I shift my grip on the urn holding her ashes as I try to look down at the hand drawn map where my destination--the lake--was scribbled among the trees.
Not trusting my sense of direction, I look around at the winding trails when my eyes spot the sight of an old man just beyond the tree line.
"Excuse me?" I call out and the man peeks around the tree, smiling at me. "Is this the way to the lake?"
He just stares at me in silence. Of course... He wouldn't speak English and I don't know a word of his language. But after a moment, he wanders down to the trail I am on. With one last look at me, he turns and begins to march further down the path.
We wander through the forest for hours, not uttering a word. As the sky gets darker, I ask, "Are we almost there?" We've been walking for hours and I know I still need to turn around and make my way back out before nightfall. Of course, I'm met with nothing but silence.
As I round the bend, I stop in my marching. The old man is gone--completely vanished from sight. I scan the trees looking for any sight of him when my eyes fall on an old cottage hidden among the trees. I take in the sight of the house with it's chicken legs and I feel my stomach drop. The only thing more frightening that seeing this house--the house of Baba Yaga--was seeing smoke billowing out from the chimney... telling me that someone was home.
"Oh great."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
So talking about the boogeyman in one of my previous posts got me thinking about Russia's version of the scary monster that could come and take you away in the night--Baba Yaga. Sometimes a maternal helper, sometimes a ferocious villain, Baba Yaga is both terrifying and fascinating (how can you not be when your house has chicken legs?).
This story was also inspired by my hike in the pine forest a few weeks ago now. As we were marching through the trees, I couldn't help but think back to the legends of strigoi and monsters and, of course, Baba Yaga. The woods have a different feel here as opposed to America or China or anywhere else I've been hiking. There is that mystery and that feeling of not knowing exactly what you'll see when you turn around the next corner.
While we were hiking, I thought I saw an old man in a tan coat and a tan hat walking along a trail a bit below us (I honestly thought it looked like my grandfather--Poppy). The top of his hat disappeared behind the yellow leaves of a bush and I never saw him come out the other side. I just stood there, staring at where I knew this man was supposed to be... but he never appeared again.
It just added to my belief that there is something eerie and unnatural about the forests here in Siberia.
Only 9 (single digits!!!) days until Halloween!
a.r.w.
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