The lakes, it's His eyes, looking into Universe,
Waterfalls and rivers, these are His speeches
The mists, which are his transparent thoughts, are running away to all countries of the world
(Part from a poem by the poet Grigory Choros-Gurkin about the Altai Mountains)
Siberia
Windblown ribbons mark the high pass. This is where we stop along the way. The Karakol Valley in the Altai Mountains of Siberia is our goal, the place where we will do research. We want to drive on but our Altai driver says, "You never pass a pass without paying your respects." A nice taste of the Altai's view of their landscape.
Interdisciplinary Research
On the initiative of Arita Baaijens - she wrote the book Zoektocht naar het Paradijs (Quest for Paradise) about her many travels through the Altai - we are studying a small area in the Altai Mountains. With an international team of researchers: landscape ecologist Bas Pedroli of Wageningen University, Russian geologist Danill Ivanovich and Russian ethnologist Maya Petrovna. The goal is: to research the Altai's vision of their landscape and connect local and scientific knowledge. To look at the landscape from the inside: The Landscape Speaks.
Baaijens asks me along for my way of mapping: showing multiple layers of experience of a place. I grew up with maps, nautical maps. Those are vital to know where you are and where the current is taking you so you don't end up on a sandbank. To give an example of my mapping projects: in a
park I map the non-visible, the life of worms, fungi, rhizomes, bacteria and algae under the ground and below the surface of the water. Or I investigate a district of the city,
collect people's stories, make different maps: a color map, a smell map and a shudder map, about what you are afraid of. These different 'layers' together form a new image of the landscape. This journey offers me a wonderful opportunity to make visible the different layers of experience of this hitherto Terra Incognita.
Respect
Our specific target is the Karakol Valley. The Karakol is one of the rivers that form the headwaters of the Ob. The Ob eventually drains into the Arctic Ocean. For nine months of the year, the place is rigidly frozen and buried under a blanket of snow. In the remaining three months, people plant, harvest and gather everything to get through the long winter. You have to be humble here in the face of this nature. The Altai have a special philosophy. You do not take more from nature than you need, everything has meaning and for everything there is a time.
On the first day, the smell of wood fire brings me to a small building. Bending deeply, I go inside. The entrance has deliberately been made very low. A deep bow: when you enter you pay respect to the fire in the middle and when you go outside again you show respect to the sun. Here we will eat this research period.
"Where cosmos and earth meet" I read on the inscription upon entering the headquarters. The striking geologist and director Danill Ivanovitch Mamyev is our Altaiga host. He has taken the initiative to declare the Karakol Valley with surrounding mountains a nature reserve, the Uch Enmek Nature Park. Because of this, you can't just buy land there. The Altaj see the mountains as the navel of the world, the place that connects the earth to the universe, nourishing the planet like a mother nourishes a child through the umbilical cord. We look out on the three peaks of Mount Uch-Engmek, which are seen as the fontanelles of the world. A twisted cord atop each winter cap, represents the connection to the cosmos.
Mapping
In preparation, I edit the maps of the valley with Tippex. First I follow the contour lines. Thus, eventually all the texts and most of the information disappear. Only the Karakol River remains. White in the Altai stands for purity and purity, with white ribbons you show your respect for a place, a source for example and you sacrifice with milk. The white of the Tippex functions in this case to reduce the information on cards to the minimum. I want to use these almost blank maps to have the inhabitants of the valley draw their own maps: on the 'drawing machine': a construction like a workbench. On it lie the almost blank maps, over which you pull a roll of transparent paper. At this 'drawing machine' the participants tell about their knowledge and experiences in the area, point to and draw personal maps.
Atelier
To start, I set up the workspace as a studio so it doesn't have too conference-like an atmosphere. We hang vertical strips of paper throughout the space to pin our texts and materials to. With a nice company we are here. From the valley: the museum director cum teacher, the pedagogue, the hunter, the professor, the administrator, the ethnologist and two excellent translators from the area who speak English, Russian and Altaj (a Turkish language). The atmosphere is hesitant at first but trust grows and gradually we get to know each other better and better. At the end of the period it is still hard work to record all the stories that come loose.
Senses
In order to map the local knowledge, besides working in the studio and with the 'drawing machine', I also work in the landscape. Every day in a different place, near the mountain, near the source, near the lake, in the taiga. By asking people for sensory impressions such as smell, sound, touch, taste and color of an area, preconceived ideas are put aside and stories are released, people talk about experiences that come directly from the landscape. We do concentrated exercises, listening to what can be heard. We smell and name the scents of the landscape and collect what is growing. From this, stories emerge. My experience is that smell is a good way to trigger memories. Marina, one of the participants, smells a wild carnation. It reminds her of her childhood, of herding sheep, going out early in the morning and falling asleep among the grass and flowers. The smell of dry grasses remind Luba of haying together with the family. With the enumeration of what you hear, a picture of the landscape forms. Collecting material yields stories. For example, about the medicinal effects of all kinds of herbs, good for your skin or against stomach aches. Someone picks up a moss and tells about how it pushes into the cracks of your hut to make it wind and snow tight. In the afternoon we process this in the 'workshop'. This in turn unlocks new stories. The local knowledge and memories of the residents and users are important to me for discovering the meaning of this area.
White spots on the map
The hunter, Anatoli, draws his valley. He draws his route from the mouth of the river through the spring deeper into the valley. He lists positive, negative, sacred and magnetic places. He puts points and lines but circles the "places of power," the places you don't go, places you respect, that are only for the animals, plants and spirits. How he draws that is an important image for me. In my notes I then circle those places. This creates white spaces in my notes and forms my first maps in my mind. I could never have imagined those without seeing Anatoli telling, pointing and drawing at the same time in that way.
What emerges from the stories brings into focus the beautiful way the Altai look at their environment with attention and respect, and the values they assign to their landscape. Everything has a meaning, you don't just pick a flower, you don't chop more wood than you need. You borrow the landscape from your children, you don't own the land, the land owns you. You thank the river for the fish you catch. Everything is alive, stone, water and fire.
White spots on the map we in the West see as areas to explore and especially to exploit. In the Altai, the white spots are the ones to be respected. If you pickle your own pickles and beets, dry mushrooms and dill, it has to other value, you don't just throw it away. This contrast between the obviousness with which "we" look at what surrounds us and the respect there, I have never experienced more strongly than in this area of Siberia.
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