Shamanic camp / summer 2009

Lyudmila Oleynik

ABOUT THE CAMP – 2009

A week has already passed since we came back from Khotsky (or Khotsek, who knows how the name of this inconspicuous little village, more than a hundred km from the dusty capital, is properly declined). There are very many such dying villages, to my sorrow, on the territory of our most beautiful country. And it feels as if a whole life has receded into the past – so full of events and new information was this “gathering”, by my sensations.

What can I single out, you ask? But nothing stands out! Everything is whole. And everything was ve-ery much not by chance!

Day one. DEPARTURE AND ARRIVAL. A NEW LIFE – NEW NAMES.

It began with my morning trip to the meeting place in Kyiv, in some “Zhiguli” of unclear origin (either stolen or borrowed for a spin), with a young driver who was even more unclear, either drunk or stoned (or maybe both at once) and who, on top of that, had come back only the day before from “places not so far away”. And this colourful specimen of human recklessness turned up a couple of minutes after my daydreams – of getting from my village to the city as fast and as conveniently as possible with my enormously heavy rucksack. And he vanished as suddenly as he had appeared, after our safe arrival in Kyiv. Then came the continuation, in the form of a timely (!) departure on the minibus we had ordered. Then – watching the progress of our “band of comrades” in a lorry through the forest (here too I was lucky – I managed to ride this stretch sitting in a comfortable car) and waiting for something wonderful, the way in childhood you wait for a present at New Year. And then… it all began!

It was a place of utterly incredible beauty – with a steep sandy shore, a boundless expanse of water, fragrant pines, sun and sky and a feeling of complete happiness that I was finally here. The fact of our arrival was slightly spoiled by the presence of another party not too far away, but I paid attention to that only at first. Then there was no time to bother with such trifles.

I will not be able to write a short account of the Event (exactly so!) that happened in my life – there was too much of everything. And I really did not know myself as the person I came to know at this Camp. I could not even have imagined how hard it is to tear off the mask of society and to invent a new name. Or how much the eyes of a stranger say when you work with them in a pair in some practice. Or how people cling to their sense of self-importance and furiously reject the offer to take a rest from it. And our first day, which ended after midnight with the successful renaming of everyone who had arrived, was so full of events that in ordinary life they would have been enough for a week or more. Just think: to arrive, choose a place for the camp, pitch the tents, take a swim, cook a simple lunch, gather in a circle with thoughts about your goals, get to know the people with whom you were going to make so many discoveries and live through so many pleasant and not so pleasant moments, to invent a new name for yourself and to support (or reject) your fellow tribespeople’s wish to call themselves this and not that, and a mass of other events – you must agree, it was a very full day!

Day two. PUTTING DOWN ROOTS.

And the next morning I woke up in an incredible state, as if “between” earth and sky – a night in a tent and the sound of the surf had finally shifted the “assemblage point”. Half asleep, I did not even grasp that it was only 4.30 in the morning and that I had to be present at the Agnihotra ritual. This too was a discovery (it turns out you can even eat cow dung, if it is properly prepared! ) Well, and with food at the Camp strange things generally happened: sometimes I wanted to eat simply immensely (probably when I was very nervous on the blind day), and sometimes I did not want anything at all – there was so much information to “digest”.

The main thing is that an iron certainty appeared in me that it would be quite hard for me to die of hunger, because life is incredibly abundant! And in fact very little food and drink was needed – some unpretentious porridge, a mug of tea and a couple of apples with a rusk were quite enough. And yes, that life and food without salt are possible was a great revelation for me! How much less water the body needs in that case and how much less tired my legs get, because there is no swelling! And also – how much the taste of each ingredient of a dish stands out (a tomato, a cucumber, greens, bread, a carrot and so on). Well, listen to me – going on about the kitchen, the kitchen, as if I were at home! Probably I still cannot let go of my “organiser’s” rushing about before departure… Now – about the sea! Another discovery that shook me: it turns out that even a man-made, “artificial”, so to speak, sea behaves in a way that is absolutely no different from real seas. On it there is sometimes a complete calm, when the waves only whisper a little, sometimes a surf, when the waves make a noise, rolling softly on to the shore, and sometimes a real storm, when the white “lambs” on the crests of the waves make you think of shipwrecks!

The weather during our Camp is a separate chapter altogether. All the weather phenomena happened as if to order, like a change of scenery in a theatre, and only helped the maximum merging of the human being with nature, becoming our allies and at the same time demonstrating their might. Yes, probably it was not for nothing that after arriving the rite of “putting down roots” in the new place was performed. It looked like this: the offerings laid on the altar built by our “leader” /in the world Natasha Valitskaya/ were presented by each member of our tribe to the spirits and elements that dwell in those places.

In general it was quite hard to get into the new daily routine: the morning Run of Power and Walk of Power seemed very simple actions, but far from all of us kept this compulsory morning ritual. And the running technique, “vigilant relaxation”, as it was called – to go one behind another “foot in foot”, relaxing the body – was absolutely unfamiliar to me. The way of breathing was also new. And the forest and the sea did not put you in a sporty mood at all! But we stoically fought our old attitudes, striking awe into the holidaymakers around us – getting up at 7 in the morning, the run-walk, bathing naked (that, of course, did not work for everyone straight away ) and an excellent breakfast cooked on the fire (there, the kitchen again!). And gradually the ossified notions of how to behave when a new day of life begins began to blur, sensations and emotions began to break through to the surface and allowed me to feel the full thrill of the beauty around and of being a part of it.

And for a quicker inclusion in the process of uniting the tribe, the practice of shamanic throat sounding in a circle worked very well: everyone sounded certain “sounds of the elements”, starting a flow of energy with the vibrations of their voices. True, every now and then I was “switched off” by my neighbour – a man who was howling along very diligently on the highest note, and I could barely keep myself from collapsing with laughter behind the nearest tree. Well, in any practice I may have some shortcomings, I am only learning, after all!

After the real “battles” for a new name, which went on until late at night on the first day, I had to stir very hard the imagination that had stagnated over long years of oblivion and make myself an amulet on the second day. It (the imagination) had already been quite disturbed by the pastimes half-forgotten since childhood – to invent something extravagant and to call yourself something prettier and more obscure, for example “Cowardly She-Wolf” or “Radiant Emptiness” (thank goodness the council of the tribe did not approve such fancies). There were, of course, among our fellow tribespeople some desperately modest ones who nonetheless fought for a name that ran completely against the process: “Nameless” (afterwards, of course, it was unusual to call a person that, and he too felt somehow ill at ease). I decided to call myself something very primitive, without excess: “Simply Living” (which I regretted the very next day. I did not think everything would be so serious). And so with the amulet too everything was in earnest, as in childhood: whatever materials came to hand went into it – twigs, stones, shells, and I also managed to get hold of bits of leather and laces from kind fellow tribeswomen and from the chief (or chieftainess? ) of the tribe – White Elephantess. The amulet was born in snatches – I had to take an active part in practices of getting to know myself and the members of the tribe (the question-and-answer practice “Who are you?”) and in trial walks through the forest with a blindfold /a sort of mini “dark retreat”/. And my sensations from such walks were not like anything I had ever experienced in life – it was as if I had landed in the scenery of some thriller.

A clear feeling that I was in a dungeon, and that someone was chasing me and my guide, almost made me run headlong, throwing off the blindfold. The world changed into the state of an alien environment, everything was utterly unfamiliar and mysterious to the touch. And what happiness it was for me (and not only for me, I think it was a shared feeling) when the leader’s signal for the end of the practice sounded! How differently the light was perceived! A side effect of our undertaking was the attempts of huge forest ants to “eat to the ground” my gigantic (in height) guide – the Phoenix Bird. That was when he had his eyes bound and I was “taking him for a walk” in the forest. Well, for some reason every ant trail turned out to be in our way! But Phoenix is Phoenix precisely so that, quietly swearing and brushing the furious “beasts” off his feet, half-shod in flip-flops, he still stayed alive and, on top of that, was terribly pleased with the process he had gone through.

After a luxurious lunch in the open air by the water, a very pleasant feeling of relaxation came. I wanted to loll about on the sand, listen to the noise of the wind and the whisper of the waves.… But my new name gave me no peace – somehow it did not fit with my inner state today. No, can one really be Simply Living in such a wonderful world? I am not grass, not some piece of wood, not to feel any emotions about what is happening! And a desire began to grow in me to call myself something else. After thinking a little, after being in a state of bliss on the seashore, I decided to take the name “Accepting Everything”. Having gone for a swim with that thought, I understood that again it was somehow vague, like thin jelly on a plate. What is it that I am going to accept? And what if someone (not my fellow tribespeople, of course! ) decides to hurl something heavy at me? He may be in just such a sad mood! So, am I to accept that too?! Oh no, I am not that enlightened yet! And then – whether under the influence of the warm sun, or out of the gratitude of my well-fed organism – I caught such a feeling of enjoyment of life that the new name literally floated up before my eyes. Why, I am getting so much pleasure right now! There it is: I shall now be a woman Receiving Pleasure! Phew, it is not easy, this – being somebody in this life! And on top of that, expressing your inner state in a way that is clear to yourself and to the “sisters” and “brothers” living next to you.

And a couple more words about the inner state. The truth that the outer world is a reflection of our inner world was confirmed once again (and not just once!) at this camp. Since the people in our tribe had gathered very different, with different understandings of what was happening and accordingly with different reactions to it, the world around us kept “throwing up” “reflections” of somebody’s behaviour. For example, a group of three loudly laughing fellow tribespeople “attracted” to our camp very similar noisy neighbours who, besides, “greatly respected” friendship with the bottle. And in response to a conflict over whose turn it was to be buried in graves – a couple of Kyivans appeared, much too sure of the rightness of their claims to our territory. Luckily the situation dissolved at once, and there was no need for any “defensive moves” from the men. Later, when we were sitting exclusively in a women’s circle, discussing our purely women’s topics, a car drove up to us, a very beautiful woman got out of it, and for some reason calling us “guys”, asked whether we had come across her friends here. In short, everything around us literally strove to join and take part in our “action”, to make it even more meaningful – both the weather and the people. But we managed to coexist quite peacefully all seven days with both our neighbours and nature, and all the events happened at the right time (both the rain, and the storm, and the strong wind that made our shore deserted for the time of our practices).

As for the amulets, in the evening I received several lessons in how you can beautifully play up quite inconspicuous objects: tree bark, shells, feathers, stones… The main thing is to SEE in ordinary things their extraordinary essence and to invite them to the role of your friend. And almost all my fellow tribespeople accomplished an incredible transformation of ordinary roots and feathers into works that took your breath away…

Day three. THE FIRST BLIND DAY AND NIGHT.

Having settled into the new place, the tribe began its third day. For some it became the first “blind day”, for me – “kitchen day”. That is, besides everything else I had to cook food for my fellow tribespeople and at the same time try not to fall out of the process. That was quite hard, because while you are peering into the pot, some action is taking place right next to you, and here you have to realise that you are not taking part in it! And that is already sad… What cheered me, however, was the presence of a second “squaw on duty” by the name of Clear Life and the feasible help of the men of the tribe. In general it was extremely hard for me to deal with household matters, because I lost my connection with something very important for me-as-a-person.

Meanwhile the people were diligently mastering the science of being “disabled”, that is, as if having no sight. Those who remained sighted kept catching themselves and remembering that they were responsible for the safety of the “blind”, and set about helping them this way and that: now correcting with a thundering shout the trajectory of some lost “blind” poor soul, now putting more food into a bowl (as if it could speed recovery), now helping to choose suitable clothes. By the way, about clothes: during the day it turned cold, and quite heavy rain began. Half of the “sufferers” and guides hid in their tents to sit out the bad weather. Part of the tribe sheltered under the “food” awning and watched this picture: a man with the name Phoenix Bird took his “blind” girlfriend – the girl Flying-to-the-Target – out for a walk. She was clearly nervous about how she looked, and kept asking what colour the raincoat they had put on her was. For some reason she thought it should be lilac, but the guide earnestly assured her it was blue and that she looked great in it. The girl would not give in and insisted that she felt exactly as if in lilac, until all the sighted people watching this picture said in chorus that indeed, there was lilac in her outfit, and she looked fabulous in it! So now try to guess by what principle people tell colours apart – with the eyes that are “ON the head” or those that are “IN the head”?

As for me, on this day I did manage to get a stunning experience of recognising a person without seeing them, only by touch, determining who was in front of me by their hands. Before that we had all together become “blind”, putting on blindfolds, and “caught the elephant” (that is, the She-Elephant ). And I managed to move blind only when I shifted my “centre of feeling” from my head to my belly. And the gamut of sensations and experiences when getting acquainted blind with a person’s hands I can compare only with the reaction of the discoverer of some unknown land. How much some people lose by passing over bodily communication! I could write a whole book about this now, in which I would call on everyone to learn to feel and touch the people who come into their inner circle. You would learn mu-u-uch more than in an ordinary conversation or in sex!

Having meditated on the theme of “the inner Man and the inner Woman”, and making a number of discoveries in the process, by the end of the day both the “blind” and the “guides” looked tired. Grumbling began about the bitter lot of those “deprived of health”. So even before supper the “blind” regained their sight and cheerfully bustled about by the fire.

Such an intense day was brought to a close by the ritual of drinking mate, during which I again discovered a great many notions unknown to me: what mate is, how it is gathered and prepared, how to fill the calabash properly and how mate is drunk. Interestingly, the interconnection of the masculine and feminine principles was present in this ritual too (the calabash, it turns out, personified the female womb, and the bombilla – so to speak, the object of male pride). After “taking on the chest” such a wonderful drink the people of the tribe could not disperse to bed for a long time. Or maybe it was also because the next day threatened to become a serious test by “blindness” for those members of the tribe most hardened in harsh battles with society – me, Receiving Pleasure, the courageous big Phoenix Bird, an extremely energetic and vivid man – Paradise Island, two of our young fellow tribeswomen – Clear Life and Playful Wave, and also the would-be Cowardly She-Wolf (that is, the woman by the name of She Who Picked Up the Trail). But by all the laws of nature this day too came to an end, and I had no choice but to crawl into my tent and put the blindfold over my eyes (this for a complete entry into the role of the “blind”). As it turned out in the course of the practice of the first “blind” day, the fact that a person has some physical defect need not in any way affect their relations with society, if it is perceived adequately. Such people simply see life from another side and interact with it differently, not the way absolutely healthy people do. In some ways they even feel it better… I thought that sometimes (and even quite often) there is a game with a sense of guilt, when healthy people rush to the aid of those not quite healthy in order, for the most part, to “atone” for their guilt for their own health (!) Absurd? No, that is life. And, as we can see, little has changed since the time when Jesus said to the cripple lying by the pool of water and waiting for the “miraculous” ripple to appear on its surface in order to be healed: “Rise, take up your bed and walk!”. People sometimes like to turn a person perfectly adapted to life into a cripple, in order to be able to play “saviour and victim”.

Day four, or I IN THE COUNTRY OF THE BLIND.

Whether because of the anxieties I had lived through for my “blind” fellows, or feeling a threat at the prospect of being “sightless” for a whole day, I slept badly that night. Towards morning I had a dream in which my fellow tribesman, smiling, came out from under the ground, opening some grass-overgrown door and inviting me to “dive” into the cave he had just left. Trying to open my eyes and discovering that there was a blindfold on them, I at once remembered my “bitter lot”. Having got out of my “rag dwelling”, I decided to call someone for help right away: I had a perfectly distinct feeling that I was on a precipice and had only to take a single step… But, thank goodness, my fellow tribespeople were not asleep and immediately sent me straight off on the run. I had to run, clutching for dear life at the shoulder of the sighted “brother” going in front.

Something incredible was happening to me: first it seemed that the world had shrunk to the size of a trench with walls of planks, getting narrower and narrower. Then, when we turned off the path into the forest, I imagined terrain with huge mountains and hollows, and again I found myself on a precipice! (Later, in the discussion, it was explained to me that this is how I perceive my life and myself in the surrounding world. Hm, there is something to work on!). The familiar picture of the world was gone! The brain was at a loss and even stopped giving the command to move to some of my limbs (when the practice of massaging our neighbours in the circle began, for some reason I did not use my right hand). The return to camp seemed unimaginable – on the way every snag and every pit was mine. Having hobbled to breakfast, I could not believe my luck. But here the brain was subjected to one more test: how can you eat something if you cannot see what it is and how much of it there is? Breakfast turned into real torture for me: the porridge in the bowl simply would not end, and all that could still be eaten turned out to be invisible, I had to wait patiently for my turn to receive some “bonus” in the form of a date or a rusk from a sighted fellow tribesperson.

Complete helplessness gradually began to irritate me, and I was glad when the ritual of the morning eating was over. The blissful lolling of our group of the “blind” on the grass was interrupted by a call to be put to the test once more in the forest. This time we laughed till we cried: we were building “figures”, or as Paradise Island put it, “playing Baba Kutsya”. That is, first the “blind” had to repeat as exactly as possible the position taken by a sighted brother (or sister ), and then everyone turned into the “blind” and carried on with the group creative work of mirroring. The delight of this practice cannot be conveyed in words: it was as if we had gone back to childhood! Feeling out and thinking over the combinations of human bodies offered for reproduction completely captured all the participants, and what was unusual for me – I easily gave up my role of “eternal leader” to another woman. It turns out it is even easier to live that way!

Then began a practice that completely changed my idea of the masculine and feminine components of the personality – the practice “Find Your Own”. All of us (and all were “blind” at that moment) were given the chance to determine with whom we were more comfortable in our life – with a man or with a woman. From my own experience I already knew that with a man, naturally, I would be more comfortable, so, choosing between the two people standing in the glade – a man and a woman – I thought I would stay by the man. And running first into the woman, I somehow did not dare settle my choice on her. But after a short search for the “reliable and responsible one” and feeling him over, expecting to get reassurance, I suddenly realised that I did not really want to stay next to him. And I immediately darted back, to HER! And a crowd had already formed around her! So that is how valuable a Woman is – and not by her strength, but by something else, inexpressible in words. Later, in the discussion, the one being chosen herself admitted that she had been terribly anxious about the prospect of “being left alone”, of not being chosen by any of us. But suddenly she decided to let go of the situation and simply stand. And then everyone piled on her! To the man, by the way, only one person “attached” herself…Imperceptibly lunchtime came. Having returned to camp, the tribe rushed to bathe. Everyone dashed into the water – both the “blind” and the sighted. And they were not afraid to strip stark naked: for the “blind” it made no difference (they see nothing, which means they do not perceive others’ judgement either), and the sighted are those who had been “blind” the day before, they had already swum like that, and nothing terrible had happened to them. Our neighbours, though, were somewhat alarmed by this turn of events and even tried to force their company on some of our squaws. But all their advances were cut short by the appearance of a brave team of naked warriors of the tribe. I would never have thought that the sight of naked people could sow such panic in the camp of the beach-goers, who had covered, for the look of it (or rather, for the “un-look” of it ), their most intimate places with scraps of cloth!

And in general bathing naked and, on top of that, “blind” turned out to be very pleasant for me. I would say I experienced such relaxation when I swam at night without a swimsuit, being at the time not quite sober.

Lunch on this day seemed truly royal to me: the list of dishes was announced by the people on duty, and I asked for the whole assortment to be moved closer to my bowl. Having “strolled” in turn through all the delicacies and felt their unrepeatable taste and aroma, our “blind brotherhood” got ready to recline in a leisurely way and talk about the usual (rather pensioners’) topics. We all felt roughly the same: as if in a home for the elderly we had been washed, fed and left on little chairs by the wall to doze until the next feeding. I clearly felt some kind of uselessness and loneliness.

Little by little irritation at my helplessness came over me. And then… I suddenly thought of my mother… she too sees very badly at the age of 82. And it is already quite hard for her to perform some actions that are habitual for healthy people. And I could never understand why it was such a problem for her, it always seemed to me that she was skilfully pretending in order to extract one more portion of attention from me, and it infuriated me terribly… Well, here was a chance to experience for myself all the “charm” of her present condition – the condition of an aged and not quite healthy person. For this experience I would express a separate gratitude to White Elephantess, since in ordinary life I would hardly ever have put myself voluntarily in such a position. And with the help of our chieftainess – I do not know what is correct – just like that, all at once, I “moved” myself 40 years ahead and stood on a level with my mother…

Yet another upheaval in my worldview, yet another insight.… But I did not manage to develop this theme in conversation. Again we were drawn into the forest. This time we were to do some creative work: to mould from clay whatever might come to mind and be made by hand. I was given two lumps, and told that they were of different colours. I set about kneading this damp mass, thinking it would be quite simple to sculpt something, but it was not so! Not one sensible fantasy came into my head – whether from tiredness or from being overfilled with other thoughts (before the clay we had had a meditation on the theme “The Animal of Power”, during which I began to see a whole zoo). One of the lumps of clay was large, the other smaller, and I rightly judged that I would put the large lump to some “monumental” work (something like a majestic image of my close and beloved man, whom I so long to see beside me), and from the second I would knock together a compact “love nest” for the two of us to live in together.

Setting to work, I distinctly felt that the clay did not much yield to my hands, and my super-man was, in the literal sense of the word, “born in torment”. Having somehow stuck onto an unclear torso limbs of different sizes and a completely disproportionate little head on a mighty neck, in distress I tried to take my revenge and make a masterpiece of house-building, but here too complete fiasco awaited me! The clay seemed to live by its own laws, it did not wish to submit dumbly to the actions of an element totally alien to it – me! We had not established contact, had not gone into resonance, so to speak, and so it wanted to keep its original state and stubbornly resisted me!

…My house did not work out. After struggling a little longer, I decided to give up the fruitless attempts to become an architect, and hastily rolled a long “sausage” of clay, then bent it into a pretzel. I called this “work” “Free Heart”. I think my second attempt to make friends with the clay will be more successful, and I shall be able to embody my wildest fantasies! After all, I have already learned a few things about how to behave with this “element”.

Utterly upset by my unsuccessful creative efforts, with the help of a sighted sister by the name of Found Love I carried my “voodoo doll” and my heartfelt “pretzel” to my tent and put them to dry in a secluded place, sheltered from sun and rain. That was what the technology of making clay objects prescribed.

The endless “blind” day went on, and again we were led into the forest. Howling inwardly and begging for mercy, I “trotted” along feebly in the column behind my sighted guide. Several more practices lay ahead of us, one of which was “The Family Boat”. It was this one that finished me off. Divided into threes, we had to be in turn in the roles of the old, the fathers and the children. And we were seated in such a way that, pressed against one another, we could feel all the “generations” – the youngest, the middle and the eldest. I again fell into some “pit”, as it seemed to me. And the whole role of the “grandmother” boiled down for me to “not rolling into the abyss” (by my sensations). I barely endured to the end of this practice, wild irritation seized me, I wanted to get up at once and leave this place… interestingly, the same feeling in the “grandmother’s” seat was experienced by another woman – Flying-to-the-Target, who was also “sailing” in our boat. Now I think that perhaps this place was somehow so “irritating”. As in Castaneda, it seemed to take away strength! Needless to say I waited impatiently for the end of my torments, and could not properly join either the discussion or the process of gathering wood for the fire. Although the practice was, in fact, extremely powerful, and I could describe my conclusions after it for more than one day.

In the end this day too came to a close. After supper we took off the blindfolds, and I felt how much everything had changed in this one day and night. Tiredness rolled over me in a heavy wave, my eyes ached from the unfamiliarity. The faces of familiar people looked completely new. And it was very joyful that the so familiar feeling had returned – the illusion of “being in control of the situation” . All the same it is still hard for me to trust this world, and that is sad. I cannot yet relax and “make myself available” to the power that so obviously protected and supported me all that day, and my whole life, perhaps.

It is remarkable that while we sat and discussed the events we had lived through in the tribal circle, our neighbours decided to brighten up their tipsy leisure by listening to musical works by folk authors. From their car blared a cheerful song about a boar who “кричав на все село”, because they wanted to slaughter him. I do not know what inspired such a theme for the “work”, but somehow it did not fit with our processes. And the brave man Paradise Island for some reason very easily put an end to this “concert”, simply by going up to the neighbour and asking him to hold off the “disco”. The neighbour was moved by our problems and “stepped on the throat” of his dashing performers. He held out for a surprisingly long time, until it was quite dark and we began to disperse. Then he quietly crept up to Paradise Island and, politely apologising, asked permission to continue the party, to which the Island gave his consent. After that the music at the neighbours’ sounded very quiet, and we made merry about it for quite a long time.

Day five. GRAVES AND OTHER INTERESTING THINGS.

Life in the camp gradually gathered more and more pace. Events replaced one another, emotions, feelings, insights, conclusions were layered with such density that there seemed to be no room in my head for anything new. So at some moment a kind of “switch-off” of my evaluation of what was happening occurred in me, and I simply began to live (the name I had chosen the first time had caught up with me after all!), trying to enjoy myself in accordance with my name. However, for various reasons, the atmosphere and the microclimate, so to speak, in the tribe were slowly heating up. “Little bells” signalling that the people were being “knocked out” of their usual patterns by a life so unlike the everyday routine, on the seashore in tents, had begun to sound practically from the day of arrival. It is understandable that it is quite hard to give up the masks, images, styles of behaviour, personal stories, habits (and so on and so forth) built up over a whole lifetime and so dear to us. In place of all this we are offered nothing less than to give up all this “baggage”, acquired by “back-breaking labour”, and to try to look at the world and ourselves in it from the point of view not of a Transformer but of a perfectly equal participant in Life. And the equality has to be felt with the trees, and with the earth, and with the biting ants, and with the deer that hid in the forest, and with the fire – with the whole surrounding World! That is just what a Shamanic camp is for!

And this is so unusual and, at first glance, so silly that you try to hold on to the familiar picture of the world, which is collapsing before your eyes, and here the riot of passions begins! I, for instance, had a quite clear feeling that my elder sister was present with me at the camp, a relationship with whom was far from cloudless and who tends to “line me up” here too, in the guise of the woman Clear Life; my son in the guise of Phoenix Bird, and the builder who had tried to “botch together” the renovation in our house last year and with whom I had quarrelled to smithereens because of his shoddy work (in the guise of Aleksey, a representative of the party hosting our camp). And every now and then I started to twitch and get distracted into some “post-mortems” with these personalities,… clearly picturing in the place of my fellow tribespeople all those people with whom I had not “sorted something out” in ordinary life.

And the people were jammed on their own “hang-ups”: in one couple, for example, the man considered that his woman had not watched over and looked after him responsibly enough while he was “blind”. Another man believed that his woman had been undeservedly offended, by being denied leadership and the “right of the first night”, so to speak, in the conduct of the recapitulation practice at the burial in the grave. And the woman herself said in all seriousness that her sacred right of primacy was being trampled by the chief… White Elephantess at this camp, and was going to “punish” everyone present by refusing to take part in this practice.…

I want to say that when passions heated up to the limit, a sort of switch seemed to trip in me, and I stopped “plugging into” the game on offer. I remembered my present name – Receiving Pleasure, and such boundless Love suddenly rolled over me, and such happiness that I am alive and see this whole world, that I wanted im-me-di-ate-ly to share it with others, to the point that I could have kissed and hugged everyone who came to hand! It was simply that all the conflicts began to look to me like nothing more than the whims of children who had once been hurt; somebody had once deprived them of affection and attention, and now they suffer over what they did not receive.

Having lost count of time (by the way, neither watches nor mobile phones were allowed on one’s person during the stay at the camp), our tribe began another day of testing the strength of its UPWs (usual pictures of the world). And everyone was faced with nothing less than “dying” for a while. Actually, “dying” was provided for only in order to recapitulate one’s previous life and its problems, but the preparation for the process was so serious that I began to feel fear from the evening of the previous day. Gradually it intensified, and while the tribe sat, gathered in the usual circle to discuss the processes and sort out relationships, I began seriously thinking of refusing such an unattractive undertaking.

It turned out that I was terribly afraid – afraid of death, or rather, of the unknown that it brings with it. Again the fear of losing control of the situation surfaced! And no joke: who in ordinary life would dare to lie in a grave?! But, quite rightly reasoning that no one could send me to the other world before my hour, I armed myself with a spade, ropes and knives and set off with the other fellow tribespeople into the forest, to the place of our “burial”, found by White Elephantess.

…If you have never dug a grave – count yourself lucky! I saw what hard labour it is. The brave supposition of our cheerful Paradise Island that the job would take 15 minutes was smashed to smithereens after half an hour of almost non-stop spade-waving. Sweat was pouring in streams off him, off his comrade Phoenix Bird, off one more “brother” of ours in the tribe – the man His Own Place. The work meanwhile had advanced by only a third.

For us, several women of the tribe, the mission of helping the men consisted in gathering branches and leaves to cover the graves and to make lids for the entrance into the grave. Along the way White Elephantess explained what this process meant for the Indians who practised it regularly. Here again an analogy with the female womb was drawn: the grave was nothing other than the womb, and the exit from it symbolised a kind of birth.

A person lying in the grave could return to the time when he was still a foetus in his mother’s womb, and could remember the process of his coming into the world and the feelings that accompanied it. But in fact different people related to the process differently and could take away a completely unexpected experience from it.

While we were all preparing the places of “burial” together, I diligently avoided thoughts of death, because as soon as I relaxed my self-control, horror seized me, my forehead was covered in cold sweat (in spite of the heat) and my hands began to shake. It was frightening to imagine that into approximately such a grave, on one such beautiful day, some good people might “tuck away” all that was called ME… For a while I even “dropped out” of what was happening, and caught myself only when the graves were ready, and all that remained was to cover them with the lids we had made (this whole undertaking lasted no less than an hour and a half). It turned out that Phoenix Bird had dug a pit to his own mighty dimensions, it was big and roomy, a VIP chamber of sorts . I decided at once that if I was to be “buried”, then in comfort, and certainly not in the “little” pit dug by Paradise Island. As it turned out later, there was something I had not taken into account!

Having determined the order of the “immersion” and having grabbed a quick bite in the camp, the first group of testers went off to bury themselves. It must be said that the preparatory stage also required maximum concentration on painful moments from the past (childhood, youth, key points of becoming aware of oneself as a woman/man and so on). All this had to be written down in summary so that, having plunged into the other world, one could get the necessary relief and see a way out of the circumstances that weighed on one’s life. But as practice showed, few managed to focus on these questions. The brain behaved extremely disorganisedly here too! But that is not what I am talking about yet.

It turned out that I was presented with the rather merry opportunity to “bury” myself almost at midnight. In this way the intensity of the experience became simply incredible. The last hours before the process I spent persuading myself not to be afraid and to perform my heroic deed after all. Right beside the graves a ritual fire had been laid, and the flame in it was kept up the whole time someone from our tribe was underground. This fact comforted me somewhat (at least something is visible). And it was also warming that the sitters – the people who sit by the graves and will come to help at any moment – were two healthy men. That is, my chances of a successful “return to life” were quite good. Despite all these pluses my mood sank lower and lower.

And so the first required hours had passed, and the first “test subjects” were dug out. They looked quite human, and no unpleasant phenomena had befallen them. When I climbed into the vacated grave it was already deep night. Almost in tears, I settled into my temporary shelter and, my heart sinking, watched the last gleams of the flame fade on the walls of the grave and the rustle of earth trickling from the lid die down. The last spadeful of sand was thrown on to the grave, and darkness and stillness fell…

In the first seconds I felt a wild desire to break off this experience and leap outside at once. Fear seized me by the throat, my body froze and I felt paralysed. But some part of my brain (curiosity, probably, or perhaps regret for the effort spent on preparation) did not let me lose my nerve after all, and I stayed. Slowly getting used to the new place, I began to feel: first the dimensions of the grave, then my body, which was thrown alternately into heat and cold, then various thoughts began to come into my head, I tried to say a prayer, but soon sensed the pointlessness of this action. After all I am not in trouble, not ill and am here of my own free will, and the people helping me are absolutely real, so what should I ask the Creator for? Having calmed down a little, my brain wanted to get on with its usual business – analysing and evaluating the surroundings.

But not at all! There was nothing to evaluate – darkness and silence, broken only by the rustle of little streams of sand trickling from under the branches covering the vault of the grave. So for lack of anything better the mind began fussing and lamenting over the stupidity of this undertaking. A terrible vexation suddenly overcame me that I was wasting two hours of my life so ineptly. And the bitter cases from my past that I had diligently written down somehow did not come to mind, the brain did not want to think them over, nor to look for answers to the questions that had worried me during the day. After scolding me a little for my carelessness and lamenting how much useful I could have done instead of lying in a pit by compulsion, my head decided to rest and doze.

And here my stubborn attunement to fear during the day (and perhaps during my whole life) made itself felt! My all-analysing brain picked up through my ears some strange sound, which it transformed into a picture of a dry oak leaf crunching under somebody’s foot (and why so?!!). It at once began to seem to me that someone was walking above me and certainly meant to bring the vault of the grave down right on top of me! However, the mind had to dismiss this version as completely absurd. But calm did not return: someone (with a rat’s snout and a mole’s body, as I pictured it) began digging a tunnel to me in the grave!!! At first I tried to calm myself with the thought that it was all only auditory hallucinations. Rising and sitting up, I began to listen to the strange sounds in the hope that from another position they would no longer be audible. At first that was so, and I lay down on the ground again.

But a second later I was thrown up again: the sound had become so distinct that it began to seem to me that in my “cell” one more inhabitant was about to appear, and what he would be like was unknown, because I would not see him! Probably at that moment my hair stood on end with horror. Sitting “paralysed”, my mouth open, for a few moments I wondered whether to call for help or still sit out this incomprehensible phenomenon.

But when “someone” began to “dig” even more intensely, I no longer wondered, and bellowed in a mad voice to be dug out, because in five seconds I would have punched clean through the layer of logs, branches and earth and soared up out of the grave like a surface-to-air rocket! My hopes in the strong, healthy men – the sitters – were justified: I was dug out at record speed. My teeth chattering with terror, leaving some of my things behind in the grave, I tore outside. Having reached the fire, for a while I could not say anything. Then little by little I came to myself and began asking the man who was helping me, Paradise Island, to inspect the little grave for damage caused by some animal unknown to me. Twice he thoroughly examined the whole space, and finding nothing, began to make fun of my fear. Everyone laughed together at the hallucinations that the brain so loves to create, and I had begun to relax in the warmth and light of the fire, but here among the trees I saw lights approaching us! Frightened again in earnest, for a while I could not understand that all the fellow tribespeople who had remained in the camp had come to meet the “resurrected”.

After the required time, that is, another hour and a half after my “escape”, from the neighbouring grave they pulled out the man Nameless, who was for some reason absolutely naked. After that the tribe went off together to the tents and for another couple of hours could not settle down: the “resurrected” wanted to share what they had lived through, and those not yet buried listened with interest. After my story about the terrible beast, Clear Life, who had been in the grave before me, announced that she had heard the same sounds I had, but did not become afraid of them, since she decided that it might simply be termites gnawing the old logs of the ceiling of our grave!

So that was the drawback of the VIP chamber I had chosen! Oh, how vexed I felt at my lack of restraint and patience! One thing consoled me: the sounds were there all the same, and I had not been afraid on completely empty ground, as my rescuers supposed! It was deep night when the tribe finally dispersed to their “wigwams”. On the horizon all evening there had blazed the flashes of lightning of a thunderstorm moving somewhere a hundred kilometres away. The fearsome might and beauty of the element mesmerised and made one respect the force that had created a world so diverse in its manifestations. And it was a good thing that this terrible storm did not reach our shore then, because we would not have had the strength left to save our modest belongings, and we would all have slept right in the puddles! This day came to an end. Everyone was alive and well, and that was already excellent…

A new day of my life was beginning…

Day six. THE GRAVE EXPERIMENTS CONTINUE. CLARIFYING THE QUESTION “WHAT DO WOMEN WANT?”

The closer the time came to the end of the camp, the harder it was for me to “drag” myself out of the tent in the mornings. Information was being pressed in so densely that in the short time allotted for sleep the brain could not process it. The body grew tired from the unaccustomed conditions of sleeping, eating, of such a life altogether. But interest in what was happening outweighed everything, and I heroically, with legs giving way beneath me, went out for the morning “Run of Power”. In the night before the sixth day the weather changed – a sharp cold wind blew, the sky was overcast.

The sea was stormy, the waves carried their white “lambs” up from the depths and hurled them with a swing at the shore; probably it was their “sacrifice” to the Creator. Or perhaps simply a demonstration of strength and a test of endurance for the people living on the shore. By the way, all our neighbours drove away by the evening of this day, leaving the shore entirely at our disposal.

The day that came was a tense one. To all the domestic inconveniences were added the worries of sheltering the kitchen utensils and the fire from the strong wind, which drove all badly secured things about as a footballer drives balls. We were lucky, fortunately, that Paradise Island was with us, who turned out to have excellent “canvases” of huge sizes. In the world they served as advertising banners for his firm, but to my mind their purpose was far more justified right here in our camp. It was under them that we hid everything necessary, and sat ourselves in bad weather. In the forest, however, it was quiet. The wind got tangled among the trees, and wearily died down after the first four or five metres inland from the shore. So our brothers and sisters, who were to continue the experiments of being buried in graves, could be disturbed by nothing. For some time I watched the process – I saw how differently people reacted to the events they were living through. Some were afraid (for example, Flying-to-the-Target was beside herself when she went underground), some simply slept: we could barely wake Phoenix Bird, we were already thinking of pulling him out by the legs, but he is just too massive!. Paradise Island came out of the grave showing his feelings outwardly in no way. Even those who had been about to issue an ultimatum and not take part in the practice went down under the earth – so unusual, so mystical was the state of the participants and of the organiser of the process. And the influence of the experience lived through did not make itself felt at once: something elusively changed in the perception of the world, but this change was irreversible. The first thing that was noticeable – people’s faces changed; the gaze became different, the speech was different. I can call the consequences of this practice a miracle that happened independently of my consciousness and desire. I began to feel more keenly the uniqueness of each person I met on my way; I suddenly felt how close death had come to my mother and how empty my world would be without her; how petty my arguments about some household things were, about my primacy and the inevitable victory in the struggle for imaginary values; how quickly the time of my earthly life is flowing away and how much is still not done – not loved enough, not given, not understood… And the form and cost of the monument that would stand on my grave after my death were of no importance to me, when I thought of it, lying in darkness and silence… Death really is the best adviser (Castaneda’s don Juan was right!).

I will not describe our conversation in the circle after everyone had passed through this test. I heard very much about the discoveries that many managed to make in the darkness and stillness of the underground “cells”. Then everything was perceived quite differently from how it is now, after some time. One thing can be said with absolute certainty – this experience was like nothing else in my life, and, probably, in the lives of all my fellow tribespeople.

After the wonderful “resurrection”, having had lunch and a swim, we were invited to think about more earthly things. Namely – what is it, after all, that women want? This question was to be decided separately by the women and the men of our small and already so dear tribe. So the men, to discuss the difference between the masculine and the feminine nature, withdrew into the forest to take apart the graves that had served their time, and the female half managed to retreat under the kitchen awning and strike up a conversation about when and who first felt like a woman, and how it came about. In the course of the conversation sometimes very terrible and unpleasant facts surfaced. Gradually it became clear that practically all the squaws of our tribe had rejected their feminine nature. I could no longer bear and digest so much negativity, so I simply declined to tell about my own experiences. Just then, in the nick of time, our men came back, content and joyful from the work they had done and the conversations about relationships and the problems in them.

The question “What do women want?” evidently remained rhetorical for them, but the happiness of returning home swallowed up the urge to find an answer to it. And never mind, God bless it, this question. For the time being the ritual of mate-drinking was set for the evening (that is, again there was joint “drinking” ahead, albeit in a somewhat different version). White Elephantess presented a whole ceremony with the invoking of the forces of nature – water, wind, fire and stones. The calabash symbolised the female womb, and the bombilla the male organ, and it was strictly forbidden to stir it while the calabash was passed round the circle from one fellow tribesperson to another. This ritual went back to the depths of the centuries, when the Indians used mate to save themselves from hunger and exhaustion. It turns out that in this wonderful drink, if it is prepared properly, there is a whole Mendeleev table, and in its beneficial properties it has practically no equal.

The day was ending. As before, it was very hard to disperse to our wigwams without sharing impressions of the events we had lived through. The wind was getting stronger. The coming day promised again to be full of unexplored sensations, bright, interesting and… cold. The forces of the elements called upon to help decided to show to the maximum what they were capable of.

Day seven. MEN, WOMEN, THE NATIVE AMERICAN SWEAT LODGE AND A JOURNEY INTO THE ASTRAL.

All night before the seventh day I could not close my eyes because of the fiercest wind, which threatened to tear my fragile dwelling off the ground and, with me in it, hurl it no nearer than the country where mate tea comes from. I had already wanted to crawl out of the tent to a quieter place in the forest, but I was stopped by the fear of being left altogether without the things that could easily be carried away together with the weightless (without me) shelter. So in the morning the first thing I did was to look for somewhere to move to. A place was found simply beside the kitchen awning, and I “relocated” there with pleasure.

After the usual morning run and exercises with the contest “Catch Me!”, White Elephantess began preparing us for the rite of initiation – the initiation into men and women. For this we, the women, constructed certain likenesses of skirts and saris out of the scarves and shawls at hand. Wrapped and wound over sports trousers, these “dresses” looked very colourful! I think the design finds in conditions of forest life were simply masterpieces! And since every action had a serious historical basis underneath it, it had to be approached very consciously. It was news to me that wearing a long skirt is a very harmonising process for a woman: a skirt, it turned out, joins into one the energy flows coming from the earth through the legs. And this gives a woman the chance to join the power of Mother Earth and to use it for her own wellbeing and health.

Then all the women separated from the men’s group and went off into the meditative process of gathering flowers for the meeting with the men. My state was, to put it mildly, like before a first sexual contact – the unknown was frightening. What if this ritual involves some kind of violence against the weak female nature? And here I must keep silent and cover myself with flowers? Well, in short, I was nervous in no childish way! Just imagine – at my age and with my experience of dealing with men, to discover something new in them!

Hushed and brightened, we women slowly gathered in a circle. A little way off sat the circle of our men. It was visible that this ritual intrigued them too – every now and then they smirked mysteriously and “invitingly”. Then really unusual things began: each of us (men and women) sat in the centre of the circle (the women in the women’s, the men in the men’s ) and in turn looked into the eyes of all the participants. I must say that I had never before this moment seen SUCH eyes anywhere!

These were the EYES OF WOMEN! Such as they really are – tender, loving, strong, beautiful… And these eyes seemed to say: “You are a Woman! And you are beautiful!” And then you had to stand up and do the hardest thing: go into the circle of the men. And at that time one of the men (who had been in the centre of their circle) went off to his own feat – he went to the women. I suspect that their state was like mine: like on a first date at school, honest to God!

Blushing and shy, like a girl of marriageable age, I entered and sat down in the middle of the men’s circle. From all sides THEIR eyes looked at me – eyes of strength, of confidence and… of a child! Somehow unexpectedly the maternal feeling stirred in me – the feeling of a Woman who is needed. And suddenly it became completely unimportant that I was wearing a funny skirt made of a scarf, put on over sports trousers, that my hair was covered by a kerchief of quite the wrong colour, that it was now the 21st century outside and technical progress had reached incredible heights (if even TV series have started to be broadcast online, what could possibly be next!:))

Eternal values came to the surface, and the flimsiness of all the “empty dummies” offered as a model to imitate from every billboard, from the spreads of fashionable glossy magazines and in endless TV and radio advertising, became so obvious! A Man and a Woman, forest, water, fire and earth – that is what turned out to be the most important at that moment! Without these components no blessings of civilisation are damn well needed by anyone! Having stepped out of the men’s circle, I was aware of myself as a Woman to a far greater degree than even in the most significant “feminine” moments of my life…

That is how the rite of initiation (that is, the initiation into man and woman) went. With quite different sensations all the fellow tribespeople returned to camp. One more feat remained to be accomplished: before dark to build what no one had ever seen and nobody knew how to build, namely – a Native American sweat lodge with the funny name “inipi”. By the way, I am still confused about where to put the stress in this word.

White Elephantess undertook to explain the idea and the construction of the lodge to the men. For the umpteenth time in the last week our “strong half” took up spades and axes (as always, the most “inveterate” digger and builder was Paradise Island – he was everywhere!) We, for our part, were asked to pick branches, leaves and flowers to cover the dome of the inipi and to spread the floor on which the tribe was to sit.

The work was in full swing: the men dragged the trunks of young trees and stripped them of their branches; dug a pit for the stove in which the fire would later be kindled and into which the big stones for heating the lodge would be laid; then dug the trunks into the ground in a circle, bent and tied them in a special way… I have a whole diagram showing where the entrance to the inipi should face, how the trunks are arranged in the drawing, what the structure itself and the ritual itself mean altogether.

I want to note that our lodge turned out splendidly, despite the fact that our builders were complete amateurs. Even White Elephantess paid tribute to the construction, saying that she had never before seen a structure built so neatly and harmoniously and so beautifully covered with those same “advertising canvases” from Paradise Island’s stores. Inside, the inipi was decorated with bunches of flowers and leaves on the earth floor. In the middle was a small pit for the hot stones, which were slowly heating in a big stove-pit not far from the entrance.

The day was gradually fading. The wind, which had driven the people off the shore and made me flee into the depths of the thickets in our camp, died down. The sun sank lower and lower to the water, colouring the firmament and the smooth surface of the sea in colours of incredible beauty. In the darkening sky the first stars began to show… And the call was given to begin the ritual of the Native American sweat lodge, quite unusual and unknown to anyone in the tribe.

It was not like anything I had experienced until then! Our “bath tent” stood on the edge of a steep shore, below which the water splashed, and above it – an infinitely deep sky strewn with stars, as diamonds are strewn over the precious garment of the Maker of the World.

We were one whole: almost our entire tribe, no longer shy of one another, like true brothers and sisters, and this Nature all around. The ritual itself symbolised the process of Birth (or of death – depending on how you look at it): the inipi – like the female womb, and we all – like children who come into the world when the moment arrives. Entering the lodge and leaving it also had to be done in a quite definite way.

But the most interesting part began when into the very centre of the inipi, into the central pit, a stone heated red-hot in the fire was brought in. Sparks danced over its surface, it was red and so hot that the temperature in our “sauna” leapt almost instantly by some twenty degrees, the body began to burn and the brains – to melt, like wax on birthday candles! But that is not all: according to the Indian ritual, the tribe passed the time in the lodge singing dashing and meaningful ritual songs. And since our knowledge in this area was extremely limited (apart from the loud cry “Ho!”, meaning approval, we knew no Indian words) – our songs were of the most varied kind. We began with the unforgettable little song of Gena the Crocodile, and finished with a medley of various songs that we could only remember. And as the temperature in the inipi rose, so did the volume of our sound.

After the first two dashes out of the lodge and dives into the cool, starry water, it seemed to me that I could not possibly experience greater bliss. After the third round the stars became so close to me that I could touch them with my hand (so it seemed to me). Everything merged into one – the fire in the stove where the stones were heating, the moon over the sea, the forest, hushed and listening respectfully to our “trills”, the heated bodies dancing by the fire, the flowers under the vault of the lodge, the heat from the stones and the coolness of the night… This was Life – real, full of feelings and sensations, colours and sounds! I was filled with it to the brim when White Elephantess suggested climbing into the inipi for the fourth time, according to the law of the Four Elements. After hesitating a little, I crawled after the tribe inside our structure, hot and dark as the female womb, feeling how my head was slowly separating, as it were, from the body, and the body was acquiring an unprecedented lightness. The people, it seems, were already at the upper limit of bliss, since they had gone quiet, and only noisy breathing and the faint hiss of a cooling stone broke the silence of the night.

And here one of the brothers decided to “turn up the heat”. When he rolled into the lodge one more stone, blazing with fire, which split at once into two parts, the whole tribe let out an incredible cry from an excess of joy, a wonderful feeling of lightness – as if the body were falling apart into the tiniest particles. A little more – and we would have risen into the air on this wave of happiness!

Pouring out of the lodge, our whole “society” raced to the water, no longer distinguishing where the precipice was and where the path. There was a sensation of wings that lightly carried the body where it wanted to go. Then for a long time we drank herbal tea and enjoyed the happiness of new experiences and discoveries… The last night in our incredible camp was coming to an end. And I could only notice that the constant dialogue in my head had ceased. Silence had come. I was glad of this – and fell asleep at once.

Day eight, and the last. POST-MORTEM, THE RITUAL OF TRANSITION, PACKING, DEPARTURE AND RETURN TO KYIV.

The morning of the last day was sunny and quiet. After the “bath ritual” people slept sweetly, truly like newborn children. However, the moment of parting with this reality was inexorably approaching, and White Elephantess gave the signal – began to strike a singing Tibetan bowl. The “dreamers” slowly came to, crawled out of their “wigwams” and drew together at the fire. We had to accustom ourselves to the thought that soon this place would be empty, that our “wigwams”, the fire, the inipi, everything that had become so dear to us in these seven days, would disappear… It became sad.

Suddenly I remembered my clay works, which were “ripening” in the shade at the place where my tent had stood. Worried that I might not find them, I rushed there. After a short search I finally saw… Oh, I wish I had not found what I saw! My beautiful super-man, the man of my dreams, had been taken apart for spare parts! The head, the right arm and the legs lay apart from the torso. After grieving over his “remains”, I gathered everything into a heap and, digging a little hole, performed the rite of “burial” of my illusions… The lines of a little song came to mind: «Я его слепила, из того, что было, а потом что было – то и полюбила…» This event led me to the realisation that I would never manage to construct out of a living person such an “image”, convenient for me to live with. Everyone is beautiful in themselves, what matters is what I concentrate my attention on and what I want to notice in a person, and he will decide for himself whether we are good together or not… Strange as it may seem, my clay “pretzel” – “Free Heart” – was whole and unharmed, and I gladly took it as an “object of power”.

White Elephantess, like an experienced (or experienced? ) chief, had prepared an appropriate ritual of farewell to our camp, to ease the painfulness of parting. We gathered in the glade and began to tell what we had managed to learn in this short period of time, and what we would carry away with us into our habitual life.

I was struck by the change that had occurred in the people – they had become different. The learned phrases were gone, the expression of the faces became alive, the movements – smooth, the feelings became tangible. I listened to everyone, I was interested in the discoveries of others, in their frankness – and I wanted to share with them what was in my heart: joy, the peace of a person who has returned Home. Then we had a chance to get a hint from a deck of unusual Tarot cards with Native American symbolism. Much was unclear, but White Elephantess patiently explained the meaning and deep sense of each card.

It seemed strange that soon we would stop calling each other by our “Indian” names, to which we had grown so attached! It was a little frightening to go back to the space that was making noise beyond the forest and with which we had had no contact at all for a whole week. Again an analogy arose with the process of Transition from one state to another (birth, death, transformation). However, the chief White Elephantess knew how to make the return home so as not to lose oneself and one’s energy.

The men built a sort of Portal from tree branches, we women decorated it with flowers and scarves. When the preparations for the ritual of Transition were finished, the tribe gathered around these symbolic gates. Each thought about what he wanted to leave here, in this magical place, so as not to go back to his old, outlived patterns of life, relationships, work… What he takes with him as a gift and a discovery… Then one by one we approached the Portal, and with a feeling of irreversible change stepped across the invisible border.

That’s it! And this part of life was left behind! All that remained was to give ourselves back our former “worldly” names, which the tribe did, gathering in a circle and confirming that I am now simply Lyusya, White Elephantess – Natasha Valitskaya, and the other people too can be called what they had been called before. At first it was hard all the same to get out of the habit of our Indian names, and every now and then we called each other as was customary in the tribe.

Meanwhile the time of departure was drawing near. The things had already been packed, the tents folded, a festive table laid with delicacies unseen for a whole week – home-cured salo, sweets, fried eggs, pie. People were celebrating either the loss of the past or the gaining of a new present, people laughed, joked, shared impressions, grew sad and exchanged contacts, agreed on meeting soon, hugged and said quite sincerely that they had become truly close. That is how children talk after a summer parting, when they meet at school and kindergarten… The sudden appearance of our lorry, which was to take us back to the “world”, became almost a tragedy for me.

It was hard for me to tear myself away from the warm earth, to help put out the fire, to say goodbye to the sea, in which on this day the water was of an incredible green colour (from the multitude of tiny algae raised by the recent storm). We played for time, unhurriedly carried out the rucksacks and tossed them into the back of the lorry. The driver was nervous – other business was waiting for him. But we had no thought for him. We were parting for ever. It was sad.

And then came the ride in the back of the lorry to the village of Khotsky, when every now and then we had to duck so as not to hit our heads on a thick pine branch over the road. There was a well with a “crane” – I had not seen one since my childhood. There were brown piglets in the yard of the house of those lads who had helped us with food and water all this time… Then we were set down beside an unfamiliarly noisy highway and had to resign ourselves to the fact that we were leaving after all.

A white minibus slowed down beside our thinned-out little group, we hurriedly tossed in our rucksacks and sat down in the passenger seats. I felt like a savage who had come from a desert island into the big world. I did not know how to communicate with people now, their faces looked strangely alien. On the screen of a small television some series about prison life was running (what an interesting sign!). Little by little I began to get used to the surroundings, but the sadness of losing something important remained… Having got off at the city railway station, we hugged for a long time with Natasha Valitskaya and the other lads of our “Indian” family. We agreed that we would certainly meet soon – otherwise it was impossible to live through the parting.

Lifting my massive great rucksack, I headed for the dark vestibule of the metro, whose doors kept “swallowing” hundreds of travellers through this life like me. I was returning. But I was already irreparably different!

EPILOGUE

…I am sitting in the trembling, unsteady shade, shimmering in the unimaginable heat, on the dusty embankment of one little Crimean resort town, drinking water that turns from cold to almost boiling half an hour after I take the bottle out of the fridge, and typing a text message of congratulation: today is the Anniversary of the Start of the Camp – 2009.

I remember the events of a year ago, I laugh, I grow sad, sometimes a chill runs down my spine at the memory of my “grave” adventure.

The lads of our “tribe” – where are they now? Someone has become a truly close friend to me, someone has been lost from sight, but I know for certain: they have become different, not like everyone else. At first it was hard, then it became even harder, when it became clear that the old values and relationships had died, and how to build life in a new quality was unclear. There were victories, and there were bitter “defeats” too – although can one seriously call anything by such words now? There were new trainings, meetings, discoveries, trips, tears and laughter.

My life (and the life of all those with whom I now keep up relations after the Camp) has changed radically. None of us has returned to the “river” in which we “swam” before our “turning-point” trip. At least not in the former quality. And what is most important – I have noticed that I (and most of my fellow tribespeople”) have far fewer fears – the fear of change, the fear of Life. And – the fear of death. I understood in this year that my life and my path belong only to me. And all the results and the responsibility for the consequences of my actions are also only mine. And that there will be no more such life.

That is why I am glad now to have the wonderful opportunity to remind of our “tribe” those people who then, a year ago, had the courage to go into the unknown and passed all the trials with honour.

Thank you all, lads! And – good luck!