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The Canadian company that hired me recently as lead hand carpenter, was in the process of expediting a contract with the city of Yakustk in Siberia . The company was responsible for building 300 wood frame apartment units, valued at approximately 20 million US, on the outskirts of that city On the phone the project manager assured me that the temperature at this time of year would not drop to less than Minus 20, after all it was nearly March...."things are warming up in Yakustk". When the landing gear finally dropped and Aeroflot touched down in Yakustk it was 28 degrees below zero centigrade. It had been an interesting flight. When we took off the superintendent seated next to me, wanting to buckle up, tried to locate the other side of the seat belt, discovered to his dismay that there was none. Like an old dilapidated bus some of the seats were stuck in odd angles, some were upright, others were fixed in various reclining modes. Oh well, the two Russian characters sitting in the front of me trying to converse with me in German while feeding me shots of Russian vodka, made up for the lack of comfort and besides didn't the locals fly these death traps all the time, and they are still around....aren't they? I was not well equipped for the cold, I had along three pair of jeans and a few pair of thermal socks, all of which I wore respectively one on top of the other. Most Canadian workers brought arctic suits and felt lined boots. The Sakha people (indigenous natives to the area ) usually known by the Russians as Yakutians- some of them- wore only the felt liners as protection against frozen ground and a type of canvas jacket so I didn't feel too far out of place. Edmonton Alberta, where I had lived during my younger years, couldn't hold a candle to this place. There are approximately 250 thousand Russian souls living in this barren geography .... god only knows what they all do for survival! Observing from the roof tops ,while working at the project, one could see a multitude of cranes near the Lena river, which ran adjacent to the city, protruding high into the air and dotting the horizon . I expect that numerous people must be employed in this location and I also know that there is a considerable number of mining operations being carried on near the Yakustk area. At the job site there were dozens of carpenters and tradesmen from areas right across Canada. Some were , born in former communist countries so they spoke Russian well. Others like one carpenter from Victoria BC learned colloquial Russian so quickly that it embarrassed me when I considered my own lack of ability. |
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My Introduction to Dr. Ot While working in Yakustk I met Dr. Ot a Russian trained surgeon who worked at the site directing the enormous Russian cranes owned by the company and operating the zoom boom- a forklift type of vehicle where the forks were hydraulically forward extendible, performing general labour jobs and acting as a first aid attendant. He told me that he was unable to support this family with the wages that he would earn working as a surgeon in a Russian hospital. Dr. Ot is a practitioner of acupuncture. He demonstrated this art by curing a Nova Scotia carpenter of smoking, simply by inserting needles at specific points in his body. I never saw the carpenter light up after that. Dr. Ot was Sakha or Yakutian, as the Russians called it, a native to the area - they claimed to be a descendant of Gengis Ghan. The Sakha language was partly Turkish as attested to by the fact that their early ancestors passed through Turkey .... why did they go that far north and not leave after one winter ? I was invited to visit him and his wife and their three daughters whose ages were between 5 to10 years old. They lived just a few blocks away from the main part of the city . The older girl spoke a little English - I didn't know that English was taught in Russian schools but apparently it is. She demonstrated her expertise on the Jewish harp, a musical instrument surprisingly, common with the Sakha people. When the wood framing part of the construction project was near completion and I was getting ready to return to Canada, I asked Dr. Ot if he had ever desired to move to North America. He indicated to me that he would like to work in Northern Canada or Alaska, so I requested that he write a letter of introduction, which I could mail to people or post on the internet, in order for him to find employment in North America. |
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