Why is Chernobyl, the city of death, open to people?

After time and natural digestion, the environment has improved a lot. In the impression of many people, Chernobyl is a "city of death". In fact, about 4000 people live here today. The Ukrainian government opened the door of the restricted area to tourists in 20 1 1 year, and about 15000 people enter this area every year. In July this year 10, Ukrainian President Zelensky announced that the Chernobyl isolation zone would be opened to the outside world and a "green corridor" would be built as a sightseeing passage. Now, dozens of travel agencies in Kiev have organized a "trip to Chernobyl". A classic one-day tour includes a visit to Chernobyl and some abandoned villages, as well as a visit to the monument to firefighters who died of nuclear radiation. If tourists want to stay a few more days, or have more adventurous needs, there are also customized tours here.

1After the nuclear leak at Chernobyl nuclear power plant in April, 1986, the Soviet government set 30 kilometers around the nuclear reactor as an isolation zone, and evacuated more than1/0000 residents around it.

Chernobyl is located in the isolation zone, 0/6 kilometers away from the nuclear reactor/kloc-,which is the main center of daily life in this area. Before the accident, there were16,000 people living there. Today, there are still 2,000 workers working here to clean up-according to the official statement, there will be workers working here at least until 2065, the year when the reactor is decommissioned.

Everything in Chernobyl seems normal, and its appearance is no different from other towns in Ukraine. There are four small markets, two canteens, a post office and a long-distance bus station, as well as cultural centers, gyms and churches, and even three hotels.

During the years when photographer Pierre Paul stayed in Chernobyl, this "normal" feeling shocked him and he began to record the daily life in Chernobyl.

After the Soviet government ordered the evacuation, residents were moved to the suburbs of some big cities nearby. But about 1200 people think that city life is not suitable for them, and it is difficult for them to survive with low wages. A few months after the forced evacuation, they ignored the ban of the Soviet government and returned to their homes in Chernobyl.

Today, these people live scattered in abandoned villages in the Chernobyl exclusion zone. Lack of infrastructure, no communication with the "civilized world" outside, only some officials come to check occasionally. Their children live in other places and visit them regularly.

Now, there are less than 200 people left from the original 1200. Time and radiation took away most of it, and the last survivors were very old. When the last of them dies, the culture, traditions and customs of these villages will also go with them. Memory will disappear, because radiation will not only destroy life, but also history. They are the last witnesses of the lost land.

Eugene Kenyatsev has illegally sneaked into the quarantine area more than 50 times. The desolate isolation area is always related to the theme of death, but he met the love of his life-his future wife, and a new life was born here.

Illegal invisibility was once a fashion for young people in Ukraine. Their destination is the Chernobyl isolation zone, and the center is the No.4 reactor that exploded in 1986. Most of these stalkers are in their thirties or younger, representing the later generation of Chernobyl. They have the same destination: the ghost town of Pripyat.