On a rock overlooking the deepest lake in the world, Shamanism was born among the Buryat people. Buryats are descendants of the Mongols, and they live in the area surrounding Lake Baikal in south central Siberia. Today, there are just under 500,000 Buryats living in the Russian Oblast of Buryatia, and many are still devoted to their Shamanist beliefs.
In June 2004 I had the opportunity to travel to a village in southern Buryatia. I’ll call it “Village S” because those who currently work there have asked me to keep its name secure. Village S is about 30 miles north of the Mongolian border, and about a 5 hour drive from the large city of Irkutsk, which is the unofficial capital of Siberia. Our team of ten from the University of Mobile flew from Mobile through Memphis, Detroit, Amsterdam, and Moscow to Irkutsk before resting a couple hours and driving into the Sayan Mountains to Village S. On the drive in, we broke down, so our trip was extended to about a seven hour drive. We left Mobile at 6AM Central Time on a Friday and found ourselves in Village S around 1AM Irkutsk Time (14 time zones ahead). It was exhausting, but my strange sleep patterns aided me in jet lag recovery. Sleep was good that first night, even if it was on a couple stacked bed-pads.
Village S is pretty remote, by American standards. It’s located off a main road, which I think was the only paved road in town. There wasn’t any running water there, except for one spicket located near the school cafeteria and orphanage. There might have been more wells and spickets in other places, but the one pictured below is the only one I knew of. People from all over would fill barrels and drums full of cold spring water and take them back home. The water was good. You should know that. It was pure and it was cold and it was great. I waited a day after all my teammates got into it before I started drinking from it, just to see what would happen to them. Sneaky, cowardly, call me what you will, but I definitely didn’t want to get sick- our bathroom was an outhouse the cows daily attempted to enter. There were rules and concerns when entering the outhouse- don’t touch the walls, don’t fall over, don’t get trapped by cows, and don’t stay long. Good rules to live by.
Village S is nestled in the Sayan Mountains, and the view was gorgeous. To three sides were mountains- you could see they were pretty far away, but still massive in the skyline. Snow still capping them- how could anybody deny God in this place? The year before, in 2003, our UM team was banned from the river that flowed nearby. Every year a few people get caught in its current and drown. In 2003 a Shaman came to Village S and performed rituals to cleanse the river of its demons, so that no more people would die there. We got to see the river up close, and it’s pretty big. Not as big as the Mississippi, but it definitely had a current swift enough to keep me out of it. It had also eaten away at the hillside that I was standing on, and it was a good six or so feet below me. Easy to fall into, hard to get out. As I said before, Village S was nestled in the mountains- and on one side were rolling hills- all others saw mountains in the distance, and the river rushed through as well. Beautiful land. But it was dark- the people… the people lived without Christ.
This is just part one of the Siberia Series:
1. Siberia: The Final Frontier…
2. Siberia: The People of Village S…
3. Siberia: Why We Went…