If you happen to complain about cold days, to strong wind or freezing temperature, you probably haven’t heard about Ojmiakon. If -10 Celsius degrees is too cold for you, you probably never ever will visit this coldest city in the world… But it does no harm for you to read about it!

Ojmiakon is located only few hundred kilometers from Antarctic Circle and is often called the Circle of Cold. No wonder why – average temperature in January in this city is -50 degrees! In 1942 unrelenting thermometers showed -71,2 degrees which up till today, is the world’s record.

Don’t you even try to put on your glasses – at lest you wish to take them together with your skin…

Who can live there?

There are around 500 people living in the Siberian city of Ojmiakon. Most of them are Turick Yakuts.

It’s obvious that their life in not very easy, but being born in such temperature makes you much more resilient. It may seem surprising to see people on the streets running to be in time or children playing with snowballs, but for Ojmiakon citizens it simple daily life. While families, groups of friend and merchants are chatting and laughing in the streets, tourists struggle to survive.

Virtually non if the houses in Ojmiakon has toilet inside as it’s almost impossible to maintain hydraulics in such killing temperature! If you need to bury somebody, it’s necessarily to build a fire at least few days before to make the icy ground melt down a little bit. All cars need to be kept in warmed garages. Needles to say, that if you leave you car outside for one night you can be sure that you won’t start an engine ever again.

What do you eat in Ojmiakon?

Being constantly in very low temperature makes you feel hungry all the time. The only thing, that keeps Yakuts people warm are is meat-heavy diet In general, they eat only meat and fish, paradoxically, cold served. Of course, they don’t need to be worry that the meat is stale – minus temperature keep it fresh for a long time. Their best delicacies are: white salmon, horse livers or simple meat soup. Everything is accompanied by „Russian tea” which is nothing more than vodka! Fish markets are most common 'groceries’ in the city and are very popular among citizens.

Dairy products are also very important component of their daily meals. Although citizens of Ojmiakon can’t afford to eat vegetable or fruits, they compensate for the lack of vitamins by gathering wild berries.
 and dairy products.

How can you even work?

Most of the city’s inhabitants are Turick Yakuts. You may wonder what they are doing for living in such place? Well, the answer is easy. Almost everybody is a hunter or reindeer herder, making their living by hunting or taking care of animals. Needles to say, that they can’t grow any crops, no matter how hard they would try.