Camp 11 in Taksimo from the 9th to the 21st of August 2004 "I would have never thought that Russia is so Russian."
by Katja Doose
Our train ride was just like I had always imagined it: incredibly long, and despite all the time zones somehow timeless.
My watch was the first thing I stored right at the bottom of my backpack. From now on we just wanted to comply with our own rhythm and that of Siberia, which we managed surprisingly well. We met them all - from a gay Mongolian who got astray to men who bought food at almost every stop and became more and more corpulent. At the end of the train ride we even contracted something like a friendship with the Provodnitza, who wasn't sympathetic to anyone at the beginning. But it proved to be possible to acquire a smile from her after all. For the travellers with a weak bladder the biggest disaster during this 4-day train journey were the closing times of the toilet. And because you have nothing else to do than constantly drinking a cup of tea during the trip, we frequently came into ticklish situations.
On the third day I already noticed that it became harder and harder to jump onto the bunk bed. I worried about having bad amyotrophia and seriously asked myself how on earth I was supposed to touch a spate if I already had problems to get into my bed.
The sporadic stops of 20 minutes rather served for the purchase of Piroshki than early morning exercises. Against all expectations it was no big problem to put on the backpack and to search for the pink-coloured hotel in the lovely city of Takismo, 412 km east of Lake Baikal, at the arrival after 4 days.
Our project was supposed to be right here. Or was this only the meeting point? Maybe there had been other volunteers in our train as well? The train didn't go every day and tomorrow at 10 o'clock we were supposed to show up at the tourist centre after all. It all seemed a bit odd. But we wanted to take charge of our accommodation first and then enjoy a cool beer in the non-shaky hotel bed. We knew from Adriana, the head of the GBT team, that we were supposed to spend the night in this pink-coloured hotel, which I had already mentioned, and which was reportedly not far away from the train station. But unfortunately I got the feeling that my Russian knowledge didn't help us at all, but that we had to display gruff and brusque questions in order to get a helpful answer, as is the case in whole Russia. So there we were, in search of the hotel. But because it was pink, we found it without problems, and the concierge welcomed us friendly, after she had stopped flirting with the mainly male hotel guests.
"I would have never thought that Russia is so Russian", was the first thing that came into Naemi's mind when she saw our hotel room, which we longed for after our 4-day journey. It reminded me of a pretty shabby dormitory room in Cottbus in the east of Germany and was not bad at all. But it was Naemi's first real impression of Russia after all. 4 days in an almost 1st class cabin in the Transsib don't count.
We enjoyed our beer, scrubbed our skin, and made the beds. Even if we had a hard time falling asleep due to the missing sound of tadam-tadam tadam-tadam, we were able to relax a bit, before we were greeted by an icy view the next morning: there was snow on the mountain peaks. (Oh dear, and I had recommended Naemi to leave her jeans in Moscow. They needed so much time to dry and were totally impractical for our purposes... but at least they were warm, she must have thought now.)
With adventurous carelessness we got into a taxi that was already occupied by 3 men and let us drive to the tourist centre of the city. We already feared that the taxi driver was not able to do anything with it. But nevertheless he helped us finding it. And because he had relatives in Germany, the ride was on the house. Larissa welcomed us at the front door and knew at once who we were, which took a load off our minds. Because at this moment we weren't sure at all if we were at the right place at the right time.
Of course we were offered tea, bread, and cheese immediately, and there were lots of questions on her and our part. It turned out that we were the first ones and she didn't know and who was going to come, and when. Some Olga was about to appear and tell us more. When we told them that two men had already called their help off, they looked at each other desperately and complained that now more than ever they didn't know how to realise the project with so many women. After the refreshment they offered us a joyride in the school bus that was our private one from now on. The landscape outside of the BAM city was impressing. Larissa and Anna pointed at the snow-covered mountains in the background and proposed to hike there tomorrow, when the other volunteers would have arrived.
At night the remaining volunteers arrived. Thus we were complete. Our team consisted of six Russian helpers, one Russian who had lived in America half of her life, the bus driver Kolja, the three organisers of the tourist centre, one American and one Russian brigadier, and us three Germans.
Due to the weather conditions we just had to discuss if we were going to sleep in the tents each night, or if we were going to return to the tourist centre every now and then. But because we all had come exactly for the "back to nature" feeling, they didn't have to ask us twice. But a Banya day in the city was already planned nevertheless.
The project was supposed to take place 20 km outside of Taksimo, and the aim was to build a 5 km long nature trail for kids, leading to a 3000 year old cave. When we arrived there, a wooden pavilion and an ingenious wooden loo had already been built. We soon went about pitching our tents, which turned out not to be easy due to the stony ground, and of course boiling water for our first cup of tea in the camp.
We constructed benches for the fireplace, and other things that were going to make our life as homelike as possible for the next two weeks.
At night we were sitting at the camp fire, where Zhenya, the brigadier, instructed us into the rules of tools and asked us to present ourselves shortly. It was noticeable that Russians obviously have a talent for speeches, as their presentations lasted at least twice as long as ours.
The next day was not as successful as we had imagined. Understandably, everybody wanted to start working, but the day was conditioned by rain showers every now and then, which animated us to rather drink a cup of tea than to work. But the next days went according to plan.
At seven o'clock the two who had been chosen for this service had to get up in order to prepare breakfast for the rest. Most of the time we had oat flakes porridge, also cold Kasha, or buckwheat semolina, called Gretchka, which was a special pleasure for me. Additionally, we had tea and sweets ad libitum. Let me tell you this one thing concerning food: we often missed a couple of thing, but we never missed tea and sweets. Once in a while, the bus and some others headed for the city in order to buy food, which we stored in the tent destined for it.
At 9 o'clock we started working. Zhenya divided us into groups, which were supposed to work on one section respectively. In the lower section there were no animal tracks or similar to be found. Thus we started at zero. One group raked, chopped, cut, and dug, and the other group marked the trail, which was going to change a couple of times in the course of the project.
In parts, the work was exhausting, and we lacked motivating results at first. After the trail had been raked, we began to peel birch trunks, which were supposed to serve as steps or just as a trail boundary. The first section of the trail was situated on a steep incline, which made the work a bit complicated. But after some practice we knew how the cookie crumbles and soon the first section was finished.
Now we began with the second part situated near the cave. We were already worn out after the morning hike there, but because the weather was good from the second day on, we were able to enjoy the view and every now and then we lied down at the slope and watched the others work.
Lunch was ready at 2 pm. I don't know if it was because Zhenya was together with Germans a lot due to his job as a tour guide, but dinner always had to be ready in time.
The helpers who had been chosen for this service stayed in the camp all day, watched over it, snipped vegetables, kept the fire in check, and were mainly busy with preparing food.
We were lucky to have a living juke box called Zhenya with us. There was almost no evening when he didn't fetch his guitar out of the tent that smelled like tuna, and played us something. The great thing was that he never ran out of songs. You could have assumed that after some joint evenings the songs recurred and you were able to sing along after the fifth time finally. But we were wrong. Zhenya was able to play almost everything, from the Russian rock band Kino and Nick Cave to Element of Crime, and even the German drinking song about the ancient Teutons wasn't missing in his repertoire.
The song that will probably stay in our minds forever is the Buryatian hymn, assumably the most beautiful I know.
In return for our work, Anna Vladimirnova, the head of the tourist centre, and Kolja, our amazing bus driver, planned an excursion to the Vitim, the biggest river of Buryatia. Actually we wanted to visit it in the middle of our project, but it went wrong due to a bus break down. Thus we decided to reschedule it to the end of our work in Taksimo and to consider it as a crowning finish.
We were a bit melancholy indeed, when we striked the tents, removed the nice plastic table cloth from the table, and stored all tools in the box. Wait a second! We didn't really found this deplorable. It had been nice, but the work could rest a bit now.
Thanks to our Crazy Kolja, the journey to the Vitim was a unique experience. It was great fun despite the incredibly dangerous crossing of the bridge and even rivers. It often occurred that everybody had to get off, because the risk that the bus including its occupants would fall down the bridge was just too high. Kolja's heroic readiness to make sacrifices was lauded each time with keen applause and acclamation.
When we arrived there, we were hardly able to believe our luck. It was just breathtakingly beautiful. Empty. Vast. Quiet. Mysterious.
We spent the night in a house that Kolja had organised through a friend, visited the Banya, and for the first time really relaxed for a long time. But above all, we were able to go to bed at night without thinking about being woken up with loud "Breeeeaaaakfaaaast" calls the next morning, in order to start working afterwards. Obviously we were ready for a holiday.
While the men were making music on all kind of objects they were able to find until the wee hours of the morning, we went to bed right after Banya and massage. Unfortunately the next morning brought a bit of rain, and like so often we didn't know what to expect. But by and by we even enjoyed the fact that there were surprises waiting for us always and everywhere.
Well, this was a perfect surprise indeed. Still drowsy and without breakfast we headed for the river bank, where we waited for the boatsman, who was supposed to bring us to a beautiful spot 10 minutes upstream.
Already the journey there, past rock faces and with a rainy sky and the sun struggling though, was a natural phenomenon. In addition the thought that there were only a few souls far and wide came into our minds.
The river bank that he brought us to was stony and seemed less-than-cosy at first sight, but when you put the stones in the right position it became a comfortable spot. Jörg sallied forth at once in order to build us a latrine. So this was the place where we wanted to spend the next 6 to 7 hours.
The return voyage to Taksimo was even more adventurous than the journey there because it had rained during the night, but we arrived save and celebrated Kolja once more. The last day we spent at the beach at the river that crosses Taksimo, savoured Stary Melnik and Sukharikis, and thought about settling down there. After a last joint dinner, the women of the centre handed us over self-crocheted belts, which were supposed to bring luck on journeys, painted stones, and certificates. We were all very emotional.
But we didn't have the really sad scenes until we were at the train station. A last group photo, a last hug, a kiss here and there, serious looks, and then... Do svidanya.
