OLD BLUE EYES

“Does your ass fit you?”

“Pardon,” I replied politely, thinking I must have misheard or at the very least misunderstood.

“Does your ass fit you?” repeated John, my new (very new) Canadian friend, grinning from ear to ear.  He too was travelling on the Trans-Siberian Railway and was taking time out on his way to China.

I was still mystified and wondered if the phrase had some deep significance in the world’s arguably most inaccessible region.  I was standing overlooking the largest body of fresh water on earth and I was at least prepared for being unprepared if you take my meaning.  But my new friend was enjoying himself too much to share his little joke just yet so I remained bemused.  He told me that travellers a hundred years ago would have had to break their journey and take a ferry across the world’s deepest lake.  It wasn’t until 1901 that Russia’s Trans-Siberian Committee decided to complete the world’s longest railway by building a line around Lake Baikal. It has remained Russia’s aorta, its life blood, particularly in the remote and desolate east.  Thousands of ordinary people travel on it every day. It is effective, on time and…slow! Not many visitors choose to arrive in Siberia this way…but I had.

I was rewarded with a journey through history to a spectacular destination. Remote, wild and yet welcoming in a way that sometimes shamed our western ways.  It was all the better for the time taken to get there and I wanted to savour every minute.  I came to see the startling beauty of Lake Baikal.  Known as ‘The Blue Eye of Siberia’ it is the world’s oldest lake. It is also the deepest.  It contains so much fresh water that, if the world ran out of all other supplies tomorrow, we could all drink from it for the next 40 years before it would run dry.  The filtration action of sponges makes the water crystal clear and completely safe.  It is bottled straight from the lake and provides a substantial source of income. I felt exhilarated and privileged. The knowledge that my route out was by the longest train journey possible, and would take weeks not hours, made the isolation all the more keen.  I tried to imagine what it would have been like to get here in the early 20thcentury and found myself lost in reverie again.  I couldn’t even begin to imagine the hardship.

Until 1904 Lake Baikal was the gap in the middle of the Trans-Siberian railway. The Mid-Siberian section ended at Port Baikal on the lakeshore.  The next section, the Trans-Baikal ran from Mysovaya on the far shore to Vladivostok. Covering the 260km in between was a matter of crossing the lake, summer or winter, because of the inhospitable terrain to the south and the financial burden of building a railway through it. In practice this meant building huge ferries to transport the trains from one side to the other.  But this was fraught with problems; storms in the summer and ice in the winter.  On one notable occasion in February 1904, following an attack by Japan on the Russian navy in the Pacific, troops were rushed by rail from European Russia as far as Port Baikal to find the ferries ice bound.  The solution, to lay tracks across the ice, was disastrous and the locomotive sank before it was half way.  This only served to confirm the earlier decision to build the track around the lake whatever the cost and this finally opened in September 1904.

None of which, of course, explained the reference to the appropriate (or otherwise) shape of my backside but John could contain himself no longer.

He explained, “It has to do with a visiting dignitary.  A British train engineer, who was here to help build the link in the railway, wanted to impress his Russian hosts.  He was taught that if you run the words ‘does your ass fit you’ together quickly you get a fair approximation of ‘zdrasvetye’ which is the Russian for ‘hello’.  So he practised for days, even in front a mirror so it is said, until he got it just right…or so he thought.  But when the moment came he was so nervous that all he could think of was the original in English.  ‘How’s your bum!’ he blurted out.” - Apocryphal … I’m sure!?

We had arrived from opposite directions.  I had travelled for about eight days from Beijing.  John had done about the same from Moscow.  Like him I had approached Siberia with something akin to awe.  The coldest, most remote parts of the earth lay within its immense boundaries and I was going to stay there for several days.  Admittedly in early May and in the relative comfort of a homestay in Listvyanka but nevertheless in Siberia and only a stone’s throw from the lake. Baikal was still frozen, as it had been throughout the long winter months, but signs of the coming thaw were apparent, not least by listening to the ice cracking and singing.

The lake itself was a magical place.  On the first evening, sat at the edge, I could make out the faint mountain range on the far side.  As winter turned to spring the air was warming noticeably but the wind also picked up the cold on its way across the ice.  As the sun slowly dipped to the horizon, apparently paying its last respects, the light transformed the scene from hazy outline to stark and menacing shadows.  Ice crystals continually seemed to reach the point at which they could no longer cling to the sheet covering the lake.  They broke off in a symphony of tinkling glass, each upright crystal seemingly falling a split second after the one before.  The effect was enchanting, graceful like a swan slowly gliding away from the shore.  Then the crystals spread to form a shattered mirror, slowly covering the exposed water. As they melted the liquid lake became larger.

The next morning it had frozen again as the temperature had dropped overnight to a bone numbing minus many degrees.  I understood that this would go on for several weeks before the whole lake would be navigable again for the short summer season.  Then over a million people would use the lake for recreation, giving a lie to the cold inhospitable reputation of the region.  In October, or thereabouts, the whole process would reverse. The ice pack would reform thick enough to carry trucks.  So clear the fish would look like they could be plucked from the water below without the inconvenience of breaking the ice. It would be just an illusion of course but I couldn’t help but have a tinge of disappointment that I hadn’t arrived in the depths of winter.  I had always wanted to walk on water!

Reeta, my host, had met me at Irkutsk train station and driven me the 50 kilometres to her simple house.  She provided what might be called bed and breakfast with knobs on!  All the other meals were thrown in as well for what seemed like the price of a Big Mac.  And what meals!  Mountains of blinis (sort of small sweet pancakes), preserved fruits, sausage, eggs and cheese – and that was just breakfast!  I had to tackle at least two further meals every day.  I ate enough fish to keep a family of otters for a week.

The house which would be home for the next few nights was typical of the area. Simple wooden construction with a huge central stone fire place.  The three rooms all benefited from the fire that was kept constantly alight during the winter.  Just as well there was no shortage of wood in Siberia.  The “taiga” or forest seemed never ending.

The house had no running water which meant an outside loo and no shower. To compensate (for the lack of shower) a fantastic arrangement in an outhouse served as washing and bathing facility.  A Siberian sauna.  It consisted of a metal fire box into which copious amounts of wood were stuffed and ignited.  Above was a large basket of stones which, as the fire heated up, apparently added to the heat and the dryness of the air.  On top of this there was an enormous pot of scalding hot water. Another identical pot nearby contained cold.  A large ladle enabled me to mix the two in another huge enamel basin.  Everything was big in Siberia, including the water containers!  The contents of the basin I threw at my own body giving the combined delights of a sauna and a hot waterfall at the same time.  Then I did it again…and again.  The effect was wonderful!  More mundanely I was also able to wash some clothes!

There was however no compensation for the lack of an inside toilet.  The thought of going to an unheated outside “dunny” in the middle of the night during a Siberian winter was just too horrific to contemplate.  Even in a relatively warm May I was determined not to find out just how cold it was at night.  My advice? Stick to the vodka, it keeps your body warm and your bladder empty!

The village of Listvyanka lay close to the Angara River, the widest river source in the world.  A haphazard arrangement of wooden houses was divided roughly equally between the two sides of the stream running through the middle of the village and into the lake. The two halves were connected by a ramshackle bridge which appeared to be held up by the winters remaining ice.

My days were spent walking in a dream enjoying a freshness of the air I had never experienced before.

I visited the excellent Baikal Ecological Museum where I learnt that the lake has a very high oxygen content which provides an ideal environment for species that have become extinct elsewhere.  Freshwater seals, now estimated to number only about 60,000 are found only in Baikal.  They dive deeper and hold their breath for longer than any of their kind.  The whole lake is a kind of treasure-trove for naturalists.  Eighty percent of its species are found nowhere else in the world.  They include over 1000 types of algae, over 80 gastropods and over 50 species of fish.

I stood, like everyone else, during a service in the beautiful Russian Orthodox Church for as long as I could.  I understood nothing but the deep sense of community and caring.

On my last night John and I went to a bar in the village with Reeta and her delightful friend Sergei.  As the drink flowed Sergei’s tongue loosened and his English got better and better.

“You have seen the Shaman Rock in the mouth of the Angara River?” he asked. “Old Man Baikal had 336 sons which is one for every river that flows into the lake,” he continued as I realised his question was rhetorical before I could reply in the affirmative.  “But he only had one daughter, the beautiful but headstrong Angara.  She enraged him by refusing to marry the weak and feeble Irkut, preferring the mighty Yenesei.”

I knew these were rivers, one piddling (by Russian standards) and the other the longest in the country.

Sergei carried on.  “The Old Man chained her up but on a stormy night she escaped to her lover.  He threw a huge boulder at her but he couldn’t keep her. Now we ask the spirit of the lake to protect us on our journeys by dipping our third finger in our vodka and flicking it over our shoulder towards the lake.”

Which is what he did.

“Yeah right, Sergei.  Does your ass fit you!” I said.  But I smiled and dipped my third finger in my vodka…just in case!

Reeta didn’t take part in this ritual though only, Sergei claimed, because she didn’t like vodka and was drinking beer.  It turned out she had a soft spot for the “water of life” but it was very expensive in Siberia.  I had ¾ of a bottle of decent malt in my bag.  It didn’t last long even though not a drop was sent in the direction of the lake spirits.  I had worked out what keeps Siberians warm at night…and why they have a serious alcohol problem.

The next day – my first Russian hangover!  Luckily I had plenty of time on the train to get over it. I was comforted by the fact that I would soon recover, my slight headache incomparable to the fate of the Romanov family, the last Russian tsars. During the Russian revolution they were murdered in Ekaterinburg.  But that was my next stop, two days away!  Plenty of time to read and think…and sleep.

Not many people opt to cross the vast Russian steppe this way.  They don’t know what they are missing.  Take my advice.  Take the slow train.