I am sitting on our apartment’s balcony with Manuel in Virginia. My thoughts, though, are far away; I am traveling over an immense taiga. I was born in a remote place in Siberia, in the small town of coal miners, Myski. After fifteen I left town only to return during the summers for a few weeks to visit my parents.
Shors always lived in our city, but as a child I did not pay attention to this fact. Only a few episodes come to mind from childhood memories and they don’t explain much. When I am thinking of Shors I remember grandmothers (babushkas in Russian). They’re sitting in the city market and selling wild leaks. Locals call this plant “kolba”.
I can vividly see grandmas getting their plants out of the commodity bags tightened with rough threads. On the piece of cardboard they scratched “500 rubles a piece”. In the 90's Russian goods were measured if not by millions, certainly by thousands of rubles. In the fall same babushkas will come back with the same bags but filled with pine cones.
Much later, as an adult, I learned that not all Shors live in the cities. Some of them chose life in taiga and still live outside of civilization. They survive on everything that taiga gives them; they hunt, fish and do all the things that their ancestors did for centuries.
There, on the balcony, I could not stop thinking of those who remained. What drives people like Shors to choose this type of life in taiga tracing the animals in a deep snow and climbing up cedars 45–50 meters high? Why do they risk their lives and then sell taiga goods cheaply to urban dealers?
Perhaps, the reason is not taiga itself but the cosmos that these people created for themselves. Taiga in these gloomy edges of the earth is still animated and these people perceive it as a living organism. Their world is still roamed by large and small spirits and I wonder how exactly they see it.
When my thoughts run so far ahead, it means I have to make plans. This means that I definitely need to go to the village at the end of the world and see everything myself.
Usually in such situations, I talk a lot, my eyes are shining and I breath irregularly. At this stage my euphoria strangely affects all kinds of people. These people, usually, quickly and without additional questions agree upon everything I say and become my partners. Manuel, my husband, was the first, followed by my sister Vera and her fiance Mike who also happened to be a cameraman. After Mike was an editor Eugene and two Marias with the same sounding last names. Then Alexander from St.Petersburg joined with his friend Eugenia. The circle closes with illustrator Alex, Vitalik with Christina in Novosibirsk and another Maria in Moscow.
Without thinking too much, I give the project the mysterious and promising name, “Land of Spirits”. Quickly, I scribble press releases and send them to wherever possible and impossible.
Before even setting foot in Shoria and still not knowing all of the details, Manuel and I contact American shamanists, linguists, herbalists, and we send them flyers. While in England, our right hands Maria & Mike reached out to Bournemouth University to find young assistants. Together they shot a campaign video in which people in more than ten world languages appear on the screen with the message to save Shor culture in Siberia. But why did we decide then that Shors urgently needed to be saved?
I eventually made it to DC where my new friends from AFI docs wished me good luck on the movie. Students came to me and expressed their wish to be volunteers at the open show. One enthusiastic teacher asked to send her our movie to Oklahoma. She is delighted and can’t wait to show the doc to her students. I even found an experienced editor, who said he would see our edits in postproduction and give us valuable feedback.
There is no way back. We have to shoot.
Let’s do it, decided Manuel and I sitting on our balcony in Virginia and draining gas from recently purchased generator from eBay. Before that, it took us several days to test it. Then we wrapped it in the swaddling clothes, like a little baby, and shipped it USPS straight to Shoria.
A week later we flew ourselves.
Upon arrival we had to do three things:
- to get immunization shots against tick bites,
- buy 10 days worth of provisions for 8 people,
- find a guide and arrange an itinerary.
We found Nikolay and his wife Anita in the nearby city of Mezhdurechensk. They greeted us with herbal tea and “talkan”, an extremely nutritious Shor dish made of grounded barley with honey. Their apartment was located in the stereotypical soviet five floor apartment building. When we entered, we noticed that the entire floor of the living room in their small apartment was covered with dried herbs. The herbs were neatly lined in piles.
— Kolya brought them from his hunting trip — Anita explained.
At this exact moment a red fluffy cat gingerly came into the living room and pushily lied down like someone important.
Nikolay is quite short with a samurai look about him. Among Shors he is a hunter but in everyday life he’s a professional boxer. He grew up in the Ust-Anzas village. There, in taiga, he still owns a house and looks after his parents graves. He offered to bring us there. As a child, he scoured all the surrounding mountains and seemed to know every stream and every tree. We thought that Nikolay is exactly what we need.
Without waiting any longer, Nikolay dialed his friend, a driver from Tashtagol and right in front of us solved our transportation problem. It turned out that a road through taiga does exist but no pavement, of course.
We spent the last day before our adventure deep in preparations and bought some camp food. By the evening, Mike, Vera, Manuel and I had a hard time remembering what else we might need in taiga. It was then that we decided to buy a burner. It was not enough, but we also bought many meters of tarp in case of rain. Just before the store closed we remembered that we forgot to buy rubber boots.
Why do I need rubber boots. It is July. Middle of the summer — argued Vera trying on new, extremely bright boots — I am fine. But Vera’s inner voice spoke up and she ended up buying the rubber boots. As it turned, this was the smartest decision she made.
That last night no one was asleep at my parents house. First, we received our shots against ticks, then the living room turned into a check point of goods. From hand to hand, we passed to each other cans, small and medium bags, biscuits, mattresses, tents, warm socks, lighters, canister full of gasoline, you name it.
In the corner of the room we noticed the generator. We looked at each other. Square box of a very decent size. Who would agree to carry this thing on his or her back?
From somewhere in our house my dad suddenly found a round stick, whether from old curtains or the remains of a furniture, who knows, but he adapted it by making a hole in the center. Woala!
At least the box was ready. Two people supposed to hold the stick from the both sides, like a roasted pig on a spit, and lift it.
The next morning we met the remaining members of our crew in Novokuznetsk and in about three hours were at the Tashtagol’s bus station.
In Tashtagol Nicholay’s driver was waiting for us with a mini van. Without any mishaps we drove to Sheregesh, a small resort town 20 kilometers away. Mountain Zelenaya showed us its slopes at the entrance to the city.
When we reached the outskirts of the city the paved road ended.
- I thought somewhere over here was a turn to Ust-Anzas — the driver said.
- It is strange but I cannot see it. Weird. Always was and now disappeared.
He wagged a little more on a bumpy dirt road between the summer wooden houses called “dachas”. Car stopped. The driver asked for direction of a man who was passing by. The man only shook his head and said that he had never heard of such village.
— Here we come, —a thought flashed in my head.
Meanwhile, the driver bypassed dachas and we went to the right direction, in our driver’s opinion.
Finally, we found a little dirt road and went straight. Our mini van was moving deeper into the forest, occasionally hitting potholes and running over numerous wooden bridges. Beneath those bridges gurgled fast mountain rivers with odd-sounding names “Big Bustle” , “Small Bustle” . Someone definitely had a sense of humor.
Leaving behind those rivers we passed through abandoned villages and entered the real taiga.
The air was noticeably cleaner and easier to breathe. Aromas of grass and flowers mixed with pine tree fragrance made the air feel special.
Two mountain passes are over — summed up the driver. — The last is the most difficult.
The car slowly crawled up on the dusty road. At the top of the third mountain we stopped for a break. We went out of the car and in front of us saw a wooden gazebo. A little further, was a tree all covered with colored ropes.
A bag of colorful satin ribbons appeared from nowhere in Anita’s hands. She handed them over to us. Meanwhile, Nikolay was lost in the trees and a minute later returned with an armful of dry wood for a fire.
After the ribbon, a paper with small neat handwriting appeared from Anita’s pocket; spells, recipes, instructions: go clockwise, stand up, be filled with gratitude, I could not decipher further.
— Oh, I prepared a little on Internet — explained Anita. — Do not worry, they understand without the Internet, too. If you’re honest, you can ask them about anything.
— Who are they and what to ask? — We wondered.
Well, each mountain has its owner. See that mountain over there — she waved her hand toward the neighboring mountain — this Aigan mountain is even more so. This mountain is sacred. These places are special for us, Shors, and before we go any further, you need to feed the spirits of the place and say: “do not touch me, just support”.
— Is she serious? We’ve not made any deal with the spirits yet.
Anita, in that moment, started her little ritual.
— Choose the ribbons I gave you by color. The blue color is universal, ask for peace. The red one is here for passion. Wish yourself love. The Birch tree is suitable for any desires. Loop through this branch here and tighten. Here we go.
— Mike, do you have vodka? — asked Nikolay — We’ll do our tradition. Bring fatty meat, cheese, bread from the car, let’s take a bite and feed the spirits.
While Mike walked to bring some edibles, the fire crackled and flared up quite well, even sparks flew.
Nikolay and Anita walked around the fire and we, like young hatching, made our circles after them. Their faces are serious. Nikolay holds vodka in one hand and with another hand quickly, almost mechanically, screws the cap up, long and intently looks at the fire, begins to pour vodka straight from the bottle to the fire, and walks, walks, walks. Mumbles something in Shor. Whispers. Pours again and again. Walks. The fire flares up even more. The slices of fatty meat and cheese sent into the fire next and melted there immediately.
— Choose the better pieces, — teaches Nikolay — Give them the best. They love fat. Never leave you in trouble, for sure.
Who will be in trouble and what kind of troubles he is talking about? We did not have time to grasp. Slightly puzzled, in silence, we just did automatically what he told us to do.
After such a strange rite we got in to the car and carefully, on the brakes, steeled off the mountain. Now we were on the finest top. Underfoot, right in front of our eyes the endless taiga appeared. The road became very narrow. We drove slowly and had a feeling that even a tiny wrong move could make a difference and we all will ended up in the cuvette. I am thinking about it and noticing that there is nothing off the road. Abyss. One rusted car is already down there. My heart pounds every time I look outside. The impossible beauty and fear. Videre Napoli et Mori (lat: to see Naples and die). Only now am I am starting to realize why it was necessary to light the fire for spirits.
It was getting dark. The car went down the mountain and stretched against the river. No one expected such a turn of events. From the other side, from the hills, the huts of Ust-Anzas, blackened by time, looked at us. There was light in some of them. Randomly set, they seemed tiny dwarfs against the backdrop of the mountain that looked like a big, heavy humped dragon. The river flowed near the foot of the hill, just past the village, rested against the back of this mighty, mythical beast and changed its direction.
Just a short drive along the coastal rocks, the car began to slip, and then completely stuck in the sand and pebbles. The driver had to go into the river and slip straight into the water up to his knees to turn around. Our guys helped and pushed the car from the both sides. The mini van hauled and made so much noise that it was difficult not to notice us from the other side.
The villagers did not know anything about our arrival. They do not have cell phones and we could not call them in advance. All we could do was throw our caps in the air and cry out to the darkness:
— Hi there! Egegegegey! Please give us a ride.
At this point the driver wished us good luck and his mini van disappeared around the corner. We could not wait longer. It gets dark quickly in the mountains and in about fifteen minutes will be pitch dark.
From the other side the barking of dogs reached us but nobody came out.
— Let’s call the King. — Nikolay suggested.
— Or rather, let’s — picked up his thought Anita.
— Who is the King? — we replied.
— Well, it’s a friend of mine, a good man — Nikolay began. — We, Shors, do not call each other by names. Nicknames are much better.
And we all shout out to darkness in all our voices
— King! King!
Just think about it. The Shor King himself will meet us. How on earth could such a plot element be planned before?
It became pitch black dark. The large moon rose and the reflections on the water formed the lunar track. A splash of water. From nowhere, the black silhouette appeared from the far edge of the river. Waist-deep in rubber boots, this someone was no one but the carrier, transferring souls into the kingdom of shadows.
Black man knew his business. He methodically put a long pole between the rocks and pulled up the boat, cleverly coping with the flow.
It was him. The King.
