Resilience and ingenuity – a Tajik teacher’s hydroelectric station made from Soviet scraps

‘Sometimes life forces you to do some things…’

For Raïmberdi Mamatumarov, life in Tajikistan has meant ceaselessly adapting to new realities and overcoming challenge after challenge. After a nomadic life during his younger years, Mamatumarov witnessed the modernisation of his small village of Shaymak under Soviet collectivisation. With this massive change came an opportunity to study botany at university, after which Mamatumarov returned home to work as a science teacher. But when the Berlin Wall came down, Tajikistan descended into civil war and famine ravaged the country, prompting Mamatumarov to put his skills and knowledge to work in order support his family through the crisis. Beautifully shot and carefully constructed, The Botanist by the Canadian filmmakers Maude Plante-Husaruk and Maxime Lacoste-Lebuis details Mamatumarov’s extraordinary effort to build an improvised hydroelectric station from scraps following the Soviet Union’s collapse. In doing so, the film is both a chronicle of his remarkable life and a robust reminder that genius is not confined to the places where it is most lavishly rewarded and popularly celebrated.