in a dream floating Shikotan home in the Bay Malokurilskoye ... wait for the new cataclysm did not leave the island and ... Victor says that these prophecies it seriously straining so far. Natural disasters on the islands is not easy to get used to. 94th year was the starting point for many Kuril - a huge part of the islanders left the land ... but many later returned ... The habit of living in the Kuril Islands - is in everyone's blood ... Himself Victor apartment on the mainland under the program, calculated on the consequences of the earthquake, to receive I did not have time ... Already alone tried to return to the mainland and get a job - did not. The reasons for the failure to return the three - age (do not take the job), climate (intolerance) and crowds (never treated). On Shikotan he returned six months later.
...
October-November in the islands - a period of severe storms and major weather.



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About ghosts
The second day at the lighthouse. With Victor climb to the top of the lighthouse ... 52 steps and an incredibly smooth internal - like polished glass wall ... In a few cracks. And among them - a new one. Victor suggests that this is the most severe effects of the local winds. Now the cracks are exactly three. There were cracks in the wall of the lighthouse. He runs his hand down on top of the wall. Crack black uneven gyrus comes down and goes to the stage ... The shadow on the wall - like a ghost follows the light keeper ... Up and down ... But the real ghosts in a lighthouse, according to Victor, not live. Or simply do not appear. If you spend the night in the lighthouse tower - and then do not see anything? Sleep - no objection to Victor. If you come for - and then tell me ... He spent the night. But, he said he saw nothing. Or just do not want to talk.



Japanese glass in the lighthouse has long been replaced by the French. How does it differ from the original, is now known ... In rare Russian tourists - the tower of the lighthouse, in principle, no one is allowed. Japanese tourists do not bring to the Cape. The territory of the IMF ... .- specially protected. Although, the presence and the need for a lighthouse in these conditions - a fact highly controversial - about the postwar period is not going to change anyone. At the same time, despite the fact that the territory of the lighthouse and are subject to the military - no light keeper military is not considered ...
Old Japanese cemetery is located far above the lighthouse - at the foot of the mountain ... A few hills and no gravestone ... Victor says that he saw in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk Museum photo with all the representatives of the Japanese diaspora. Officers and ordinary employees - all of them were photographed lighthouse in the background. But such a photographic copy of the lighthouse has survived. For years, the lighthouse had a different purpose, but not a place for excursions. Times are changing, and maybe sometime there will be a photo, not only the Japanese military - guessing at the answer. Victor vague shrugs ... Everything can be ...



On Cape Crab wave is not flies ... times - washed out nearby - End of the World ... With Yuda - occasionally crosses the coast with seaweed, and sometimes - as a feather fly 200litrovye barrels of fuel. Victor tells - with Japanese facilities at the lighthouse looked this way - that from room to room you can move - absenteeism street ... The system of concrete structures - like a tank - has been thought out so that the life of the lighthouse was completely autonomous. In the complete absence at Cape Crab water (height of the Cape about 60 meters above sea level) - the closest creek is on the right side of the cape - in the distance - on the coast, water at the lighthouse has always been - Rainwater is collected in an underground pit - all the roofs of low Japanese buildings were enclosed by narrow borders - in the form of artificial pools - and water taps at left in this tank ... The well is still in effect. In Soviet times, it disappeared from the silver penny, which lay on the perimeter of the bottom and served by artificial filters - water treatment ... Since light keeper carry water from a stream, originating on the coast. In winter - snow stoked.



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During the day digging in the Bay Rotten - about an hour's walk along the coast. Victor began to dig a few years ago. His uneventful collection of fossils of the Japanese findings show no fear - a few broken saucers, almost an entire cup of tea with the verses on the inner surface, a pair of decent clay jugs - to collect algae or wine ... I dream to find and dig up a samurai sword ... The cave, located in a variety of on the island - go and look ... do not recommend the latter condition is unknown to anyone here ... Victor does not go.
These excavations - on the site of an old Japanese house - also proved fruitless ... a few bottles of beer and the beginning of the tide - washes away traces of osprey on the coast ... For Victor this excavation is only in the form of human curiosity. Neither the name nor the purpose, nor the transfer of Japanese characters, Victor does not know.



About the Japanese steamer
Japanese All glass containers - collected and neatly piled in stacks - around the coast of the island. So it was on Shikotan. Once a year, I go to the islands of the Japanese ship and collected these bottles.
Stacks are still overgrown with grass and covered with sand. Maybe someday reappear on the horizon, "beer" steamer. Nobody knows exactly. But the stack, overgrown with grass. Victor is ready to show now.



About holiday
"In life there is no place for a holiday ... but we have today is a holiday!" - Says Victor, when returning from the coast ... A few days stormy sea. Neither of which king crab fishing is not out of the question - exposed on the eve of crab traps were completely empty. Excitement on the surface and below it is restless. In the morning the situation has changed ... Frankly, this size crabs in the Southern Kuriles, I had never seen before ...



Five and ten crab traps - is the norm for each inhabitant of the South Kuril Islands ...
Prior to this rule, we obviously did not get, and generally this year for crabs in the area of ​​Shikotan not very lucky ... commercial fishing in the Southern Kuriles completely banned, but the gourmet food on the table in the house of that light keeper becomes longer. What you need to do - Victor knows. The dependence on the sea, as well as from the state, is the same everywhere.
Flown storm and bad weather destroyed his fleeting plans. The autumn season - the time of bad roads. On the lighthouse is the only road driving. Before rain weekdays every morning a truck came from the village and from the coast of the three of them - Head lighthouse Ilyich, and Victor Senkevich, Georgia, and raised the top coal in the back of the car ... In the rain, no truck to the lighthouse does not pass. Such road. Even one day after a rain - we need to countryside aired, and the excess moisture is gone, then coal can be transported again. The daily work required - before the snow and long winter.
Two years before retirement, says Victor, and then something can be changed.



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On the way back from the lighthouse picked up a passenger car, which goes in the direction of the village.
Young healthy man driving and a woman aged - in the front seat ... The guy was indignant - "turn on in the morning - at five o'clock in the morning! - TV - show court. In the morning - the court! Day and night - is the x th - who slept with whom, who owes whom and endless showdown ... Ideology, damn it !! »
Nods his head in agreement in the car on night road meaningless activity. No one will see. But I nod.



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