On the Run in Siberia

230 Pages·2012·6.995 MB·English

by  Rane Willerslev

on the run in siberia
on the run
in siberia
on the run in siberia
Rane Willerslev
Translated by Coilín ÓhAiseadha
University of Minnesota Press
.
Minneapolis London
The translation of this book has been sponsored by
the Danish Arts Council Committee for Literature.
Originally published in Danish as På flugt i Sibirien: Zobeljagt,
russisk mafia og 65 minusgrader (Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 2009).
Copyright 2009 Rane Willerslev and Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag.
English translation copyright 2012 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Published by the University of Minnesota Press
111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290
Minneapolis, MN 55401-2520
http://www.upress.umn.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Willerslev, Rane
[På flugt i Sibirien. English]
On the run in Siberia / Rane Willerslev ; translated by Coilín ÓhAiseadha.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-8166-7626-2 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-8166-7627-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Yukaghir—Hunting—Russia (Federation)—Siberia. 2. Yukaghir—
Russia (Federation)—Siberia—Social life and customs. 3. Willerslev, Rane,
1971—Travel—Russia (Federation)—Siberia. 4. Refugees—Russia (Federation)—
Siberia—Biography. 5. Anthropologists—Denmark—Biography. 6. Sable
trapping—Russia (Federation)—Siberia. 7. Fur trade—Russia (Federation)—
Siberia. 8. Mafia—Russia (Federation)—Siberia. 9. Siberia (Russia)—Description
and travel. 10. Siberia (Russia)—Social life and customs. I. Title.
DK759.Y8W54 2012
305.89'46—dc23 [B] 2012001201
Design and composition by Yvonne Tsang at Wilsted & Taylor Publishing Services
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
The University of Minnesota is an equal-opportunity educator and employer.
20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To the memory of Babushka Akulina
This page intentionally left blank
contents
Preface and Acknowledgments ix
Glossary xv
Gallery of Characters xvii
One Last, Feeble Attempt 1
the fur project
1. Shalugin, Leader of the Yukaghirs 7
2. A Post-Soviet Nightmare 19
3. Sable Furs for Sale 35
on the run in the wilderness
4. Out of Range 61
5. Soft Gold 73
6. Starvation and Desperation 87
7. In the Yukaghirs’ Camp 103
8. A Long-Awaited Friend 123
back to the village
9. The Curse 141
10. Land of Shadows 155
11. Screwed 169
12. The Way Back 179
A Leap in Time 187
appendixes: surviving in siberia
a. Using the Leghold Trap 193
b. Yukaghir Idols 195
c. Netting Fish in Siberia 196
d. Finding Your Way in the Taiga 197
e. How to Track and Shoot a Moose 199
Notes 201
preface and acknowledgments
The story you are about to read had its beginnings in 1993, when my
identical twin brother, Eske, and I went on an expedition to north-
eastern Siberia with a small group of researchers and a film crew to
study the Yukaghirs, an indigenous group of hunters who live in the
northern part of the Russian Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). We were
only twenty-two years old. I had started studying anthropology, and
Eske, biology, at university a year earlier. We were already seasoned
adventurers of the region, having spent the previous two years ex-
ploring various river systems of northeastern Siberia by canoe and
learning how to survive by hunting. Because of this previous experi-
ence in Siberia, Eske and I helped organize and lead the expedition in
1993. After being dropped in the wilderness by helicopter, the expe-
dition paddled for three and a half months along the Korkodon and
Bolshoy Kuropatka Rivers. The aim was to find the Yukaghirs and to
conduct ethnographic, linguistic, and biological research among
them. We also were to collect Yukaghir cultural artifacts for an exhi-
bition at the Moesgaard Prehistoric Museum in Denmark. All of this
was filmed by the crew from Nordisk Film.1
I had first learned of the Yukaghirs when reading Waldemar
Jochelson’s classic monograph, The Yukaghir and the Yukaghirized
Tungus,2 which I found in a remote corner of the library of the Dan-
ish National Museum. The Yukaghirs described by Jochelson at the
turn of the twentieth century fascinated me: they were the earliest
indigenous people known to live in northeastern Siberia, and their
language had no evident link to any known language group. Unlike
ix