Once A Penal Colony, Sakhalin Still Captivates Its Visitors

Sak

halin is a one-way trip." That's what a Russian official once told me, alluding to Sakhalin's nefarious reputation as the penal colony of last resort, whose very name was said to make a man faint from fear. A chrysalis-shaped island at the entrance to the Sea of Okhotsk in the deepest reaches of the Russian Far East, Sakhalin's remoteness, fierce natural conditions and notoriety have made it one of Asia's most foreboding places to visit. But the isolated island is changing—albeit very slowly—from a once closed and alienated enclave into a travel and business destination.

Arguably, the first traveler to willingly visit—and leave—the island was Russian writer Anton Chekhov, who came in 1890 to study life in the penal colony. After finishing his book The Island—a Journey to Sakhalin, Chekhov remarked, "I have seen Ceylon, and it is heaven, and now I have seen Sakhalin, and it is hell." Despite his stinging account, the people of Sakhalin have a lasting affection for the playwright and his introduction of the island to the world. His likeness vies with Lenin's on monuments throughout Sakhalin's capital, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk.

To get to Yuzhno, I boarded a 1960s Russian-built turboprop from Hakodate airport in Japan for the two-hour hop across the Sea of Okhotsk. The two nations are separated by a mere 43 kilometers of water, but the cultural gulf between them is immeasurable. Whereas Hakodate has a fastidious obsession with order and cleanliness, Sakhalin is rough and gritty, reflecting its history. Forgotten by successive Russian governments and weather-beaten by violent winter storms, Yuzhno is a mix of degraded Soviet architecture, dusty, potholed streets and makeshift stalls.

Isolated from the rest of Russia, the people of Sakhalin have long made due with a pragmatic ingenuity. At the often snowbound Sakhalin airport a truck equipped with a surplus military jet engine aimed toward the ground clears ice from the runway, the heat and flames quickly vaporizing the fallen snow. The city bus system is made up of discarded Japanese vehicles shipped annually to Russia. Shot glasses for vodka in bars by night double as measuring cups for sunflower seeds in markets by day.

Yuzhno is the most convenient starting point for an island tour. At the center of the main square, Lenin's statue towers over the city's forgotten Soviet monuments. Once beautiful mosaics honoring patriotic laborers crumble within his view, and statues dedicated to Soviet idealism lay toppled and strewn about the city like last year's toys.

But amid these Soviet remnants, new buildings are emerging and old ones are undergoing renovation. The Japanese have built a six-story trade center, the Koreans have opened a cultural building and the nearby Sakhalin Center now houses the American trade office and the primary expat hangout, the Pacific CafE. The foreigners are drawn by oil and natural gas. Like California during the gold rush of the 1800s, Sakhalin has attracted the world's prospectors, each hoping to mine its bounty and, in the process, turning parts of the city into a freewheeling frontier town.

Sakhalin's nightlife, though diverse in its offerings—casinos, discos, cabaret shows and outdoor barbecues abound—is alcohol-driven. This being Russia, the vodka is cheap and plentiful. If you can still walk after the first—or second—bottle, try to get to Yuzhno's popular local brewery in the center of town. Higher-minded pursuits include the Sakhalin regional museum (housed in the Imperial Japanese Government Offices dating from when the Japanese controlled southern Sakhalin from 1905-45), the Russian Orthodox Church, the Chekhov Theater, street markets selling everything from wild berries to furs, and Gagarin Park, complete with mountain backdrop, a small train and a pristine lake.

Venturing beyond the capital city to the coast is made easy by an extensive, Soviet-era rail line.It is even possible to stay at a private Russian dacha equipped with a banya, or sauna, for a detoxifying swelter—vodka in hand, of course.

On the morning of my final day in Sakhalin, still reeling from excessive exercise of the liver, I boarded the Eins Soya ferry at Korsakov for the five-and-a-half-hour trip across the Sea of Okhotsk to Wakkanai, Japan. Chekhov, too, intended to take a boat to Japan from Sakhalin, but a raging cholera outbreak on the Japanese side caused the good doctor to cancel his trip. I soon passed out in a deck chair for the duration of the ferry ride—but not before musing that, one day, return journeys to Sakhalin might even be fashionable.