Shake with holy trembling!
Sep. 29th, 2005 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deviWe're still in Beijing, stuck here because it's a Chinese national holiday and everyone suddenly wants to go absolutely everywhere on the trains. Oh, the pain and sorrow of being stuck in Beijing! Not. Last night we went to Houhai Lake, in the middle of Beijing, surrounded by willow trees and colourful little bars, and celebrated with the locals. I have a headache now. When I tried to go online last night they told me "The Internet is full". Hmm, what domains shall we delete to free up some space?
I can't be arsed to write about Irkutsk. It wasn't very interesting. We went to a supermarket. I got glared at – actually glared at – by every female I passed on the street. (It made me feel sort of smug, actually. Irkutsk should be the next goth holiday destination. In Western Europe subcultural people try and try to be subversive and rebellious, but it's no big deal to have weird hair or scary boots any more. But in Irkutsk people seemed genuinely shocked.) The flat we were staying in was a bit like the sink estate in Lilya 4-Ever. There were four massive locks on the front door; Galina, the woman who ran it, had to teach us all individually how to let ourselves in. And I cleaned up at poker with Pablo, Andrew and Joe in the apartment, winning the pot every time. This has never happened to me since the time Jo and I won enough money to pay the gas bill playing with Chris and his mates years ago, and probably never will again.
Instead of trying to describe the town, here's some text from a guide to Lake Baikal I found in several pieces in the apartment there:
'The world is wonderful!' – people used to exclaim in the old times, those people who travelled around the globe and had the opportunity to see the world's exotic places.
There are many different things made by Nature-foggy islands of New Zealand, famous Galapagos islands and distant Madagascar. But even in this line of known world-reknowned beauties there is one in particular which Nature has created with a specific sense, love and inspiration. In this one is manifested the reflection of earth's heavenly perfection. This is our lake Baikal.
Baikal in its immensity alone, is unique (the length is 636km and width up to 79km). It can not be compared with anything and nothing can be compared to it. Everything about Baikal impresses our imagination and boggles the mind...
According to one Buryat legend, Baikal was called Baigal meaning 'Standing fire'. That is quite a precise name! As the holy fire which has come from the skies to the earth, Lake Baikal in all centuries attracted to its shores just the same powerful human spirit. Here, in 1662, on his way back from exile, the furious archpriest Avvakum (the fiery pillar of Russian old-believers) was the first to describe 'God made' beauties of the great lake. In 1733-43 there worked the expedition of Academics G. F. Miller and I. G. Gmelin. There Vitus Bering – the associate of Peter the Great – worked. All who discovered lake Baikal first for themselves were impressed by its innumerable riches.
The great, ancient island – Olkhon is one more famous place on the lake. A lot of scientists – archaeologists, historians and geologists – try to solve its mysteries. More than 1000 years ago mysterious Kurykans lived here who were cattle-breeders of the Iron age and who left on Olkhon fortress's walls. There is a cave on Olkhon island which causes locak peoples to shake with Holy trembling upon entering. A lot of legends are connected with this cape. One of them affirms that this was just the place where Chingiz-khan was buried. The silhouette of a strange animal which looks like a horse swimming towards the mainland could be seen by everybody who goes through Olkhonskie channel from the South.
Just before the village Listvyanka the bus will bring you to the steep bank of the Angara river and you can see the wide glittering silver surface of Lake Baikal. From this height it is difficult to see the small rock island in the mouth of the river, but a mighty rock base is extended down to the bottom of the lake. This is the remains of Primorski mountain range which was washed away by the river. There is a legend that daughter Angara run away from her father Baikal to her fiance Enisei-river. Baikal became furious and threw a big rock after his running daughter. So it lays there from that time.
But this not the last legend connected with the Shaman rock by old-timers.
However we do not want to rush your own discovery of the lake you can do it yourself.
So that's you told, then.
By the way, here's Ivan's perspective on the trip
I can't be arsed to write about Irkutsk. It wasn't very interesting. We went to a supermarket. I got glared at – actually glared at – by every female I passed on the street. (It made me feel sort of smug, actually. Irkutsk should be the next goth holiday destination. In Western Europe subcultural people try and try to be subversive and rebellious, but it's no big deal to have weird hair or scary boots any more. But in Irkutsk people seemed genuinely shocked.) The flat we were staying in was a bit like the sink estate in Lilya 4-Ever. There were four massive locks on the front door; Galina, the woman who ran it, had to teach us all individually how to let ourselves in. And I cleaned up at poker with Pablo, Andrew and Joe in the apartment, winning the pot every time. This has never happened to me since the time Jo and I won enough money to pay the gas bill playing with Chris and his mates years ago, and probably never will again.
Instead of trying to describe the town, here's some text from a guide to Lake Baikal I found in several pieces in the apartment there:
'The world is wonderful!' – people used to exclaim in the old times, those people who travelled around the globe and had the opportunity to see the world's exotic places.
There are many different things made by Nature-foggy islands of New Zealand, famous Galapagos islands and distant Madagascar. But even in this line of known world-reknowned beauties there is one in particular which Nature has created with a specific sense, love and inspiration. In this one is manifested the reflection of earth's heavenly perfection. This is our lake Baikal.
Baikal in its immensity alone, is unique (the length is 636km and width up to 79km). It can not be compared with anything and nothing can be compared to it. Everything about Baikal impresses our imagination and boggles the mind...
According to one Buryat legend, Baikal was called Baigal meaning 'Standing fire'. That is quite a precise name! As the holy fire which has come from the skies to the earth, Lake Baikal in all centuries attracted to its shores just the same powerful human spirit. Here, in 1662, on his way back from exile, the furious archpriest Avvakum (the fiery pillar of Russian old-believers) was the first to describe 'God made' beauties of the great lake. In 1733-43 there worked the expedition of Academics G. F. Miller and I. G. Gmelin. There Vitus Bering – the associate of Peter the Great – worked. All who discovered lake Baikal first for themselves were impressed by its innumerable riches.
The great, ancient island – Olkhon is one more famous place on the lake. A lot of scientists – archaeologists, historians and geologists – try to solve its mysteries. More than 1000 years ago mysterious Kurykans lived here who were cattle-breeders of the Iron age and who left on Olkhon fortress's walls. There is a cave on Olkhon island which causes locak peoples to shake with Holy trembling upon entering. A lot of legends are connected with this cape. One of them affirms that this was just the place where Chingiz-khan was buried. The silhouette of a strange animal which looks like a horse swimming towards the mainland could be seen by everybody who goes through Olkhonskie channel from the South.
Just before the village Listvyanka the bus will bring you to the steep bank of the Angara river and you can see the wide glittering silver surface of Lake Baikal. From this height it is difficult to see the small rock island in the mouth of the river, but a mighty rock base is extended down to the bottom of the lake. This is the remains of Primorski mountain range which was washed away by the river. There is a legend that daughter Angara run away from her father Baikal to her fiance Enisei-river. Baikal became furious and threw a big rock after his running daughter. So it lays there from that time.
But this not the last legend connected with the Shaman rock by old-timers.
However we do not want to rush your own discovery of the lake you can do it yourself.
So that's you told, then.
By the way, here's Ivan's perspective on the trip
