Farewell to the Orochen
My chances of seeing the Orochen in their traditional surroundings were slim, but nowhere near as slim as the chance of getting a seat aboard train N93 to Alihe in China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Just one train a day departs from Harbin at 7.15pm and it was already fully booked by early that morning. However, a never-say-never attitude, combined with some surreptitious queue-jumping, ensured a prized seat in the boisterous restaurant car as hundreds of passengers streamed onto the crowded train.
A couple of years ago, a photographic exhibition in Hong Kong by Hing Chao, founder of the Orochen Foundation, had piqued my interest in this people – one of 55 designated minorities in China but allegedly the country’s last hunter-gathering society. The photos showed the remnants of this once proud race, which was being rapidly subsumed as the modernisation that accompanied China’s dramatic economic development made their way of life increasingly redundant.
My trip to China’s far north confirmed my suspicions that the Orochen’s ancient traditions had all but disappeared, assimilated into the dominant Han Chinese culture. It was only on the other side of the Russian border, in the wastelands of Siberia, that the Orochen continue to live off the land.
Alighting at Alihe, I strolled around the town, built low-rise in the classic Soviet style with one eight-lane street bisecting it north to south. The Orochen Museum is in the central town square, where the citizens exercise and dance in the shadow of a bronze statue of an Orochen horsemen each evening. The museum is increasingly a time capsule, preserving the traditions of the Orochen as they disappear in the 21st century. Two blocks away, the giant timber yard illustrates how the environment of the tribe, long associated with the forests and mountains, is changing.
Rich history
The name Orochen – sometimes spelt Oroqen – is thought to mean either ‘people who use reindeer’ or ‘people who live in mountains’. They are spread throughout Heilongjiang Province and Inner Mongolia in China’s far northeast, as well as in Siberia. There are approximately 6,000 Orochen left in China, according to government and local experts, down from 8,500 a decade ago. Of this number, about half are distinct Orochen; the remainder have married Han Chinese or Mongolians.
The Han Chinese speak with a genuine fondness and respect for the Orochen, who are easy enough to spot – small in stature, with high cheekbones, hazel eyes and pale skin. They have their own language, although it’s an unwritten one and is spoken only by the oldest members (Beijing is making efforts to preserve it). They were once famous for their singing and dances, which often mimicked animal movements. Nowadays, few people under the age of 55 can sing the folk songs, and the once common Orochen lip harp is rarely seen or heard.
The ancestors of the Orochen were part of the ancient people known as the Shiwei. They originally occupied a region south of the Outer Xing’an Mountains and north of Heilongjiang, but moved near to the Greater and Lesser Xing’an Mountains following Russian invasions in the 17th century. During the Qing dynasty, they were enrolled in the army of Manzu, protecting the northeast frontier from the Russians and the Japanese.
Historically, the Orochen lived in teepees known as cuoluozi, which were covered in the summer with birch bark and in the winter with deer skins. They lived on wild animals and plants and were adept horsemen. They used primitive skis and sledges and beautiful handcrafted birch canoes; their tools were made from birch, animal bone and hide. To this day, the Orochen can make a beautiful array of items out of the birch forest that has been their home for centuries.
The Orochen tended to dress from head to toe in typical hunters’ clothing made mainly of deerskin. Furs were used in winter and leather in spring, summer and autumn. Gowns were the standard clothing for all the Orochen, whether man or woman, old or young.
When an Orochen dies, he or she is traditionally buried in the ground, cremated or given a wind burial. This last is a unique custom practised only when the earth is frozen during winter or when someone dies in the wilderness. The body is washed with water or snow and then dressed in funeral clothes without furs (it’s believed that a dead person dressed in furs may become an animal in their next life). A wooden frame is then erected on a cluster of three or four trees and the coffin placed on the frame, head down. An awning is placed on top to protect it from rain. In some places, the remains of the dead are collected on the anniversary of the person’s death and buried.
Until the mid-20th century, the Orochen practised a form of shamanism where nature, totems and ancestor spirits were objects of worship. However, the last Orochen shaman, a man by the name of Chuonnasuan (Meng Jin Fu), died at the age of 73 in October 2000.
Uncertain future
China’s rapidly growing economy isn’t the only influence hastening the demise of Orochen culture. In 1993, for example, hunting was banned in the region when the reindeer population plunged. Today, hunting is only permitted during the Guo Huo festival, on 18 June each year. The government continues to collect as many guns as it can from the Orochen, although those who live some distance from Alihe and its substantial police force continue to hunt with dogs.
In the past, the Orochen were against hunting bears because, according to legend, they were related to the bear by blood. The taboo has gradually been lost, but there are still many rules regarding bear-hunting. When a bear is killed, its head is wrapped in straw and placed on a wooden frame for wind burial. The eldest among those present will lead the others in kowtowing and offering prayers to it as a way of asking forgiveness. Tigers are similarly venerated, although they were hunted out of the local area more than a decade ago.
Last year, the old mud track through dense forest that linked the village of Turkhur in Oroqen Autonomous County, 130 kilometres from Alihe, to the outside world was paved, further yoking this distant outpost to the local government. Turkhur was built in 1987 to entice the Orochen away from the hills. It now has an Orochen population of 200 or so, but they are outnumbered ten to one by Han Chinese, many of whom were paid to move to this remote area.
A walk around the village, where each brick building looks alike aside from antlers on the walls of Orochen homes, yields a few characters. A 70-year-old woman croaks a few words, and then returns her gaping, sad attention to the TV in the corner of her sparse room. Nearby, two women in their 60s sew intricate birch-bark boxes to be sold in Alihe. The wood is extremely malleable, almost like soft leather when fresh. Children are taught this art too, the women say.
There is a conspicuous absence of teenagers here and in other villages in the region. Many of the small Orochen settlements have no middle school, so the children have to go to Alihe for their education, further hastening assimilation.
But there is no bitterness at this change in daily life, this loss of heritage. Contrasting life today with the harsh days of 20 years ago, many suggest that times are incomparably better. ‘The people here don’t want to live like they used to,’ says A Wei Tao, an Orochen orphan now married to a Han Chinese teacher. ‘Their lives are now better and easier and they can see and appreciate that.’
However, there are some for whom the bewildering pace of change and, by extension, displacement is all too much. Like other minorities around the world whose traditions have been sidelined, the Orochen are finding that alcoholism is a growing problem. Back on the streets of Alihe, boozing is evident, regardless of the time of day.
A 15-minute cab ride from Alihe is Gaxian Cave, a mountainside with a gaping black cavernous hole where the Orochen lived 1,500 years ago. None live here today, replaced by the strange, yet somehow suitably ridiculous sight of a herd of plastic reindeer.
The Evenki
The Orochen share much of their culture with the Evenki, another tribe famous for hunting deer, whose territory also straddles Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang province and Siberia. The peoples’ languages are similar enough that speakers of one can understand about 70 per cent of the speech of the other.
The Evenki number around 30,000 in China alone. Almost all of the Chinese Evenki live in the Hulunbuir region in The north of the Inner Mongolia province, near the city of Hailar. Their shamanism has been mostly replaced with Orthodox Christianity, thanks to 17th-century contact with the Russians.
The Evenks, as they are known in Russia, are under increasing pressure from the huge oil and gas developments taking place across Siberia. Although the Evenki only number some 35,000 in all of Russia, they occupy a vast swathe of land – only the Russians inhabit more.
December 2007
A couple of years ago, a photographic exhibition in Hong Kong by Hing Chao, founder of the Orochen Foundation, had piqued my interest in this people – one of 55 designated minorities in China but allegedly the country’s last hunter-gathering society. The photos showed the remnants of this once proud race, which was being rapidly subsumed as the modernisation that accompanied China’s dramatic economic development made their way of life increasingly redundant.
My trip to China’s far north confirmed my suspicions that the Orochen’s ancient traditions had all but disappeared, assimilated into the dominant Han Chinese culture. It was only on the other side of the Russian border, in the wastelands of Siberia, that the Orochen continue to live off the land.
Alighting at Alihe, I strolled around the town, built low-rise in the classic Soviet style with one eight-lane street bisecting it north to south. The Orochen Museum is in the central town square, where the citizens exercise and dance in the shadow of a bronze statue of an Orochen horsemen each evening. The museum is increasingly a time capsule, preserving the traditions of the Orochen as they disappear in the 21st century. Two blocks away, the giant timber yard illustrates how the environment of the tribe, long associated with the forests and mountains, is changing.
Rich history
The name Orochen – sometimes spelt Oroqen – is thought to mean either ‘people who use reindeer’ or ‘people who live in mountains’. They are spread throughout Heilongjiang Province and Inner Mongolia in China’s far northeast, as well as in Siberia. There are approximately 6,000 Orochen left in China, according to government and local experts, down from 8,500 a decade ago. Of this number, about half are distinct Orochen; the remainder have married Han Chinese or Mongolians.
The Han Chinese speak with a genuine fondness and respect for the Orochen, who are easy enough to spot – small in stature, with high cheekbones, hazel eyes and pale skin. They have their own language, although it’s an unwritten one and is spoken only by the oldest members (Beijing is making efforts to preserve it). They were once famous for their singing and dances, which often mimicked animal movements. Nowadays, few people under the age of 55 can sing the folk songs, and the once common Orochen lip harp is rarely seen or heard.
The ancestors of the Orochen were part of the ancient people known as the Shiwei. They originally occupied a region south of the Outer Xing’an Mountains and north of Heilongjiang, but moved near to the Greater and Lesser Xing’an Mountains following Russian invasions in the 17th century. During the Qing dynasty, they were enrolled in the army of Manzu, protecting the northeast frontier from the Russians and the Japanese.
Historically, the Orochen lived in teepees known as cuoluozi, which were covered in the summer with birch bark and in the winter with deer skins. They lived on wild animals and plants and were adept horsemen. They used primitive skis and sledges and beautiful handcrafted birch canoes; their tools were made from birch, animal bone and hide. To this day, the Orochen can make a beautiful array of items out of the birch forest that has been their home for centuries.
The Orochen tended to dress from head to toe in typical hunters’ clothing made mainly of deerskin. Furs were used in winter and leather in spring, summer and autumn. Gowns were the standard clothing for all the Orochen, whether man or woman, old or young.
When an Orochen dies, he or she is traditionally buried in the ground, cremated or given a wind burial. This last is a unique custom practised only when the earth is frozen during winter or when someone dies in the wilderness. The body is washed with water or snow and then dressed in funeral clothes without furs (it’s believed that a dead person dressed in furs may become an animal in their next life). A wooden frame is then erected on a cluster of three or four trees and the coffin placed on the frame, head down. An awning is placed on top to protect it from rain. In some places, the remains of the dead are collected on the anniversary of the person’s death and buried.
Until the mid-20th century, the Orochen practised a form of shamanism where nature, totems and ancestor spirits were objects of worship. However, the last Orochen shaman, a man by the name of Chuonnasuan (Meng Jin Fu), died at the age of 73 in October 2000.
Start the slideshow (8 pictures)
Uncertain future
China’s rapidly growing economy isn’t the only influence hastening the demise of Orochen culture. In 1993, for example, hunting was banned in the region when the reindeer population plunged. Today, hunting is only permitted during the Guo Huo festival, on 18 June each year. The government continues to collect as many guns as it can from the Orochen, although those who live some distance from Alihe and its substantial police force continue to hunt with dogs.
In the past, the Orochen were against hunting bears because, according to legend, they were related to the bear by blood. The taboo has gradually been lost, but there are still many rules regarding bear-hunting. When a bear is killed, its head is wrapped in straw and placed on a wooden frame for wind burial. The eldest among those present will lead the others in kowtowing and offering prayers to it as a way of asking forgiveness. Tigers are similarly venerated, although they were hunted out of the local area more than a decade ago.
Last year, the old mud track through dense forest that linked the village of Turkhur in Oroqen Autonomous County, 130 kilometres from Alihe, to the outside world was paved, further yoking this distant outpost to the local government. Turkhur was built in 1987 to entice the Orochen away from the hills. It now has an Orochen population of 200 or so, but they are outnumbered ten to one by Han Chinese, many of whom were paid to move to this remote area.
A walk around the village, where each brick building looks alike aside from antlers on the walls of Orochen homes, yields a few characters. A 70-year-old woman croaks a few words, and then returns her gaping, sad attention to the TV in the corner of her sparse room. Nearby, two women in their 60s sew intricate birch-bark boxes to be sold in Alihe. The wood is extremely malleable, almost like soft leather when fresh. Children are taught this art too, the women say.
There is a conspicuous absence of teenagers here and in other villages in the region. Many of the small Orochen settlements have no middle school, so the children have to go to Alihe for their education, further hastening assimilation.
But there is no bitterness at this change in daily life, this loss of heritage. Contrasting life today with the harsh days of 20 years ago, many suggest that times are incomparably better. ‘The people here don’t want to live like they used to,’ says A Wei Tao, an Orochen orphan now married to a Han Chinese teacher. ‘Their lives are now better and easier and they can see and appreciate that.’
However, there are some for whom the bewildering pace of change and, by extension, displacement is all too much. Like other minorities around the world whose traditions have been sidelined, the Orochen are finding that alcoholism is a growing problem. Back on the streets of Alihe, boozing is evident, regardless of the time of day.
A 15-minute cab ride from Alihe is Gaxian Cave, a mountainside with a gaping black cavernous hole where the Orochen lived 1,500 years ago. None live here today, replaced by the strange, yet somehow suitably ridiculous sight of a herd of plastic reindeer.
The Evenki
The Orochen share much of their culture with the Evenki, another tribe famous for hunting deer, whose territory also straddles Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang province and Siberia. The peoples’ languages are similar enough that speakers of one can understand about 70 per cent of the speech of the other.
The Evenki number around 30,000 in China alone. Almost all of the Chinese Evenki live in the Hulunbuir region in The north of the Inner Mongolia province, near the city of Hailar. Their shamanism has been mostly replaced with Orthodox Christianity, thanks to 17th-century contact with the Russians.
The Evenks, as they are known in Russia, are under increasing pressure from the huge oil and gas developments taking place across Siberia. Although the Evenki only number some 35,000 in all of Russia, they occupy a vast swathe of land – only the Russians inhabit more.
December 2007
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