Efren Regato left the warmth of the
Philippines to settle in icy Svalbard. For me it’s ok. As long as I have work,
I can adapt to the cold. People from more than 50 nations
live in the Norwegian archipelago just 1300 kilometers
from the North Pole. In winter, it stays
dark for months. And in summer,
it’s constantly light. Citizens of any country can live
and work in Svalbard, without a visa. Many are fascinated by
life out here in the Arctic. This is no nine to five job. You’re out in nature and feel
almost humbled by this vast expanse. Filipino Efren Regato runs a
cleaning business here in Svalbard, on the northernmost
edge of Europe. He has plenty of work. because tourists
have finally returned. Good. More work. More
job. More money. Better. Good morning. Housekeeping! While still in the Philippines, he heard that this remote
location deep inside the Arctic Circle has well-paid jobs
and no visa restrictions. It’s open to anyone
who wants to work here. He set out to begin his
new life ten years ago. First time I arrived in the airport
and then I saw the place and then: What kind of place is this? There’s no trees. First time I've been feeling
that kind of cold the first time out of the airport. And then cold, it‘s
cold, super cold. In Manila, he used
to sell car insurance. But it was a struggle
to feed his family. Now he cleans up after others. He says it’s a good job apart from when hotel
guests behave badly. Sometimes they are
drunk and then they puke. Sometimes it's getting worse
like broken TV or glasses. It's crazy. Yeah, I am proud of myself that
I am doing a great job with work. He lives in Longyearbyen. With just 2500 residents it’s
the largest town in Svalbard. This footage was
filmed earlier in the year, when there
was daylight 24/7. After two years of coronavirus
pandemic and no tourists, visitors are finally
returning to Svalbard. That’s a relief to
Christian Bruttel too. He’s a tour guide from Germany
and runs his own business, catering for
German-speaking tour groups. He used to work as a schoolteacher
in Germany’s Black Forest. Ten years ago,
when he was about to qualify for a lifelong
job guarantee, he took off for the
Arctic, and stayed. Back then, I wasn’t even
30 and I just couldn’t imagine doing that same
job right until I retire. I am a bit restless. But at first, this was more of an
attempt to broaden my horizons, just for a year. I never thought it would
become a new life concept. His brother Mario and
sister-in-law Miriam are visiting. In a few days,
they’ll embark on a one-week expedition
with other tourists. Today, they’re off to
find a good place to camp. On Svalbard, you
need to carry a weapon residents here
share the archipelago with around three
thousand polar bears. Here, every decision
you make carries weight. You’re dependent on
your equipment working, on knowing how to use it
and having everything with you. Any decision you make can
have terrible consequences. And the fact that every action counts
in this also very harsh environment is something that
really fascinates me. The coronavirus pandemic
hit him and his company hard. The lockdown and the lack of tourists
were both nerve-wracking and costly. Those two years
were a huge challenge. At first, we thought we’d lose
one or two months of the season and then in summer
it would start up again. But then summer came,
and the fall, and winter, and we realized that the
following winter and summer would be cancelled too. And we thought: how much longer can we do this? He’s now hoping for a bumper year,
to get the business back on its feet. But first, the three will
need to invest many hours to find the right camping
spot for the tour group out here in the
great white vastness. This couple also
work as tour guides. Élise Thil is from Belgium and her
husband Loup Supéry from France. And, they’re preparing for the
arrival of their baby daughter due in just six weeks. I think you miss maybe the
key that I have in my hand? Being pregnant in Svalbard
is a particular challenge. With no maternity clinic, pregnant women have to go
to the mainland to give birth. At some point when I got
contractions in January, we got a bit scared
of an early delivery. And we know that
the system here is, that you get evacuated with the
plane, but it still takes a few hours. So if you are after 24 weeks,
when the baby could survive, you still need to be
evacuated pretty fast, if you want to have a chance
of keeping that baby alive. So that's when I realized
the limitations of living up here. And definitely that it is not a usual
place to get pregnant I would say. She plans to travel to the Norwegian
mainland three weeks before the birth. Élise doesn't want
to leave any sooner. Because the island has given her
the peace she so desperately needed. Her daily walks with the huskies
are a little more arduous right now, but they’re nothing compared
to her previous job as a doctor working in an emergency
room in Belgium. Three years ago,
she suffered burnout. You have so many patients to
see, not enough doctors to see them. So you end up with a
crazy workload every day. I had never been on edge
all the time and that’s not me. I fell asleep while driving and
that scared me really a lot as well. At some point it was just
not possible to keep on going. She decided to visit her boyfriend
Loup who was already living on Svalbard’s largest
island, Spitsbergen. She was captivated by the
island and extended her stay. And then during
the six months here, I fell even more in
love with the place, with the wildlife, the
landscapes, the community. When you need something, you just
post a message on the group of town. So yeah, I think it's
pretty impressive to have such a tight community
all that way far north. She began a new
life as a tour guide. Until COVID-19 almost forced
them to abandon their dream. Because here anyone who
can’t work has a problem. Meanwhile, Christian Bruttel
has spent more than three hours searching for a suitable
location to camp. After driving 70 kilometers,
the group sees the first place that looks like it
could be suitable. They need good ski slopes
and wind for snowkiting. They’ve now reached
an altitude of 500 meters. We’re no longer on
the glacier and here so there, there and there — we have
sudden drops into the next valley. And the wind actually pushes
you towards those precipices. Well, the wind might not
always come from that direction Wow it’s cold! If the wind always blows towards
those drops, things can get dangerous. Especially for beginners,
because they’ll be pulled by the wind to where
it drops down suddenly, so we have to be really careful. No forget it, look it’s not
even 30 centimeters deep. We need about a meter depth. Two meters would be better. Then you can easily
dig down for the tent, get standing height in your
tent and build a nice igloo. They’re planning to go
camping with ten visitors. Out here in the snow at
minus 10 degrees Celsius and without a warm shower. Sure, getting up in
the morning is tough. But you’re getting up in this
landscape and this amazing view, and you warm up quickly
once you start moving. It’s just an incredibly
intense experience in nature. It’s beautiful. Yeah amazing. But then it drops straight down. But the view! Yeah beautiful! With the crevasses back there. But it’s no good. Both safety AND the
scenery are important. They’re hoping for better
luck on their next stop. The visitors are due
to arrive in a few days. Heading out into the wilderness
is what most tourists come here for. But for Efren Regato, that
prospect holds no attraction. He doesn’t have time anyway. I don't want to, because
it's hard. And I am busy. I can’t go there. I am busy working. And then even if I’m
off from the hotel work, I also helping my
business to clean up. That's why I don’t have
enough time to go there. He often works six
days a week, and still he has to turn
some jobs down. He’s hoping to earn a lot
of money by the summer as he’s going on his first trip
back to the Philippines in ten years. Not easy to go because
expensive going there from here. You must save money first. A little bit excited
and then scared. Yeah, because it's been a long
time I didn’t go back to my country. This one is okay. I turn off the light and
then close the door. His last room for the day. While out, he often livestreams
video for family and friends back home whose comments
show how other-worldly the snow-covered
landscapes seem to his relatives. Hi. Hello. How are you? This is your place. A nice place. Beautiful place. And then: it’s cold. And then: a lot of ice, snow. A number of Filipinos
living in Svalbard lost their jobs during the pandemic. Without an income or state
help, they were forced to leave. Now more workers
are urgently needed. That's why I’m going
back to my country. I just invite my sister
to work with me. Now, I don't accept
private housing cleaning, because I don't
have enough people. Around a hundred
Filipinos currently live here. Even though it’s cold, this area by the sea is a meeting
place for impromptu BBQs. Efren also brought
his two sons over, 23 year old Erwen
and 18 year old Jericho. Since I've been
here for five years, I always see the same thing
as every day when I go out. So basically, most of my cousins
or my friends in Philippines, they used to go out in the
beach or like, go out in the mall, like hanging out
around like that. But here I'm just always in
my room playing computer. It’s still boring for me, I feel
like it's not enough here, yeah. But he says leaving
here isn’t easy. He’d like to go to university. But for the subjects
he’s interested in, he’d need to move to the
mainland and be fluent in Norwegian. So far, he’s made little
progress with the language. It's just too cold
outside. Yeah. On the edge of town, there are
a number of facilities for sled dog. Huskies are only allowed to be let
off the leash in compounds like these. The heavily pregnant Élise
is relieved to have her friend Franka Leiterer helping today. They look like puppies
when they're playing. But they are seniors,
proper seniors. Temperatures as low as
minus 30 are not for everyone. Then there are the
many months of darkness. From late October
to mid-February there’s no sun or
daylight here at all. If I would just listen to what
my body wants to do so, and that is sleep all of the
time, then it would not work. Yeah. You mess up your rhythm. Some days I really struggle in
the dark season depression-wise. It is not easy. Usually we reverse
our schedules, and we are more awake
during the night, and we go and sleep in the
early morning and sleep until noon. Well it's nighttime 24/7, so it
doesn't really change anything, if you're awake at seven in the
morning or seven in the night. Except that the shop is closed.
That's really easy to forget about. That’s true. Some people have really
trouble to handle the dark season. For me it's more the
summer season that is difficult, because during the summer
season it's too much light, and I don't sleep enough. And when I don't sleep
enough, I get cranky. Svalbard has more than four
months of nonstop daylight, from late April to late August. Élise and Loup select
pictures they took to hang, another step in getting their
apartment ready for their baby. Their dream of living in the
Arctic was almost shattered when they both lost their jobs and
their income during the lockdown. They had virtually no
state benefits where the cost
of living is high. That was definitely a
struggle, because for me, I was not on any
percentage contract. I was only on what
we call freelance here, so this kind of
contract doesn't give me any unemployment
benefits in Norway. So I was basically
just getting nothing. So it was a lot of
trying to survive using whatever we had
on the bank account. And borrowing money and
putting on hold the loans that I had to pay back as well. That, too, is part of
immigrating to Svalbard. When times are tough,
you have to find a way. Élise and Loup were on the
verge of giving up when finally, the restrictions were eased. We worked almost
200 percent, both of us. In every single company that
could give us work, we took the work. So last summer I worked
as well two contracts in the same time,
many, many hours. In the end I did the same numbers
of hours than in the hospital, but doing something
that I liked. Then you consider, okay, I dropped everything and I
left everything to come here. And then if I have to go
back, what do I do after that? It was a bit stressful. Looks nice. It’s now two o’clock
in the morning. While heading out to a second
location, Christian broke down. He had to replace a broken
belt on his snowmobile. Ja. Let’s go. They drive for
another hour and half. After 170 kilometers and
11 hours on the snowmobile, they arrive at the
second location. This time it’s a winner. The sea looks beautiful! In addition to the spectacular
view, other criteria also fit... like the depth of the
snow for example. Over 90 cm. Great. You’ll never find
the perfect spot. We don’t want to nitpick, it’s
definitely going to be amazing. Svalbard is the best place to
live, according to Efren Regato. The most important thing for
him is that his job is paid well. The fact that there’s only one
supermarket here doesn’t bother him. A lot of the things
that you can buy here. But I think it’s a
little bit expensive. You can even find
imported tropical fruits. It’s a Papaya. 400 Pesos in the Philippines. You can buy fish and
then three kilos of rice. You can prepare food for two dinners
for your whole family for that, yeah. If any product sells out, the
shelves can stay empty for a while. The ship bringing fresh supplies
only comes once every ten days. The next one isn’t due till the
following Monday, as Erfren learns. My salary here, compared
to the Philippines, it's a salary of a senator... Oh reindeer in the
middle of the road. Another one. If you hit that animal
the police is giving you a penalty. For the past few months he’s had to
manage household chores on his own, as he and his wife
have separated. He mostly cooks Filipino dishes. Tonight, he’s making Chicken
Adobo, with ginger and garlic. It’s hard now, because
my wife is not around. My wife has another
woman also, same gender. They like each other
and then I forgive them. I just give them free way. You are playing the same? Yeah, we're playing together. With whom? We're playing together the game. Where from? I don't know. Different places, from Germany,
from Sweden, from Russia. I think, you are
wasting your time. Just go in. Run. The food is prepared. Ah, okay... I gotta finish. Christian Bruttel’s company bought a
house in the center of Longyearbyen, thanks to help from investors. It was a gamble. And shortly after the
purchase, the pandemic hit. Obviously, there’s a huge
amount of debt to pay, and we couldn’t do that during
Covid. We needed visitors. He was never
bothered that there was no safety net
here, until Covid hit. Then as an exception,
businesses were allowed to claim
state assistance, including those in
the tourism industry. But that only applied
to Norwegian firms. When your direct
competitors are getting up to a hundred thousand euros in
subsidies and you’re getting nothing, just because one of the owners
there is Norwegian and you’re not, it certainly puts a dent in the
idea that Svalbard is international, and everyone is equal and
needs to be treated equally. It felt like major
discrimination. Following the lockdowns,
they need to catch up. And thankfully, things are busy. Despite that, they’ve
decided to take some time out from work for a
beer with friends. Long time no see. It’s a she? It’s a she. It’s four months that we
haven’t seen each other. And now it’s just we are getting
blasted in the real season again. For me it’s like: Ok, wow, is
that an actual real season? Yeah it is. I think it is crazier. From today to tomorrow
it fully started again. But then as well we have
more people coming here. It’s more crowded. We
never had the situation that... But it's two years
of frustration. Two years of frustration for
people not to be able to travel. Exactly Their work here is
very much seasonal. When the tourists are here,
there’s little time for friends. But they do value the
relationships they have. I know what you
guys think about it, but the fact that
we are in this super rough environment
also brings it to be: this is people that not
only are your friends, but also that actually
could save your life, when you're going
on a trip together. And that brings it to another
level than a regular friendship. Efren Regato’s sons find
life on the island less exciting. But they wouldn’t want to
be in the Philippines either. It's just way too dangerous
there for me to stay or to live. A lot of people on the side
street that do bad things to you. They do snatching phones like that
or wallet or get a knife on your side and then ask for your money. You don’t have any choice but
to give it instead of getting hurt. For me it's a good place to bring my
kids here, because it's a safe place. And then there’s
no bad people here and then I think
it's a good place for my kids to grow. How does it taste? It’s good. Not bad. It's just right. Longyearbyen normally gets
around 70,000 visitors a year. It used to be mainly
a coal mining town. But many believe tourism
has a bright future here. Élise included. During this film shoot, she was
working hard on a new project. The magnets would
go really well here. Together with three
friends, she was preparing to open a rather unusual café. This is going to
be a Huskies Café, basically it is a place where
people can meet huskies. We have a lot of people
in town, that usually ask, where they can meet dogs
without taking a dog-sledding-tour. It looks almost ready, but we still
see everything that we need to do. But they made it, and the cafe
has since opened to the public. Élise’s dream of living in Svalbard,
where she recovered from burnout, almost didn’t work out. Now she has a new
challenge of living with a baby, in the difficult
environment of the Arctic. But I still think, we can
manage to go through all of it and find solutions
for every single thing that comes our way
like we always did. And we’ll adapt Pretty happy about being
here, where I am now. When Efren Regato
visits the Philippines, he plans to go to some of the
country’s popular beach resorts, something he could
never afford to do before. His family now see him as a
wealthy businessman from Europe. They think that I have a lot
of money and they can eat at some fancy restaurant and
then go to the beach resorts like that and have
fun and party, party. And I am in charge
of the expenses. I don't want to stay as
long in the Philippines, because for me it’s hard and
it’s warm in the Philippines. My body is adapted
to here, cold. And then maybe if I go back
to the Philippines as long as I go to a vacation, it might be,
that maybe I get sick for that. Here’s lunch in here. We meet Christian
Bruttel one last time before his departure to
the snowcamp. His tour group
has arrived. I’m very thankful
that it’s working again, that we have tourists coming, and
that we don’t have to bid farewell to the livelihood
that we built up here. For a long time,
we just didn’t know. It feels like the worst of the
crisis is now behind them. But I very much doubt
that I’ll do this forever. Because it’s a very busy life, it’s hard work and it’s
like you have no roots. So I don’t think
it will be forever. But for the time
being, we’re here. Svalbard is open to all those who
are willing and able to work hard and cope with the extremes. Most migrants move
on after a few years. For them, the
archipelago in the Arctic is a beautiful, but
temporary, home.
