There was a time when an Udege, looking at a deer, thought he saw a deer-man.... Back in those times, all sorts of things happened to people. Such things that nowadays do not.
From an Udege tale
The Udege people have lived in the boreal jungle, in what is now Russia’s Primorsky Krai, for hundreds of years. Given their close contact with nature, their beliefs are riddled with references to supernatural forces that must be respected. For example, the Udege people believe that if someone attacks a tiger without reason, Amba will hunt him down.
In 1997 a Russian poacher named Markov ran across the trail of a gigantic Amur Tiger. Despite the risk, Markov interpreted the tiger’s footprints as the promise of a better life. He shot the tiger, but did not kill it. Unexpectedly, Markov unleashed the Amba, the tiger’s dark side.
Over the next 72 hours, the wounded tiger tracked Markov down and killed him. Later investigations suggested that the tiger planned its movements with a rare mix of strategy and instinct and, most importantly, with a chilling clarity of purpose: Amba was seeking revenge.
Such animistic beliefs are emblematic of the impact of nature in Udege communities across the Russian Far East. Theirs is a hunting culture, and one of the last bastions of shamanism.
This photojournalism project, which sought to create a collective portrait of the people, fauna, ecosystem and ways of life surrounding the Udege, was influenced by two books that focus on the complex relationship between native peoples and the boreal forest and examine the conflict between modern and traditional life.
Kostya
The first is Vladimir Arsenyev’s Dersu Uzala, a rather long work that recounts Arsenyev’s expedition to the Ussuri Krai (Territory). A rational, educated Russian scientist meets a Nanai hunter, Dersu, in the forest. Dersu is uneducated, illiterate and knows nothing of the world beyond the taiga, yet his balanced, naturalized view of the world completely transforms Arsenyev’s own worldview (and saves him and his party of explorers more than once).
The second book was John Valiant’s The Tiger, A True Story of Vengeance and Survival. It tells the story, recounted in brief above, of the poacher Markov, which took place 75 years after Arsenyev’s stories were first published.
Today, both Udege hunters (population approximately 1,500) and the Amur Tiger (population approximately 500) are on the verge of extinction.
In the local dialect, Udege means “the people of the forest.” Central to their worldview is an animism and an appreciation for the interdependence of man and nature – their observation and of dialog with nature is a way to inhabit and be in contact with the world itself.
“According to them, not only people, but beasts, birds, fishes and insects have soul and shadow. Plants, stones, and all inanimate objects have them,” wrote Arsenyev about Dersu. But what happens when, as Valiant writes, “The spiritual and social breakdown accompany great changes in the environment.” An ancient Nanai tale begins: “Once upon a time, before the Russian had burned the forests... the new inhabitant’s arrival changed everything…”
Depopulation, destabilization of social networks, and humanity’s deforestation of the Russian Far East, have made the fate of the Udege and the Amur Tiger signposts for our world’s rapidly changing environment. In 2014 and 2015, I traveled several times to the region, interviewing a number of people about Markov’s death and the subsequent hunt for the tiger that killed him. Extracts from these interviews follow.
Andrei the hunter.
“There were four of us following the tiger’s tracks... The snow was deep and we figured out that we could be in trouble... We were walking back to back….
“We walked forward for 30 meters and my dog was leading. We noticed something strange was happening with her, she was so nervous. I was leading the squad half a meter in front of my men when in a matter of seconds I heard a roar. Before I realized it, the tiger was pouncing on me. We made eye contact with each other and I had the time to shoot twice. One bullet hit it in the neck and the other in the leg.
Anatoly Jobotinov, attack survivor and former member of the tiger patrol.
“Then I felt myself being thrown through the air. I did not feel any pain, just a heavy blow. I protected my head with my arm, but at the same time I did not want to release the weapon, so I curled up, with my head tucked in, and thought now (the tiger) is going to sink its teeth into my neck, as it did with the other victims. I remained in a fetal position gripping the tiger’s fur. Then I heard “tac-tac-tac-tac” My squad was shooting. Then a sudden jolt moved the tiger off of me. I was breathless and snow covered my face.
“When I could get up my men asked me ‘are you alive?’ I answered ‘Yes, I’m fine.’ I saw the tiger about two meters ahead of me, near to death. Then someone grabbed a camera from the car and began filming. He told me ‘Yura! you are completely covered in blood,’ but I did not feel any pain. Instead, I wondered where my weapon was, and then I saw it inside the tiger’s mouth. How could that have happened? I did not push my rifle into his mouth… maybe when he attacked me?… (he crosses himself) Thank God I have a guardian angel. The rifle was useless after that…
“During the shooting, I had no time to feel fear. Everything happened in three or four seconds. Once I was back in the car, I started thinking about it. That is when I felt scared to death. I do not smoke, but I asked my colleague for a cigarette. While I was smoking it, he stared at me and said: ‘Do you finally realize what happened to you?’”
“Growing deforestation is forcing tigers to search for new territories. The young ones eventually will be forced to live near the bigger and old ones. Then they will search for a new territory, but… if the tiger wants to survive, he will be compelled to live and hunt among humans, which will lead to conflict between the two species.…
“Now people kill the tigers, they push them out of their territories. Everywhere you can find roads and 4x4s. Modern weapons are easy to find, and all these things are annihilating the tiger. Years ago, it was very different. Only professional hunters went to the taiga. They knew and respected the animals, the land. Now there are only tourists, who do not respect anything. They just kill for pleasure. They do not respect spring, pregnant animals or cubs…”
“If you see a tiger for one second, he has been watching you for an hour.”
– Old Udege proverb
Fresh track of a three-year-old tiger near the Bikin River.
“A friend of Vladimir’s came to see me that morning. He told me he had been attacked by a tiger. I asked him: ‘Why didn’t you bring him here?’ I thought he was alive. He replied that there was nothing to bring home.
“The tiger took him and ate him. He left just his leg. They brought his leg, we put it on a coffin and gave him a proper burial, as everyone should be buried, despite the fact that there was just one leg. It was the third of December, 1997. He has been gone for a long time…”
Tamara Borisova, Vladimir Markov’s widow.
What is the amba?
“In our culture, ‘amba’ means a bad spirit who has possessed a tiger. Then he begins attacking and behaving badly.”
Have you ever met the amba?
(Laughing) “Happily no! If so I would not be here. I have met tigers in the taiga, but only by chance. If you try to find him, you will never succeed.
Book of poems found in the Sikhote Alin mountains.
“Once, while hunting, I went out into a field and suddenly I heard a crack and something coming out of the brush. The tiger must have thought I was an animal. But when he saw I was human he turned and ran. It’s a thing that happens instantly, and you do not realize until afterward the danger you were in. But the truth is that, if you do not hurt anything, there is no danger either for a person or for anyone.”
Are you afraid of the tiger when you go out hunting?
“You are afraid if you have done something to him. If you have offended him or hunted him, the tiger will chase you. He can even continue chasing your sons and daughters when you pass away. In the past, if an Udege attacked or offended a tiger in any way, he would not dare to enter the taiga anymore…”
Tiger-man in costume for the region’s annual Tiger Day.
After hunting an animal do you leave anything for the tiger?
“Yes of course. If you have hunted an animal and the tiger is hungry, he can take a piece of the animal, but he will probably treat us with respect because he knows we feel respect for him. If a tiger eats some of your kill, it means you will have good luck.”
How does a tiger become an amba?
“When they get old and incapable of hunting, or when they have been injured… Then they may look for the people who hurt them, and when they are in that mood, they can be very dangerous for everyone.
“For us, the Udege, the tiger is like a god. We worship him. He is sacred and we never would attack him, unless our life was in danger, and even then we would try to scare him away by shooting in the air. We avoid any kind of conflict with the tiger.
“For us the taiga is a way of life. We hunt and fish. Even when the minks were not as valued as they are now, we hunted them. Our culture and beliefs are bound to the taiga. We believe in the spirits from the forest, the spirits from the fire… they help us in our hunting.” RL
Alvaro Laiz was awarded the 2015 Fotovisura Grant for Outstanding Personal Project for his photojournalism project on the Udege.
The trailer for a new Russian documentary on the Udege can be seen here: bit.ly/udegefilm
Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.
Russian Life 73 Main Street, Suite 402 Montpelier VT 05602
802-223-4955
[email protected]
