[HN Gopher] Living alone in the wild Siberian forest
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Living alone in the wild Siberian forest
Author : simonebrunozzi
Score : 122 points
Date : 2023-01-29 08:36 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.youtube.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.youtube.com)
| pier25 wrote:
| I wonder how he gets money to buy stuff from the village like
| food, cigarettes, etc.
| virgulino wrote:
| This is a great youtube channel, I've been watching for some time
| now. Good insight into the lives of the Yakut people.
|
| The video is about a hermit. More interesting to me is the normal
| village Yakut. Kiun has made many videos about that, like how
| amazingly adapted their houses are:
|
| https://youtu.be/xZotuV1qkvA
| robocat wrote:
| The wood fired heater mentioned is a type of
| https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_stove or
| https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Masonry_heater
| triyambakam wrote:
| I've watched a number of videos from Kiun and actually their
| houses don't seem very well adapted. What am I missing?
| csk111165 wrote:
| It was in my youtube recommendation yesterday. :)
| 1024core wrote:
| I started watching this a few days ago, and right in the
| beginning, you see cigarette butts in the ashtray. If he's living
| "alone", where the heck is he getting his filter cigarettes from?
| Plus, most of his day is spent taking care of basic essentials
| that we, in the civilized world, barely spend a thought on.
| [deleted]
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| It is mentioned in the video, that every now and then he needs
| to take a 5h hike to the next village.
| watwut wrote:
| Yeah. The batteries, flour and matches have to be bought too.
| More interesting question is where he has money from - he
| clearly does not have much, but he has some and they come
| from somewhere. (Savings? Some kind of minimal pension? He
| sells hares?)
| epistemer wrote:
| I think you just have to suspend your disbelief when watching
| anything involving the genre of "Person living in the
| wilderness with no technology youtube channel".
| bananamerica wrote:
| He goes to the village occasionally, they say that.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| post nuclear apocalypse living will look like this. 3000+
| recorded wars in history, seems like time is approaching
| sgt101 wrote:
| Very odd - he's hauling wood from out of the forest when there's
| standing dead wood in the shots near the house... also why
| doesn't he have a wood pile from summer? Surely the wood is
| frozen hard so super hard to chop and split? I thought you had to
| chop and split it in the spring? What if there's a storm and you
| can't go into the forest - you'll freeze without a woodpile.
|
| Also - wooden shutters? What's the point of cellophane when it's
| dark outside? Just make a shutter and mount it in the evening?
| Surely that would help?
|
| Also the attic of the cabin is open at both ends, just making a
| rough screen would mean that there was no airflow and make that
| space more insulating.
| progre wrote:
| Frozen wood is actually easier to cut and split, at least the
| kinds that I've come across (mostly spruce and birch).
| mikestew wrote:
| Indiana ain't Siberia, but we only split wood in the winter
| when I was growing up. It's common enough that there's a
| saying, "cutting your own wood warms you twice". Gawd, I can't
| imagine swinging a sledge when it's 35C and 80% humidity.
| [deleted]
| irthomasthomas wrote:
| This popped up in my YouTube feed yesterday. It must have pleased
| the algorithm. All could I think, at the end, when they gave him
| all those gifts is "buy this man a god dang window!" Having to
| chop trees and gather wood 3 times a day just because his
| cellophane window and no one thought to fix that for him?
| danielfoster wrote:
| That's what I thought!
| ckolkey wrote:
| Funny - it also popped up for me yesterday.
| mandeepj wrote:
| it popped for me as well, but about 4 days ago
| dopidopHN wrote:
| Same. I did look for a book about a familly found deep in
| Siberia in the 80s.
| bananamerica wrote:
| Yes. Instead of giving him food, just give him a proper window.
| His quality of life would skyrocket.
| isthisthingon99 wrote:
| Supposedly it's because bears break the windows at which point
| he's back to square one. Still i can't imagine there isn't a
| better alternative.
| davidw wrote:
| Some metal bars could fix that?
| isthisthingon99 wrote:
| Maybe.
| kweks wrote:
| A few years ago, got an Ural motorbike and set off across a
| frozen lake Baikal to find the cabin of Sylvain Tesson, a French
| author that spent a full winter in the cabin.
|
| http://travel.ninjito.com/images/2018-03-15-Siberia/qx-baika...
|
| Inspired by the sheer beauty, I went back next year, found
| another abandoned fisherman's cabin and spent 2 weeks ..
| existing.
|
| What is definitely true is that your days are very quickly filled
| with important tasks: skate 5km every other day to get water,
| trek across the forest to get wood, cut wood, maintain your fire,
| etc.
|
| Completely astounding experience to be so isolated and
| independent in nature.
|
| http://travel.ninjito.com/2019-02-30-Baikal
| virgulino wrote:
| Congratulations, I hope to make the trip one day.
|
| Sylvain Tesson made a documentary about his experience, "Alone,
| 180 Days on Lake Baikal", https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2127242/
|
| https://youtu.be/JlLaWBXfQxU
| bogomipz wrote:
| This looks great. Relatedly, Werner Herzog made a documentary
| on the Taiga:
|
| "Happy People: A Year in the Taiga":
|
| https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1683876/
| Chilko wrote:
| Great photos! Just wanted to say that I find your website very
| inspiring every time I come across it. What do you photograph
| with? Some of those images have quite a medium format vibe.
| dorchadas wrote:
| This is something I've had a desire to do for a while now
| (either summer or winter), thanks for sharing your writings.
| Going to read into that, and maybe see about planning it in the
| future before I'm too old to reasonably do it.
| bogomipz wrote:
| Wow, what amazing pictures. I had a few questions if you don't
| mind:
|
| What type of wild life did you encounter?
|
| How did you manage to find and rent the cabin?
|
| Did you travel solo?
| rOOb85 wrote:
| Great pics! Someday I'd love to visit lake Baikal.
| lfodofod wrote:
| > skate 5km every other day to get water
|
| Is it so shallow you can't just make a hole in the ice?
| donsupreme wrote:
| somebody get that man a proper glass window please
| enw wrote:
| The channel owner responded:
|
| > We didn't know that he doesn't have proper windows, we were
| shocked as well. It was our first time meeting him and he
| doesn't have any mobile connection. It's very difficult to
| reach his place, it took us 3 hours by car and 1 hour by
| snowmobile (which got broken while we were filming). Thank you
| for your concern, we will replace his windows soon.
| woleium wrote:
| Why doesn't he at least use two layers of cellophane? air is a
| great insulator. one on the inside and one on the outside and
| he would definitely be much warmer
| goodpoint wrote:
| Two layers... or even six, given the climate. But he might
| not have it or be unaware of the improvement.
| dopidopHN wrote:
| I find it odd. Even a plank you put at night would help.
| jeffbee wrote:
| Great documentary on a similar subject: Happy People.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_People:_A_Year_in_the_Ta...
| fluxem wrote:
| I don't know why people find this awe inspiring. For me,
| inspiring stories are about overcoming adversity, like physical
| disability and living a full life.
|
| This video is about a man, who is keep making poor decisions and
| living consequences. Why is living 5 hours away from
| civilization? He could have build a hut an hour away, which would
| be more convenient (and safer). Why doesn't he installed a proper
| window, which would keep his house warmer and require less trips
| for the wood. Why doesn't he have a job, which could pay for
| food, instead of wasting the whole days gathering for food.
|
| This is reminding me of
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAq-r2dm9Tw
| elvis10ten wrote:
| > I don't know why people find this awe inspiring
|
| Maybe it made people question what is actually essential. And
| it's crazy (like wow) that he has done this for 20 years, I
| don't think people will choose to go live in the middle of
| nowhere after watching this.
|
| > who is keep making poor decisions and living consequences.
|
| A statement without (his) context.
|
| To add to your other questions: why did he choose to do this?
| Does he enjoy this? Etc.
| s5300 wrote:
| >>I don't know why people find this awe inspiring >> This video
| is about a man, who is keep making poor decisions and living
| consequences.
|
| This reeks of jumping to conclusions & victim blaming. Would
| you treat somebody with schizophrenia the same way?
|
| fwiw, dude seems like he was traumatized by losing his family &
| whatever else & this was his only way of coping with life.
| That's definitely jumping to conclusions from my POV... but
| perhaps a better guess than victim blaming.
| kilgnad wrote:
| You might be right. But his questions are valid.
|
| In this day an age cancel culture has everyone pointing
| fingers and blaming everyone for just having opinions. Who
| cares man.
|
| All I care about is that those questions are legit. Why does
| he live so far and why no window? There's some suggestions as
| to why... but those suggestions aren't satisfactory imo.
| the_only_law wrote:
| You don't have to know every detail about everyone. Minding
| your own business is free.
| vbezhenar wrote:
| I don't think that it's legal in Russia to just build a hut in
| the wood and cut trees around. Of course if it's depths of
| Siberia, nobody will notice, but if it's near big city, it
| might be different. So this might be one factor why he's away
| from civilization. He does not want to deal with bureaucrats.
| [deleted]
| nibbleshifter wrote:
| > He does not want to deal with bureaucrats.
|
| Highly likely. He lives just far enough out that they can't
| be fucked dealing with him.
| dopidopHN wrote:
| Exactly, late in the 1800 , early 1900 it was common for a
| orthodox sect to just recede further in the Siberian taiga.
|
| Some geological team found a familly of those guy and gal
| in the 80s.
|
| They were doing surprisingly well. ( to an extend )
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| Well, not everyone can or wants to enjoy a first world living
| standard.
| john___matrix wrote:
| This must be the ultimate HN reader video fodder, popped up in my
| feed the other day too. Interesting watching people like this who
| just decide they want to be away from everything.
| triyambakam wrote:
| Seems like he's emotionally wounded and less so truly enjoys
| being alone. He looks older than most people I know his age. I
| have seen in other Yakut videos that the families harvest wood
| for the whole year all at once, so it's strange he does it every
| day. His diet seems really poor. I have dreamed about living in
| the woods, but not like that.
| l5870uoo9y wrote:
| my long distance psycho analysis hutch was that this is a sort
| of an escapism after his entire family died and that he wasn't
| able to process it (and that the broken window he frustratedly
| poke is a symbol of that). however without consultation you can
| really say a thing
| ohyoutravel wrote:
| It strikes me how his entire day is filled and spend providing
| for his basic needs. If he doesn't get up in the morning he will
| freeze to death for lack of heat during the winter.
|
| The ice from the lake versus snow seems weird to me. Can anyone
| comment on "freezing lake removing impurities and being safer
| than snow"?
|
| He does need a better window though, I'm happy to provide this
| via go fund me or something. He would definitely make a bunch of
| money documenting his life and posting to YouTube, enabling him
| to get proper insulation.
|
| Regardless, this is great if this is the life he desires. I feel
| horrible for those poor dogs though. They seem to be underfed and
| if he suffers any issues they will freeze to death or starve. I
| hate that.
| pier25 wrote:
| > _I feel horrible for those poor dogs though_
|
| Those dogs would probably be already dead if it wasn't for him.
| I don't think strays survive those harsh winters.
| FpUser wrote:
| >"If he doesn't get up in the morning he will freeze to death
| for lack of heat during the winter."
|
| Pretty sure he has some emergency stash to be used when he is
| sick. Unless of course at some point he becomes too frail and
| would rather prefer for nature to take care of the matter.
| vbezhenar wrote:
| Snowflake forms on small dirt particle. Snow is inherently
| dirt. Never use snow for drink water. Just try to melt some
| snow and you'll see for yourself. Ice is different. Using ice
| is definitely proper approach if you don't have better sources
| of water.
| 867-5309 wrote:
| perhaps the base layer of snow will be dirty from having
| contact with the ground, but any snow on top of that will be
| safe to drink so long as the pH is close to neutral
| watwut wrote:
| Afaik, snow is NOT safe to drink in the long term, because
| it does not contain minerals. It will demineralize you
| which is why mountain climbers don't drink snow.
| 867-5309 wrote:
| the difference being that mountain dwellers would find
| alternative sources of minerals, and climbers would take
| supplements with them
|
| if you're dehydrated you're not going to pass on snow in
| search of ice
| heelix wrote:
| From my winter camping - it takes a lot more work to melt
| snow than ice, when one is boiling water.
| 867-5309 wrote:
| I'd imagine it depends on the type of snow and the type
| of ice, but if we're talking about (almost) pure water
| types then snow would obviously melt more readily than
| ice
| fruit2020 wrote:
| Why would snow be dirt? It falls from the sky
| qup wrote:
| It needs dirt to start forming the snowflake crystal. I
| can't imagine it being a problem ingesting it, though.
| woleium wrote:
| As water freezes it forms a crystal lattice. As the lattice
| forms it pushes impurities away from the formation front. This
| is why ice cubes are clear at the edges and discolored in the
| center, the impurities are all pushed to the last place to
| freeze, the middle. By taking the top of the frozen lake he's
| getting the (more) pure water, similar to the edge of an ice
| cube.
| MuffinFlavored wrote:
| > It strikes me how his entire day is filled and spend
| providing for his basic needs. If he doesn't get up in the
| morning he will freeze to death for lack of heat during the
| winter.
|
| Meanwhile I have a friend who doesn't work, lives at home,
| never leaves the house, watches Twitch/YouTube + scrolls
| Twitter all day.
|
| Two different people living completely opposite worlds, and
| interestingly enough both of them probably think the other has
| it wrong and they have it right.
|
| How can something as massive as "entire lifestyle choice" be so
| open for wildly varying interpretations?
| docandrew wrote:
| I know whose autobiography I'd rather read.
| californical wrote:
| Only because it's so uncommon. If we all lived alone in the
| woods, we'd probably be curious about the all-day-digital
| person
| glass3 wrote:
| Twitch/YouTube is as lonesome as the wild Siberian forest.
| Both have found situations that flood them with repeatable
| stimuli that makes them feel good.
|
| It's interesting to look at what both don't do.
| s5300 wrote:
| >> his entire day is filled and spend providing for his basic
| needs. If he doesn't get up in the morning he will freeze to
| death for lack of heat during the winter.
|
| Could very well be the only thing/routine that's able to keep
| him going/alive. Being alone with your thoughts & not staying
| active at all is pretty severely bad for your health. Given
| that he states his entire family died when he was young & he
| doesn't feel as if he can fit in with society, he's probably
| quite traumatized & it wouldn't surprise me if this were the
| case.
|
| >>I feel horrible for those poor dogs though. They seem to be
| underfed and if he suffers any issues they will freeze to death
| or starve. I hate that.
|
| As much as it may suck to those of us living in modern
| societies, animals are tools. _Especially_ dogs. They have been
| appropriated as such for presumably all of human history. In
| the urban US they tend to be tools for the owners feel good
| emotions nowadays - essentially ornaments /living trinkets.
| Like the poor brachycephalic Frenchie of somebody I'm currently
| living with that can't breathe & slobbers all over itself 24/7.
| If it ever got out of the house by itself, it would be eaten in
| around 10 minutes by any one of a few dozen coyotes that
| inhabits my desert neighborhood.
|
| If you want to be sad about animals, direct that towards your
| local chain animal shelter that non-humanely euthanizes &
| incinerates them by the 55 gallon drum. Not some lonely hermits
| only companions & day-to-day assistance.
|
| Oh boy. I'm being a buzzkill. I really do hope he's able to get
| a proper window that will hold up in that environment through
| this social media exposure & perhaps some sort of
| security/lifeline for if he were to suddenly fall ill.
|
| Anyways - I was very much reminded of the Lykov family upon
| seeing this story. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lykov_family
| userulluipeste wrote:
| That is not "living", that is just getting lucky on
| surviving/subsisting. There are so many things that even a medium
| school grader would know to improve on first occasion, like (even
| with that cellophane) on windows setting the sheet(s) up at least
| in more than one layer for improved insulation, so that the loss
| of heat may not be that severe, or like separating the entrance
| to the main living space by some sort of hall that would prevent
| unintentional airing, or like assuring close by supplies for the
| winter season, so that those multiple trips per day for anything
| become as short and of as little importance as possible, and many
| others. This was just painful to watch.
| watwut wrote:
| The documentary is not introducing him as an engineer with
| great education. He is a dude who lost family as young and at
| some point decided to live alone in forrest (I guess he has
| some pension due to amount of stuff he clearly bought).
|
| There are many fundamental decisions he could have done
| differently ... but that sort of person won't decide to live
| like this in the first place.
|
| Living in the forrest does not have to imply great wisdom in
| everything. Sometimes it is just poverty and being a social
| issue.
| potatototoo99 wrote:
| I am sure he has though of those things, but the documentary
| didn't show or opportunity did not arise.
| kepler1 wrote:
| I got this video served up to me randomly as well. I was amused
| by the random Youtube commenters all along the lines of "what a
| beautiful simple life this man leads", etc. etc.
|
| And I couldn't help but shake my head at the naivete / shallow
| internet lauding that this is some idyllic rustic life. This guy
| is actively choosing to live in harsh, most unforgiving
| conditions that require all his daily energy, hours from any kind
| of help. And he's going to die there as well unless something
| changes, and probably without anyone knowing.
|
| As others have said, maybe he wants this because of some
| unresolved emotional problems. All I see is someone who is making
| his own life purposely hard. Perhaps there is a little to be
| admired here -- the unusual nature of it, and the perseverance.
| But this life isn't something to be desired by anyone, and I
| don't join in the reflexive cooing over how awesome it is once
| you get over the unusualness.
| yetanotherloser wrote:
| Why is it a bad thing for him to die where he has chosen to
| live and die? (assuming he actually has, which is really not
| something I'd bet too hard on, on the strength of one video).
| Why do you suggest it's a bad thing if nobody knows when he has
| died there?
| dumbaccount123 wrote:
| Every senior software engineers dream
| moomoo11 wrote:
| until they hit engineering manager and then its a big house in
| the suburbs lol
| lagrange77 wrote:
| It was really my dream for a long time. But taking account the
| current geopolitical transitions, it may continue to be merely
| a dream for a some time.
| RivieraKid wrote:
| What do you mean?
| playingalong wrote:
| A war started by Russia and general lack of safety going
| there? (Forget the legal aspects)
| ROTMetro wrote:
| As someone who did this and moved to the Rocky Mountains but
| grew up in the Bay Area'ish (Santa Cruz), I love my small town,
| but man do I miss the city. It's way easier to get away to the
| countryside when you have city money, harder to do the reverse.
| Also for unsocial geeks it's a strange social change. Instead
| of being anonymous at for example restaurants or stores, you
| know everyone, so everything has much more social interaction
| than the big city.
|
| On a personal level it wasn't great, but the childhood my kids
| got, camping in actual wilderness instead of car camping,
| boating every day after I got off work, camping at wilderness
| boat only campsites where we had to swim our gear to shore from
| our anchored boat, catching brook trout with grasshoppers
| simply tied to the end of reeds (I was amazed that worked,
| though the stream was so packed with trout they could've just
| grabbed them though that would be illegal), seeing every wild
| animal with the exception of porcupines (this frustrated my son
| no end. Also, scariest animal to the kids? Grouse and beavers
| (when swimming), and yeah, wolves howling at night when
| camping). Picking huckleberries having to wear bear bells.
| Skiing all winter (kids unlimited pass was like $125 so cheaper
| than seeing a movie every weekend in winter, and it included
| the bus pass from the bottom of the mountain so we could just
| drop them off in the morning and meet up with them for some
| night skiing at the end of the day). I like to think while I
| messed up a lot that that gift of a childhood was special.
|
| But it is a harder transition than you would think, especially
| for someone who in not comfortable with themselves. Funny thing
| about going away and finding yourself, you have to be ok
| with... yourself. Or else self loathing and self destruction
| sets in.
| mr90210 wrote:
| Lol, NO!
| mr90210 wrote:
| This video came up on my YT feed.
| lazyweb wrote:
| There is a show called Alone [1] in which 10 participants compete
| for 500.000 dollars by trying to survive the northern canadian
| arctic winter as long as possible, up to three or four months.
| Virtually all footage is filmed by the participants themselves.
| It's quite engrossing.
|
| [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4803766/
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(page generated 2023-01-29 23:00 UTC)