The God of this Place (from 2000)

The God of this Place
By Bobby Winters

The Buryats are a people who are native to Siberia.  They are not ethnically Russian, and they are not Mongolian.  However, I grew up in Oklahoma surrounded by Chickasaws, and they would pass for Chickasaws in my book.
We met religion among the Buryats a number of times on our trip.  Our first day in Ulan-Ude we made a trip to the Buddhist Temple just out of town.  Since this was my first visit to such a temple, everything was new, and I did not take in very much.  One thing that I did notice, however, were strips of cloth tied on the branches of the trees just outside of the monastery grounds.  We were told that these were prayers.
We were led through the temple by a guide.  We went around the grounds clockwise.  We were invited to turn the prayer wheels, but I did not.  I was uncomfortable with the idea of praying to any deity other than my own.
While this guided tour did help lay a foundation for learning about the local beliefs, it is not the best way to learn about the religion of people.  The best way is out in the natural habitat.
We got another dose during our stay in Ulan-Ude on an excursion to Lake Baikal.  We started out in the morning and proceeded for a while down a beautiful mountain road.  The driver of the car that I was in liked speed, and soon we were well out ahead of everyone.
When we stopped on a mountain summit and got out to let the rest catch up,  I noticed that there were strips of cloth tied in the branched of trees by the side of the road.  Prayers like we had seen in the temple.
Then the rest of the group caught up with us, and our driver called us over to form a circle.  He got a silver goblet out of the van along with a bottle of vodka and filled the goblet.  Then he wet his fingers with the vodka, flicked it out in a spray, and he took a small drink.  It was more than a sip but less than a shot.  He then poured a similar amount out on the ground and said something in Russian.  The translator said, "For the god of this place.” After this he passed the cup to the next person in line. 
This reminded me of the baptism ceremony, and as the cup was passed from person to person my mind whirled, as I began to see a connection between this religion and my own.  In the days of Noah, God cleansed the world by water. And using Moses at the Red Sea, God had saved the children Israel by water.
All through the Bible there is all of this wonderful symbolism with water in the stories of Noah, Moses, Joshua, Jonah and others in the Hebrew Bible.  In the New Testament this is played out in the stories of John the Baptist baptizing in the Jordan, Jesus walking on the water, and Paul shipwrecked at sea. 
Add to this the fact that the Russian word for water is "voda" which differs only from "vodka" by a single letter.   All this was too much for my melodramatic nature.
My turn came.  I sprinkle the vodka and said, "Remember your baptism."  I drank a small portion, and I poured a libation saying, "For the God of this place."
After the ceremony, we continued on our way.  We crossed a river by a ferry and made our way to Lake Baikal where we took a very nice Banya, a Russian steam bath, showered in western style showers, and took a boat ride on the Lake.
We met the religion of the Buryats a last time on a trip while we were in Chita.  We went from Chita down to Aginskoye which is in a predominantly Buryat sub-region of Chita Oblast.  A few miles before we got to Aginskoye, our van broke down.  We got out while the driver looked over the engine and walked back about a quarter of a mile to a roadside shrine like the one we had drunk our libation at on our Baikal trip.  Then we turned and walked back. 
The driver had found the problem.  The radiator was leaking water.  He took a five-gallon jug that he kept in the back of the van and walked a half a mile ahead to a creek, filled the jug, and walked a half a mile back.  He filled the radiator, and we continued on to Aginskoye.
While we were in Aginskoye, we visited another Buddhist temple.  As we entered the grounds by a gate, I noticed a pair of ethic Russian children with dirty blond hair climb over the back wall.  We proceeded around the grounds of temple in a clockwise fashion. 
I turned the prayer wheels this time.  As I did this, I noticed that our guide was putting coins as offerings to the god of Wisdom among others.  The children followed us. When we had almost completed our circle, I finally realized that these children were taking the coins that our guide was leaving and that our guide was unconcerned.
I walked over and nonchalantly laid a one-rouble coin on one of the altars.  I hope the altar of the God of Wisdom.  I nonchalantly walked away.  The coin disappeared into the hand of a dirty-faced little girl.  Another member of the group, who had looked at me strangely when I did this, had a light dawn in his face.  He walked over and put two roubles in the same place.
After supper we began back to Chita.  Our van ran out of water every fifteen minutes.  Our long-suffering driver stopped and refilled it and stopped at every river that we crossed and refilled the jug.
And we returned safely to Chita.