When Thor arrives

For hundreds of years, the Shors lived on their original lands, which are now called the Kemerovo region. They were engaged in hunting, fishing, shamanils, revered spirits - the owners of nature. And then coal cuts opened - the Kuznetsk basin, Kuzbass. And the gods turned away from people

“Everyone does not care for the ecology! ..” says the young guy, spitting seeds right in the car, parked next to ours. - The people are ready to smell this coal and this burn for thirty thousand rubles a month! ”

Where is Moscow and where is the owner

Upon arrival at the place of fishing, the shorts first performed the rite of Shachyg (roar) and tried to behave so as not to angry Tag-Eesi, the owner of the mountain. The owner of the mountain does not like noisy companies, does not tolerate drunkenness, fading, fights, scandals. The owner of the mountain loves consent, friendship, discipline, ingenuity and hard work. Thus writes the researcher Andrei Gudoyakov in the book “Nine Bubes of the Shaman”.

And Oleg and Kostya are sitting on a bench and eating salted cucumbers. In the Kuznetsk district of Novokuznetsk, a stone's throw from the aluminum factory. Novokuznetsk is the largest metallurgical center of Kuzbass. In this region in the south of the Kemerovo region, 60% of the Russian coal mining is concentrated.

Novokuznetsk streets photo: Vadim Bryadov for TD

Oleg and Kostya are about fifty, but they look ten years older. Kostya says: “I have been changing glasses in my kitchen every two years! It is useless to wash them. You go to the balcony, and here they are, pipes. There is nowhere else to watch. Water from the tap cannot be drunk either. Those who have a car go to the spring for water. ” According to Oleg, the Moscow authorities do not follow the health of the plant workers. “Where is Moscow, and where are we! - repeats Oleg. “They don't give a shit on us.” According to Oleg and Kostya, the residents of the district only dream that about the “hot grid”, that is, about the early retirement. “Although few people live to retire,” Kostya grins.

Residents of the district only dream that the “hot grid”, that is, about the early retirement

According to Rosprirodnadzor, life expectancy in the Kemerovo region is three to four years lower than the average in Russia (the average life expectancy in Russia is 72 years old.- approx. “TD” ). The region is the leader in professional incidence: the first place is occupied by respiratory diseases, which are common especially among miners. The pollution of air and soil is more than one and a half times higher than the average Russian indicators.

Tuleyev, Putin, Santa Claus

The researcher of the Gudoyakov writes that the shorts believed: “You can’t tear grass with the root. Grass is the hair of the earth. Tearing them with a root means to cause the earth. ”

We are going along the road in the vicinity of Novokuznetsk. Behind the window there are endless green fields and taiga, surrounding small wooden villages. On the horizon, the blue sky is hidden by brown smog. On the roads, leaving behind long dusty traces, the wheel huge dump trucks loaded with coal. “Here people breathe a Mendeleev table,” the driver complains.

Residents of Kuzbass and the nearest regions are resting at the Belovsky reservoir. On the other side of the Belovskaya GRES photo is smoking: Vadim Braidov for TD

The lion's share of responsibility for the environmental degradation of the region is carried out by companies engaged in uncontrolled prey and processing of minerals. Where coal cuts are opened, nature is destroyed, the earth shakes from explosive work. According to the Eco Protection organization, here more than fifty settlements are located closer to the law of a thousand meters guaranteed by law. “A thousand meters from the coal section is nothing. But even this modest norm is not fulfilled! " - says Anton Lementyev, a local representative of Eco -Protection. The mining engineer by education, Lementyev refused his career in the coal industry when he realized that this was a dirty thing.

According to local activists, coal miners reduce investments in the environment and security measures in order to compensate for the huge costs of transporting coal.

Most of the violations remain unpunished, since, according to Anton and his colleagues, there is an unspoken agreement between coal miners and officials from the administration of the Kemerovo region. “Governor Tuleyev is the first lobby for these coal companies and these violations. In his power, it was to strengthen control, to prevent coal cuts from arising half a kilometer from the village. But he admits, ”says Lementyev.

Students celebrate the defense of the diploma in Novokuznetsk photo: Vadim Bryadov for TD

Locals are powerless before violations mainly due to legal illiteracy. “People begin to write letters to Putin or Tuleyev:“ We have such a disaster, help us, ”as if they were turning to Santa Claus,” Anton grins bitterly. “Eco -Protection” is going to conduct classes with local residents, to teach them to defend their rights.

Posthumous spirit

According to the researcher of Gudoyakov, the Shrings believed that “a person was hunting, and a TOS is walking in front of him - his spirit, double, assistant. A person also has a Surun - a spirit that follows a person and protects. There are also spirits of dead people who live among the living. Uzuts are called. The Uzut is especially dangerous, because it can move into the soul of a living person and destroy it. Usually he instills in the one who offended the owner of this Uzut. ”

Wooden ruins - everything that remains of the village of Kazas, once a small paradise on the banks of the Mszasa River. A little more, and weeds will completely swallow the abandoned buildings. “It feels like there have never been a village,” says Alexander Tokmagashev, a former resident of the village, a representative of the small indigenous people of Kuzbass - Shors.

In the winter of 2013-2014, Alexander’s house and some more houses burned down. The case of arson has not yet been disclosed

In 2012, extremely dysfunctional living conditions forced the inhabitants of the Cossack to sell their lands to the coal company Yuzhnaya LLC. According to the official version, they sold voluntarily, but some residents announced the threats that they received by representatives of the South. “People were afraid, so they ran away,” recalls Alexander, one of the few inhabitants of the Cossack who refused to sell their land. In the winter of 2013-2014, Alexander’s house and some more houses burned down. The case of arson has not yet been disclosed. Since that time, Alexander has been living in a city apartment, his disability pension does not allow to repair the burned house. And he turned to the administration many times with a request to preserve the family cemetery near the village.

Novokuznetsk streets photo: Vadim Bryadov for TD

The graves of the Shors hide high purple lupines. Alexander shows us the grave of his father, a participant in the Great Patriotic War. “What did my father fight for? He built the house, left it to me as an inheritance ... ”Alexander would like to transfer the house to his children, but the Fatherland, for which his father fought, was gone.

Shaitan is not asleep

There is such a short fairy tale. “There lived an old hunter, he had two sons. The hunter wanted his sons to be hunters also to be: Squirrel, Sobol and otter to hunt. Taiga Shorza feeds.

The eldest son of his father loved, obeyed him. He had a keen eye, his hands were strong, he became a hunter, pleased his father. The younger did not want to become a hunter. People came to the taiga, began to walk around the mountains, look for stones. The youngest son wanted to leave with them. The hunter did not let his son, said: “Shaitan will catch, the shaitan will not let go, punish the shaitan.”

Belaz trucks in the context of "Bachatsky" photo: Vadim Bryadov for TD

But his son and people went to the mountains, did not listen to his father. Shaitan did not want to let people into the mountains. When people came, began to knock with hammers, the taiga rustled, the strong wind rose, the mountain split in two. People were killed, the son of a hunter died with them, who did not listen to his father. Now there is no shouter. Scary there. "

Local officials say that the situation with the shorts is actually not so terrible. A couple of years ago, in the village of Chuvashka, not far from the Cossack, the workshop of Shorsky folk fishing and the spiritual center opened. There we are met by local entrepreneur Vladimir Bekrenev. Together with his family, he wants to develop ethnic tourism in a dude. Invites to a wooden yurt, opposite which there are two wooden wolves. On the roof of the yurts, the flag of white and blue is hoisted. Vladimir says that this is the national flag of the Shorsky people, and then clarifies: he was invented two years ago.

In the middle of the yurt, the stove, on the other end of the hall is a wooden throne, where, according to ancient Shoric customs, the guest can sit down and make a desire. Near the yurt, there is a workshop of folk fishing, where Vladimir’s wife draws local landscapes. Wooden signs with inscriptions in Shorsky are adjacent to the workshop with Orthodox icons and crosses. All these are souvenirs for sale.

Alexander, a resident of the village of Kazas, whose house was burned in 2014. Residents associate arson with the refusal of some of them to sell houses at home : Vadim Bryadov for TD

The construction of the spiritual center and the workshop was financed by coal entrepreneurs - this is their contribution to the revival of Shorsky culture. “The more coal, the richer the shorts,” says Vladimir’s sister enthusiastically.

Later, Vladimir and I are standing on the banks of the Msravza River. From here you can see the dumps of the section "Sibergin", where Vladimir worked all his life with a drill. Now he is retired. He says that he would like to turn the Shor lands into a reserve. When asked whether he resisted the devastation of the Shor initial lands, Vladimir does not answer for a long time. Grinkling, silent, sighs: “The“ Kiisassky ”incision began to work. I was unable to stop him. " Vladimir came to the conclusion that the fight against coal miners is a useless thing. “We live on coal. Our ancestors chose the richest place. There is coal everywhere. This is our trouble. ”

Sell ​​your land

The Shorsk legend says that Pugra Kaughai had ninety Molotov. He could not control his own force and began to destroy the mountain. For this, Kudai-God punished him. Pugra Kahachai turned into stone.

Activists Marina Sataeva and Natalya Anisimova Photo: Vadim Brydov for TD

And Natalya Anisimova, a pensioner and a resident of the village of Mencherap, says: “We made a decision. We do not accept documents from them. We do not sign anything. We are against the cut. There will be no cut. ”

In December last year, local residents learned about the imminent opening of a new coal section on the village of the village. Four land plots are seized for state and municipal needs in connection with the implementation of subsoil use. Stroypozhservis LLC received a license for coal production and is going to redeem these areas. “We are not talking about the sale, we do not want to sell anything,” the neighbor Natalia, Marina Sataeva insists.

These two women are owners of land subject to seizure. They are sitting on the veranda of a wooden cottage a few meters from the shore of the Belovsky reservoir. An artificial reservoir, created for the water supply of the power plant, is called the pearl of Kuzbass. People from all over the region come here.

Someone bathes. On the opposite shore, the pipes of the Belovskaya GRES are steamed. Pensioners note that the procedure for which licenses for coal mining is issued does not provide for the participation of the local population. “No one thought about people. We live here. Where do we go? " - Marina is indignant.

In the sections of pensioners, gardens since Soviet times. “These are your sanctions, I apologize, they are to me to the light bulb, because I do not need anything. I have all my own! I have cattle, I hold a cow. If the fields are seized, where should I put the cow? "

Children bathe in the Mszasa River near the village of Chuvashka Photo: Vadim Brydov for TD

Pensioners are convinced that the opening of the incision will destroy the local ecosystem and even the development of tourism in the area will make it impossible: “We want to prevent all this in advance,” says Natalya. - Because when there is already a cut, nothing else will be, never! There will be a lunar landscape. "

“When there is already a cut, nothing else will be, never! There will be a lunar landscape "

Women feel responsible for the welfare of all the inhabitants of Mencherep. “As soon as we agree to sell the land, other people will suffer,” says Marina.

Marina and Natalya are in the initiative group along with other shareholders opposing the opening of the incision. “We go to the Popular Front, sit at meetings in the Public Chamber, write and send letters, we correspond to“ Odnoklassniki ”, see what people think ...” - women list.

Old Shorskoye cemetery near the village of Kazas Photo: Vadim Brydov for TD

They show a mountain of letters received in response to their many appeals to the authorities. Applications of the administration, according to which coal mining will take place “in strict accordance with applicable law”, do not at all calm women who have repeatedly observed the impotence of the administration before the omnipotence of coal companies.

“If Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin will not help us with his decree, will not cancel all these licenses, we will sue,” says Marina.

When Thor arrives

According to Shorsky legend, the most angry mountain is Kilgis. She cannot be teased. Near it you do not need to scream, faded, swear. Kilgis will get angry.

And next to the village of Starobachata, the barren mountain of dump breed rises - the “Bachatsky” section.

Valentina Boriskina, activist of the village of Chuvashka, fights for many years with coal miners, considering them the main enemy of Shorian villages photo: Vadim Brydov for TD

On the edge of the village, a few tens of meters from the steaming dump, Eugene has been living for ten years. He is a teacher. “When I arrived, there was a forest here and near the forest - the field where people planted potatoes,” says Eugene. Every year, the Mountain of waste came closer and closer. Now nothing is left of the field. Eugene no longer shudders from the explosions: "They blew up and blew up, as if it were necessary." But he will not get used to coal dust flying from the cut: “When the wind blows in this direction, it is generally impossible to go out. Dust immediately creaks on the teeth. But environmentalists come, ”he continues,“ and the incision immediately stops working. No noise, no dust, nothing. As soon as they leave, it begins again. ” According to him, there were old pensioners real activists in the village, but they "did not live." Eugene loves his village, but he does not have enough time to engage in environmental problems. “When you retire, it remains more time. And I need to feed the children. "

Near the village of Chuvashka, where the Shroles still live, three coal cuts: Krasnogorsk, Siberginsky and Kiisassky. “They will blow up, they will pay off the river. There will be such conditions that we will leave here from here, ”says the Shorean pensioner Valentina Boriskin.

She treats us with pancakes and tea. Nothing in her clothes and in the house does not recall the culture of the ancestors. “We completely destroyed our language, our traditions, our customs. They depersonalized the Shors, ”the woman complains.

A resident of the village of Starobachata Photo: Vadim Brydov for TD

Since 2013, Valentine has been in an initiative group that protects the rights of the Shorsky population. She believes that the Shors became the main victims of the industrialization of the region. Their traditional crafts - fishing, hunting and gathering - can not feed anyone for a long time. Young shorts leave the villages and move to the cities. According to Valentina, the destruction of the original territories plays the main role in the disappearance of the Shorsky people: “Someone is drunk in the city, someone dies in the mines. And we are children of nature. We must live on our land. ”

“Young people do not worship the spirits. The gods turn away from us. Do not help us "

Today, the Kuzbass economy is completely dependent on the production and export of minerals. Most residents of Kuzbass work at coal mining enterprises and in adjacent industries.

Village Chuvashka Photo: Vadim Brydov for TD

Representatives of “Eco -Protection” are convinced that if the production is not diversified, Kuzbass will not only expect an ecological, but also an economic disaster. According to Ecologist Lementyev, ten years later in the coal industry in Kuzbass will only be pickens and dumps. “And then,” he concludes, “there will be neither nature nor jobs.”

“Young people do not worship the spirits,” Valentine sighs. - The gods turn away from us. Do not help us. "

School hunters argue that sometimes at night in the mountains you can meet the mountain spirit of Thor. He seems to swim through the air in a black boat. From a group of hunters who saw the spirit of the mountain, every second will certainly die in the near future.

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Kuzbass Shorts Ecology