discussing the theme

"twins" in flash

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voyage to kudymkar  

   The idea of the "twins" could not emerge out of the thin air. The most important magic lessons we do not receive from the books, and certainly not from the TV, but only from other people. Where the true secret knowledge exists, there are always the pupil and the teacher.
   I had such a meeting in my life. I have met my "benefactor", who in a short time managed to pass to me something that I do not understand fully even now. Undoubtedly, this was one of the most important and meaningful lessons in my life. In a single day I was pointed to more secrets and mysteries of the Universe than I could obtain from books for several years.
   And it happened in the year 1992, in small Uralian town of Kudymkar, the capital of Komi-Permian district in Russia, where the Komi-Permians constitute more than half of the population. This town is situated only 200 km from my native city of Perm', but it is not so easy to get to it.

Kudymkar, the capital of Komi-Permian Autonomous District. Lumber, ore, food and linen manufactures. Drama theater. Appeared in 16th century.

   You see that "Soviet enciclopaedical dictionary" has not much to say. On the map of Russia Kudymkar is an invisible city, a point not at all significant because of its littleness. The population of Kudymkar is only some 35 000 people.
   But on the map of Occult Russia, if there ever be such, this little boring provincial town would've been quite notorious. It has its special aura and mythological background which can be easy felt in its air.
   Perhaps Kudymkar as a municipal unit was registered in 16th century indeed; but archaeological researches show that the settlement on the left bank of the Kuva river was established some nine centuries before, in 7th century. In those times there was kind of metallurgical center in well-fortified estate of one of Komi-Permian tribes.
   In 16th century Russian settlers colonized this land. In early 17th century there have been erected the first Christian church with chapel -- the temple of Nikolaj the Miraculous. Old wooden idols were replaced with new Muscovite ones. This was the beginning of the amalgamation of local pagan culture with imported Russian Orthodox culture, the amalgamation resulted in amazing synthetic folklore which now constantly attracts the attention of the scholars.
   In the year 1990 the decree of Russian Ministry of Culture have declared Kudymkar a monument of history.

   In summer 1992 I had been sent by Permian State University to Kudymkar with a small ethnographical expedition. I have just finished my first year on Russian language and literature; I was hungry for new, non-academic knowledge. There was no need to long persuade me to go where the true magicians and seers live.
   We were three: two young ufologists from Perm, and me, first year University student.
   Officially I was sent to gather folklore; but actually I expected much more of this voyage. Actually I wanted to obtain extraordinary spiritual experience in Kudymkar. And it looks like I have obtained it, though then I have returned to Perm largely disappointed v it seemed to me that I had not received serious knowledge, but only some vague hints. (Now I think that my "benefactor" created that impression meaningly: I was too young then, too uneven and too selfish to use properly the knowledge gained. The knowledge was kind of conserved in my psychic, and it had manifested itself much later, when my student age was already over.
   When we came to Kudymkar, we saw a small backwoods Uralian town, with all its advantages and disadvantages, with deep unpassable dirt on the main street and sleepy inhabitants. The impression I received from the first sight was a depressing one. That was spiritually cloggy and fuggy territory where you feel yourself either an unwanted guest or a perfect stranger. That was obviously not a Russian town. Everything was different there, in their own way, though all the signboards and everything written was written in Russian.
   "Folklore sources" were not to be searched far. Old cottages and old customs were closely adjacent to restaurant and state institutions in the very center of the town. We were lodged in the town's museum, and in the several following days we have made sorties to the addresses prepared beforehand. We were interested in Kudymkar wise women, magicians, possessed men and the "knowing ones" ("todys'").
   As a good University student, I have recorded slummock stuttering of the local half-crazy old hags who were presented to us as some unbelievably mighty witches. For the most part those were humdrums about bewitching, blights and strokes, about kerkasa - brownies who live in the attics, about sheva who settles inside the man unnoticed and starts to affect him from within.
   I have seen the woman who lived together with two dozens of lame cats and dogs, and who had a brownie spirit in her attics. I was shown local epileptic, who told me in details how she was bewitched in her youth when she was given a glass of malt bespoiled with an evil magic during the haymaking.
   But the main event of the expedition was the acquaintance with the "knowing woman" T.N., 80 y.o.. It was she who reported to me several mantic secrets of the Komi. She also performed upon me a ritual which, some reservations being made, can be considered as an initiation.