"You should see their way of living. They live in smelly barns in multiples of ten," a Russian police chief tells us as he drives towards the Korean village. Speaking to the Korean loggers as they take a cigarette break the picture is painted in even starker terms: "What he's saying here is that the majority of workers have a ten-year plus labour commitment to live and work in the middle of nowhere for almost no pay." So why do they do it? As ever the North Korea propaganda machine is present to remind the workers of the 'home land' and the wise teachings of Kim Jong-Il and his father Kim Il Sung. A sign at the town reads: "Kim Il Sung lives with us forever." Yet travelling into one of the strangest of North Korea's frontiers, it is clear that the hermit kingdom's isolationist tactics are not paying off in these camps. Will new leader Kim Jong-un continue the bizarre experiment?