All more people they decide to leave the dusty bustling megacities, reconsider their lifestyle and slow down: stop buying what they don’t need, feel the greatness of nature, do what they love. For what reasons do they choose hermitage, and what colors does it take on them? new life when they are removed from the consumer society and career hysteria - in our material.

Move to a farm to raise children in an eco-friendly environment

At first glance, the presence of children is a factor that does not contribute to hermitism. The younger generation needs socialization, sport sections and creative workshops for development. But family downshifters who have given up their careers in a big city and moved to a farm with children have a different opinion.

Most good reasons for moving - these are products of dubious quality offered in supermarkets; dysfunctional ecological situation which undermines the health of the child. And most importantly, what they want to protect children from is the values ​​of the consumer society.

Andrey and Alla Tokarev changed their life in the capital to farming when they had children. They felt that the atmosphere of the metropolis is detrimental to kids.

The family decided to move in order to farm and feed their children with healthy food. Young people did not strive for absolute isolation; the lifestyle of rural people would suit them quite well. But I did not want the children to see alcoholics, so I had to choose a remote farm.

Here the children breathe clean air, eat organic foods, see nature, move actively, take part in economic affairs. The absence of neighbors nearby allows you not to worry that animals will enter someone else's territory and trample the garden. The family lives from the sale of cheese products, and Alla also kept her remote work.

Remains a debatable topic school education. There are 2 opinions among downshifters - some believe that children need to study, and the main reason is the ability to choose their own destiny in the future. Their opponents question the notion that education is worth the effort and benefits, as the education system draws a person into the cycle of tedious fuss and constant consumption, from which downshifters run away. In any case, learn school curriculum, settling in a dense forest, it is quite possible. Children of elementary grades are taught remotely, and for high school students such a form of education as an external study is available.

Leave the "anthill" of glass and concrete, but remain in the epicenter of communication

Not every hermitage involves renunciation social connections. Some downshifters, on the other hand, leave their offices to expand their social circle, meet people, and do what they love to inspire.

Such an example is the former lawyer Yuri Alekseev, who settled in a dugout near Yaroslavl highway. Here he reads, listens to audiobooks, receives guests, engages in bookcrossing, creates content for a video blog.

Yuri did not set a goal to move away from society - he willingly receives guests who strive to find out what hardships the hermit needs to overcome. How to wash, where to get clothes, food, water, how to provide a wireless connection to the Internet and charge a laptop? Yuri does not readily answer technical questions, but does not get annoyed, but speaks enthusiastically about politics, creative self-realization. And he accepts gifts without hesitation - who will bring beans, who will bring cookies - everything will come in handy in the household. Asserts that a person needs very few resources for a life full of positive impressions and useful activities. It takes several weeks to build a dugout and some building materials from the forest, and solar panels that produce 300 watts per hour help charge gadgets.

Yuri is now not just a hermit, but a media person with a YouTube channel, shares life hacks of a professional downshifter and does not hide his opposition political views.

When nature and adventure attract and people repel

There are radicals among downshifters who choose habitats that the inhabitants of the surrounding area consider unsuitable or extremely dangerous. These include Mikhail Fomenko -. He could not overcome the thirst for wandering and adventure in the conditions wildlife, even after compulsory treatment in a psychiatric clinic and a real risk of dying in the course of overcoming the Torres Strait by canoe.

This hardy and agile man lived in the Australian jungle for more than half a century - without contact with the outside world, friends and family, without political opinions and citizenship. Mikhail's sports talents were noted back in school years, when he set 7 new records and was recognized as one of the best athletes in Sydney. But in the team, Mikhail always felt like a stranger, so he preferred life in the jungle to the public. In the remote tropics of Australia, he fought with crocodiles, overcame great distances, was treated natural remedies and exercise, not knowing a better life for yourself.

Only at the age of 85, Mikhail Fomenko felt that he did not have the strength to remain outside of civilization, and settled in a nursing home.

Terror in defense of nature. How a hermit became a serial killer

The American mathematics teacher Theodore Kaczynski from California (University of Berkeley) moved into the hut, as he considered industrialization and technological progress to be destructive to nature. This man from childhood was extremely different high intelligence Mathematics was especially easy for him. After graduating from school as an external student at the age of 16, he was accepted to Harvard University.

After completing his education, Teodor Kachinsky became the youngest teacher in the prestigious educational institution. To the surprise of others, for no apparent reason and prerequisites, Teodor Kachinsky stops teaching activities and settles in seclusion in the mountains of Montana. In reality, it was a protest aimed at consumer lifestyle and technical innovation.

Theodore lived in isolation without electricity, communication, sewerage for about 6 years before he began his work in the protection of nature.

The scientist created bombs from improvised means and sent them to scientific centers and universities in the country. So Kaczynski tried to stop progress. Kaczynski's explosive devices hit Michigan, Yale universities, on board an American Airlines aircraft, to computer stores, to the offices of scientists and officials. In total, there are 16 terrorist attacks, 3 dead, 23 injured in 25 years of life outside of civilization.

The radical environmentalist was arrested in 1996, he was sentenced to 4 life sentences, but there was a prospect and death penalty. He is currently serving his sentence in a maximum security prison in Colorado without the possibility of parole.

Former drug dealer leads a secluded monastic life on a rock

Maxim Kavtaradze has been living in seclusion in a hard-to-reach place for more than 20 years. The place where the hermit settled is called the Katskhi Pillar - a 40-meter rock in Imereti (Western Georgia).

Previously, there were the ruins of a temple, but thanks to the asceticism of the monk, a functioning church was built - Maximus the Confessor.

He made the decision to live like this when he left prison. Maxim's youth was far from righteous. Alcohol abuse, the sale of drugs led the young man to prison. When the sentence ended, Maxim got a job as a crane operator, but soon felt that he wanted to serve God. He believes that height brings him closer to the Almighty.

A few decades ago, the world also learned about the last of the Lykov hermits. Many today are confused why Agafya refuses to move from the taiga to people[/GO].

The modern world is changing very quickly, but people's views on rapid progress vary greatly. Some admire innovation and development, others see it as a threat true values and your own future. Technology, internet, social media, continuous streams of information, noise big cities- the attributes of today's life, which are becoming familiar to the majority, are increasingly causing rejection among people who consider such phenomena destructive for themselves and their loved ones. Many are ready to give up comfort and all the benefits of civilization in order to get away from the usual fuss and not follow the established rules. For this, they are ready to take risks, bold changes and life in the most incredible conditions.

Return to nature

fast rhythm modern life, information excess, problems of ecology and constant stress make secluded life in nature more and more attractive. Many people tired of stress mass culture and the predominance of material values, decide to move to small villages far from cities, organize eco-villages or even go to forests and taiga, following the example of the famous Siberian hermit Agafya Lykova, who long years avoided civilization. Around the world, back-to-basics advocates are abandoning familiar conditions and choosing a life in harmony with nature. For example, in Spain there is a small farm El Pardal, located among forests and lakes. Its owners and guests run a household, grow vegetables and fruits, use solar energy and enjoy a simple and harmonious life in the fresh air away from other settlements.

Freedom city

The desire to live by your own rules and get away from generally accepted norms brings many adventurers to Slab City, a small community known as "the last free place in America". At first glance, it may seem that this "trailer city" is inhabited by hermits and vagrants who simply have nowhere to go, but most of them stay here for their ideas and will never give up this lifestyle, despite the harsh conditions of the American desert. Slab City has no electricity, no sewerage, no running water, but the people who call this place home do not complain about their absence: they have traded all the blessings of civilization for the boundless freedom they could find in this secluded corner of the world.

Conquest of the peaks

Attempts to isolate oneself from the modern world lead not only to the desire for a harmonious quiet life or the search for freedom, but also the desire to preserve the knowledge and experience of ancestors. For people who have survived for generations in the mountains of the American states of Arkansas, North Carolina, Montana and Alaska, loss of communication with own roots much worse than the lack of communication with other people. About the daredevils who daily struggle with harsh conditions, HISTORY TV channel filmed documentary series"Men in the mountains". While the world of technology is growing, affecting more and more new territories, these people continue to protect their way of life, despite the danger and constant risk. They hunt, resist predators and escape the cold of the relentless mountain winter, with no interest in progress. Them amazing life in the wild is shown in full detail in the series "Men in the Mountains", which airs on the HISTORY TV channel on Wednesdays at 21:00.

Complete isolation

extreme isolation from modern society- intentional relocation desert island lost in the ocean. It is hard to believe that someone would want to voluntarily move into the wild, where there is not a soul, and nature is fraught with many unexpected dangers, but there are several examples of such escapes from civilization. For example, Brandon Grimshaw lived for more than forty years on the island of Moyen in Indian Ocean. He took care of the local nature, saved the endangered species of turtles, planted thousands of trees and attracted many rare birds to the island. As a result, thanks to his efforts, the island acquired the title national park. And the Japanese hermit Masafumi Nagasaki in 1992 threw habitual life and settled on the island of Sotopanari in pacific ocean, deciding to meet old age in unusual conditions and abandoning social rules and norms.

Life outside of politics and religion

The rejection of generally accepted values ​​and social conventions can take on truly serious proportions. So since 1968, under the auspices of UNESCO, the city of Auroville has been developing in southern India, which has become an experiment in creating an international society without political and religious preferences. In the "city of dawn" live people striving for harmony, support for each other and the absence of disagreements. Their main values ​​are unity, freedom, spiritual growth and the improvement of the world. For many, Auroville seems like an unattainable utopia, but for more than two thousand people this place has become a home, where they found like-minded people and opportunities to realize their ideas.

Throw everything - an apartment, a job - and go to the wilderness, to the village. Live for yourself, love. Abandon the endless race of capital accumulation and wealth. Just live, because, in fact, a person does not need so much to be happy. This philosophy, called by the ear-cutting word “downshifting”, is gaining more and more popularity around the world. After the “pioneer” Australia, the USA and the UK, where today about 30 percent of people have already made a “rollback” to ordinary human happiness, a wave of “refusal of other people's goals” is ready to overwhelm our country. The first adepts new faith“We already have. But is practice as good as its theory of life in the countryside draws?

Managers love silence

Kirill Zabavin and his wife Alena have been living in the godforsaken village of Folvarki for a dozen houses for the second year. They moved to the Ostrovets district from Minsk, leaving a two-room apartment and prestigious jobs there. Alena was in great demand with her talent for selling appliances. Kirill was engaged in the development of sites, led large international projects in the field of IT technologies. Today they meet me on the threshold of a small log cabin. Alena holds seven-month-old Mikhail in her arms. He is already a full-fledged villager.

The history of leaving the benefits of civilization in the family is standard. Alena, who disappeared for days at work, was emotionally burnt out. At one point, the realization came: this can’t continue anymore, if you don’t change the situation, don’t break out of the beehive of the metropolis, you can wait nervous breakdown with all the ensuing consequences.

Kirill once had a similar thought while working on potatoes with his relatives: “If I had been digging my own garden all my life, I would have become a successful farmer long ago.” As a result, the family armed themselves with a map and went to travel around the country in search of a “safe harbor”, always near the river. We found one in Folvarki, 200 kilometers from home. The official move took place in March last year.

Most people think that moving to the countryside is a step backwards. I do not agree with this, - says Kirill, closing the laptop. - Water supply and sewerage to the house was carried out for 1000 dollars. Thus, all the advantages of urban housing over rural housing have been reduced to nothing. Although it would be possible to go to the well for water - the hands will not fall off.

The family has been living in the village for a year and a half already. Can draw intermediate results. Kirill got rid of his dislike for people with their perforators behind the wall, drunkenness in the stairwell and the clicking of heels on the stairs at three in the morning. Alena is already able to calmly respond to phone calls.

A couple hundred for food

It turns out that downshifting can really be equated with treatment? In some cases, yes. However, people are fleeing cities for various reasons. For example, in the UK, runaways tend to "jump" off "chemical" foods. They become adherents of the fight against garbage, the use of organic products, saving energy. Australians simply seek to change their place of work and residence. In Russia, downshifting is perceived as resettlement to less developed, but more comfortable territories in some respects.

There are many downshifters who, like the Zabavin family, have housing left in the cities. Renting out the remaining apartment in the city, in principle, you can live on the periphery, even nowhere permanently working. Another reason for resettlement is laziness combined with short-sightedness. Having sold housing, a person lives for several years on the proceeds, without denying himself anything. Finally, there is a kind of sect (without emotional coloring) of adherents of a simple life, unity with nature, which, in their opinion, is only possible away from the concrete jungle.

Mikhail and Elena Yurevich have their own story. They left their native Baranovichi and moved to the Korelichi region. “There are good forests here, I myself am an avid hunter. And also a big fan of bees. I started an apiary in 50 houses, I sell honey to friends. And officially I work as a watchman at a local enterprise.

Nikita and Natalya Tsekhanovich have been living in the village of Gornaya Ruta for seven years now. The head of the family in the past is a successful businessman, and today he is a cool stove-maker. They are perhaps the classic representatives of the philosophy of downshifting. Before moving from Gornaya Ruta, they lived in the most famous eco-village in our country, Rosy, Volozhin district.

But be that as it may, sooner or later, settlers with any worldview face the realities of life. Turns out it's fresh air bright sun and you will not be satisfied with the singing of birds. There is something to be done in the wilderness. Grow a garden. Keep a cow, chickens. Work for a local business. First, you need some, at least a minimum, income. Secondly, life in the village without work - right way to deadly boredom and, as a rule, drunkenness. These are realities.

Happiness is not in money, but in the ability to spend it

Kirill Zabavin claims that in the village a lot of money, in fact, is not needed. There is simply nowhere to spend them. He recalls his experiment from the one past life. I undertook to write down all the expenses and found out that I spent a third of my salary on coffee, fast food, and unnecessary things.

Many years ago, an acquaintance of Cyril from the village said: “You won’t get rich on earth, but you won’t stay hungry either.” These words are memorable. Now the family plans to prove or disprove them on personal experience. That is why Alena does not seek to get a job - at the nearest store as a seller or at the post office. The young woman says that she will try to “squeeze” the same 300-400 rubles from own land while working for yourself. She plans to breed rabbits. An experienced sales manager has already studied the demand for dietary meat. The case can become promising even within the same region. Cyril just “slowed down”. Continues to work in the field high technology remotely, but takes a minimal load. The income is three times less, but it is more than enough.

With Cyril, Alena and Mishka in our arms, we go around the property of the married couple. Birdhouses appeared on old apple trees. The facade of the house grows with fashionable sheathing. Rabbits were built in the barn. In the chicken coop prepared perches for laying hens. At first glance, an idyll. In practice, not quite so. The entrance to the birdhouse was too small for the birds. The first five thoroughbred rabbits were mowed down by an epidemic. The first chickens managed to bring just a couple of orange eggs, and then the fox showed up. Before continuing the repair of the house, it was necessary to replace part of the walls and reconstruct the stove. And already next spring, hard work on the site shines.

So far, the guys look like adventurers. A sort of tourists who decided to plunge into country style. Many go to the farmstead for the weekend, taste moonshine, try to milk a cow and grind a handful of flour with heavy millstones. These came in a more original way and they simply bought such an agroestate for fair price. How long will they last?

You can't become a villager by force

Deputy CEO Scientific and Practical Center for Agriculture of the National Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Agricultural Sciences Eroma Urban believes that, in relation to our country, the development of downshifting is quite understandable and even predictable. Our country is small, and many had (or still have) connections with the countryside:

Let's evaluate the largest and most developed city in the country - the capital. About 70 percent of its inhabitants are from the village. And the townspeople regularly go to visit relatives. We are not so detached from the earth as to be completely helpless on it.

If you have remote work, you can live even at the end of the world.
There would be internet.

Another thing is that you get used to good things quickly. When moving to the provinces, part of this good is irretrievably lost. You can make a “candy” out of a wrecked house, provide it with all conceivable and inconceivable communications. But when you leave this shelter, and you will have to leave willy-nilly every day, all romance will definitely break into reality:

What's good about the city? He came home from work, put on his slippers, turned on the TV - that's all. In the countryside, there is always something to do. At least in order to not be ashamed in front of the neighbors. A couple of beds. Orchard. Spring suffering. Autumn cleaning. So that it would not be like in a fable about a dragonfly and an ant.

- Can an unprepared person move to the village and earn money on their land, feed themselves and their families?

Theoretically, 2-3 acres of land for each person is enough to get food for the whole year. But for this you need to work hard, so that you won’t even hear the birds singing. Someone once cured a runny nose, but this does not mean at all that he is a good doctor. Another planted a bush of potatoes, but he has no right to consider himself an outstanding agronomist. To live from the earth, one must have not only special knowledge, not only be hardworking. You have to have a certain temperament. Two of my friends around the same time decided to become farmers. Rented approx. equal areas lands. had a similar start-up capital and stock of knowledge. Today one of them turns millions. The second completely burned out and abandoned agriculture.

It turns out that plans for the cultivation of environmentally friendly products, profitable and at the same time easy animal husbandry, which many downshifters dream of, are almost always fiction?

Absolutely right. If you manage to feed yourself from the land somehow, then it is not so easy to earn money for other needs. Grown produce is cheap. You cannot count on summer residents alone as clients - today they are, but tomorrow they left. Or simply refused milk, meat.

- Downshifters claim that they are the future of the village. Is it really?

It depends on what is meant by the future. If the goal is to keep the name of the village on the map of the country, then yes, this is the future, because the village does not die until the last inhabitant leaves it. If we talk about the village as a harmonious organism with its own infrastructure, economic ties- downshifters here are more like tourists, summer residents. After all, the vast majority of them earn money through remote work, via the Internet. In order for the village to come to life, you need to work in it. On the farm, as a tractor driver, in the field. Unfortunately, downshifters are not able to give such an impetus to the development of the village. True, I see one promising option - the creation of certain tourist sites on the basis of the villages by the forces of such migrants.

Program resettlement

Understanding the seriousness of the current situation, the state began to provide all kinds of support to those who wish to leave "to the virgin lands", move from the city to the village and live according to local laws. Only the return of such assistance has been clearly established: not only to live, but also to work here, in the district.

Deputy Head of the Organization of Work Department public service Employment and Alternative Service of the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection Yulia Davidenko said that the country has a mechanism for resettlement from cities to the periphery. Speech in this case we are talking about those citizens who, for some reason, have lost their jobs and livelihoods, and for the sake of their daily bread are ready to “moor” and rush into the unknown. However, this uncertainty is more than transparent. The unemployed who move to a new place of residence can count on lump sum payment in the amount of seven times the subsistence minimum budget. And when moving from the city to the very village, this amount is automatically increased by another two living wages. Of course, travel expenses are also covered. And at the new location is already waiting for signing labor contract or contract.

It is impossible not to admit that the program was adopted not for show, but really works, Yulia Davidenko noted:

For example, for last year labor, employment and social protection authorities helped to find work and resettle in countryside 168 unemployed families (total 289 people). Moreover, 18 families dispersed to the villages from major cities, such as Gomel, Mogilev, Vitebsk, Grodno, Bobruisk, Baranovichi. For January - September current year 122 more families (280 people) decided to change the city to a village with state assistance.

Such migration processes, apparently, promise to become more intense from year to year. Their advantages are obvious. They do more than help individual citizens regain their jobs and livelihoods. It is thanks to these people who wished to work on the land that the village in its classical understanding and can revive. Moreover, the average age of migrants is 33-34 years old, they have their whole life ahead of them. Probably, it is precisely these that should be called downshifters in our realities. Those who abandoned their native nest and went to the village for a better share.

As for those who proudly try to propagate “freedom from the opinions of others,” it is hardly possible to orient oneself to them as restorers of the village. Yes, there are people among them who actually found themselves in a new place. Someone has bred goats and sells healthy milk and cheese. Another has a chic apiary in the courtyard, and a line of friends and acquaintances line up for honey. Another familiar family has got horses, will soon begin to provide horseback riding services. But all of them, without exception, continue to work remotely - in the field of high technologies, copywriting and so on.

The village is a kind of commune that can function and develop harmoniously only through the joint efforts of all its members. The system of separate, isolated farmsteads, into which downshifters, willingly or unwillingly, turn the village, cannot live ...

Signing a travel certificate in the old building of the Osvei village council of the Ostrovets district, I got into a conversation with its employees. They know the Zabavin family well. Those immediately after the move developed a stormy activity: they wrote letters about the restoration of the road, organized garbage collection on the banks of the river. Yes, and just consulted with local authorities many domestic issues. “We don’t know if these townspeople will stay with us. At first glance, they are not at all adapted to rural life. Maybe they'll leave in a couple of months. What if they stay, acclimatize? Time will tell".

When they said goodbye to Kirill on the threshold of his "safe haven", he said that he had come to Folvarki for a long time, most likely for the rest of his life. He hopes that he will be able to become a villager. But will it be possible to remain a programmer with such plans?

Pros and cons

Natalia Porechina, coordinator of the project “Prevention of pollution of natural water bodies and promotion of organic Agriculture Center environmental solutions”:

- Today, those who look at the settlers in the wilderness as white crows and prophesy the village will soon disappear are deeply mistaken. The history of the EU countries, the USA, Japan, which are the most technically advanced, shows that people invariably turn back to nature. There, you will not surprise anyone by fleeing from the city to the village. The fact is that organic farming, the cultivation of environmentally friendly products, is gaining more and more popularity in the West. And today it is the fastest growing segment of the food market, the annual growth of which reaches 10 percent in terms of assortment, sales and in terms of money.

In recent years, cases of allergic diseases associated with the use of foodstuffs saturated with chemical additives have become much more frequent. And people, willy or not, are forced to reconsider their habits, pay attention to healthy products. And in the conditions of the city, surrounded industrial enterprises, it is impossible to grow it. Therefore, I have no doubt that there will be more and more adherents of a simple life in the countryside.

Dmitry Bibikov, co-founder of the Minsk Urban Platform, master of urban planning:

- I think that not only our village, but even small towns hardly have a great future. This is due not only to global trends in urbanization and development in the first place. largest agglomerations. The problem of peripheral settlements is, first of all, extremely low density population. It must be understood that even on average in our country it is lower than in Ukraine, many times less than in Poland, and even more so in Western Europe.

Hoping that people will stay in villages and small towns is a futile business. In the future, the trend towards depopulation of the village and its aging will continue. Perhaps the future belongs to farms, agro-tourism complexes and even some rural "colonies" tired of the hustle and bustle of the townspeople. But the population of such places will be minimal and permanent job will not be there.

I think that the fate of the village and small towns is decided in Minsk and other major cities countries that are able to give the citizens of the country a decent standard of living.

Blitz poll

Are you ready to move to the countryside?

Sergey Tolstikov, actor of the New Drama Theatre:

- It seems to me that downshifting is some kind of simplification of a complex, in general, topic of human choice. Here appeared beautiful word and everyone is using it now. I myself live near Stiklevo, I have a forest 20 meters from the window, nature is nearby. So I don’t have to give up special benefits for her. Hermitage, to be honest, is not my thing. But it seems to me that everyone is free to decide whether he needs society or not. I need. This is my theatre, my work, my audience. Every person, no matter what he says, will always look for a place where he will feel better.

Evgeny Ershov, producer of the Alfa Concert agency:

- You know, I myself am a pensioner, so I treat downshifters with great understanding. There is a time to scatter stones and a time to collect them. Of course, I could not transfer my business, which has long turned into love, to any village, I can only sell it in big city. But, of course, now there are more opportunities - you can take a loan, open your own estate for recreation in the countryside and earn money. It's closer to someone.

Larisa Kalinovskaya, Marketing Specialist, National Academic Drama Theatre. M. Gorky:

- I lived in the village only in the summer, when I was a schoolgirl, then a student. Yes, brains are cleared there. Especially if you read the classics by the river. No wonder the Turgenev young ladies spent time in the gazebo with a book. If my theater finally disappoints me, I am ready to leave. But still not in a remote village, but where there are mountains and a river or sea.

In 2010, French photographer Antoine Bruy began his long journey through Europe, without specific purpose and route. In his wanderings, he met people who forever left city ​​life for the sake of a lonely, almost completely isolated existence, which they find much more attractive

1. Over the past thirty years, an unprecedented trend has appeared in Europe: many quite prosperous Europeans left the cities and headed for sparsely populated areas, such as the Sierra de Cazorla mountains in Spain, the French Pyrenees, and certain uninhabited regions of Switzerland. Brewy began to meet these people by joining as a volunteer with WWOOF, an organization that runs a number of international agritourism programs that combine tourism with work in organic agriculture.

2. This "estate" in the French Pyrenees belongs to a German citizen who moved here with his family twenty-five years ago. Since then, he has rebuilt his shack into an absolutely complete home, provided with everything necessary for life. There is no electrical equipment in the house, but solar panels provide enough energy to light it up.

3. Although the family subsequently left him, this German continues to live here along with four other people. In addition, they provide temporary shelter for about twenty more wanderers.

4. The house of this boy, more precisely, the hut where he lives with his father, is located nearby in the Pyrenees. They also lead an isolated life in a hut without electricity.

5. In the photo - auxiliary housing, located on the same estate in the Pyrenees. It seems small, but it is only at first glance. In fact, this wigwam is about nine meters high. It is where itinerant volunteers stay during the summer months.

6. This person has been living in such a house continuously for the last two years.

7. The interior of one of these huts in the French Pyrenees. Bruy took refuge here and spent about three months alone.

8. In the photo - a man engaged in breeding goats and sheep with his wife in the province of Ardèche in southern France. Now he is busy treating a sheep that was bitten by his dog.

9. This is a nomadic shepherd from Germany, traveling from farm to farm through Germany, Austria and Switzerland. He is "employed" to the owners of estates to help herd cows and sheep.

10. The owner of this "estate" is an Englishwoman. Twenty years ago, she was traveling by bicycle, hit by a car. Having sold her then housing, she acquired a piece of land in Spain and began to build a homestead on it with her own hands. In the photo - an environmentally friendly home-made bio- toilet.

11. Three families grow fruits and vegetables in a community garden on this farm in Spain. The land is owned by a web designer who spends half his time developing websites and the other half on his "country estate."

12. This woman and her husband left Germany twenty years ago and went to an uninhabited region of Switzerland - away from the noisy and hectic city life. Now they completely provide for their existence, producing all the necessary food on their own. Before moving to Switzerland, she was a professor in literature and philosophy.

13. Her husband, before abandoning the urban lifestyle, was an engineer. Most of the people with whom Antoine Bruy spoke told him that they left the city of their own free will, considering such a decision reasonable and necessary. “Many people have told me that they see no point in city life. Others said that they just physically couldn’t take it anymore, ”said photographer.

The people that will be discussed in this article manage to ignore the civilized world and live as if there was never anyone in the whole world except them ...

The Sentinelese tribe settled on North Sentinel Island, which is nominally part of India. It is customary to call this people the same as the island, because no one has any idea how these people call themselves. In truth, nothing else is known about them either. After a terrible tsunami hit the island in 2004, several helicopters were sent there to take pictures and make sure that the island was still inhabited.

How did they manage to avoid contact with modern civilization for so long?

This is explained very simply. Take a look at this picture taken from a helicopter:

Other members of the tribe are also aggressive. They do not make contact, and just about anything - they immediately grab the bow and arrows.

In 2006, a boat with two fishermen was carried by the current into shallow water near the island. The Sentinelese killed them and buried them on the shore. Helicopters determined the place of burial of the unfortunate, but could not land, because at the sight of a helicopter local population, as you may have noticed, immediately "opened fire." Despite the fact that the natives apparently have no idea what a helicopter is, they tried hard to get the incomprehensible giant iron bird with their arrows. Well, they do not like guests and that's it.

The police, who, in theory, should go and pick up the bodies of the unfortunate fishermen, flatly refuse to do this, stating that as soon as they approach the island, they will immediately be pelted with poisoned darts and arrows - which, in general, can be considered a good reason.

Even our ancestors, who were more courageous than you and me, believed that it would be more expensive to get involved with these unsociable people: even Marco Polo described them as "the most cruel and bloodthirsty people, always ready to grab and eat anyone who falls into their hands."

In other words, for hundreds of years, when the whole world was busy winning land from each other, these guys earned such a bad reputation that they recaptured different kind conquerors any desire to meddle there. In the end, all "progressive humanity" decided to leave these crazy cannibals alone.

2. Korowai

This tribe lives in southeastern Papua. They first became aware of the existence of other people in the 1970s, when they were discovered by a group of archaeologists and missionaries. At that time they still used stone tools and built their dwellings on trees. However, nothing has changed since then.

Korowai tell all guests from the civilized world that if at least one of them ever changes their traditions, then the whole Earth will inevitably perish from a monstrous earthquake. It is not clear whether this is such devotion to traditions, or just a way to get rid of smart people with " big earth who are forever trying to teach them about life.

Be that as it may, they manage to remain in the same state just fine. The missionaries poked their heads a couple of times with their enlightenment, but then decided to leave them alone. What if, who knows, the earthquake is still not quite nonsense?

Korowai live in such an impenetrable area, literally - for high mountains and dark forests, that even their own villages practically do not contact each other, let alone the outside world. When the tribe decided to visit the census office in 2010, they had to travel for two weeks on foot, then by boat from the nearest (and in fact very remote) villages.

Korowai especially do not show that they do not like visits from outside. And in order for the uninvited guests to get out as soon as possible, they come up with all sorts of tricks. In addition to frightening with a terrible, terrible earthquake, which will definitely happen as soon as the first cow puts on his pants, they like to scare, talking about their bloodthirsty traditions.

But the most elegant way was fooled by the Australian newsmakers, who poked their head into the cows in 2006. The tribe sent a boy to the importunate strangers, who told reporters a heartbreaking story about how cannibals were chasing him, and that at the next meal he should become the main dish of the tribe.

After the story was taped and the film crew hurriedly retreated, the next journalists arrived, for whom the exact same performance was arranged with the rescue of the "poor boy."

Scientists who have studied the tribe assure that these people are simply all right with a sense of humor, that there is no smell of cannibalism here. Just funny people who live in trees and love practical jokes.

3. The loneliest person in the world

This man has been living in a Brazilian forest in complete isolation for at least fifteen years. He builds palm huts for himself and digs rectangular holes in the ground one and a half meters deep. Why he needs these holes one can only guess, because with any attempt to establish contact, he abandons his familiar place and finds a new one in order to build exactly the same hut and dig exactly the same hole. No one in the area is building anything like this, from which the scientists concluded that this is the last surviving representative of some disappeared tribe.

How does he manage to ignore the modern world for so long?

In 1988 new constitution Brazil granted the local Indians the rights to the lands of their original settlements. In theory, the idea seemed just wonderful. But in practice... When it became forbidden by law to “force them to move” to other places, they began to simply exterminate them.

Apparently, it was this fate that befell the fellow tribesmen of our hero: the first meeting with modern world ended for him with the death of everyone he knew. Who wants to make contact with monsters who have come up with perfect weapons to destroy your loved ones?

4. Old Believers

In 1978, Soviet geologists who were looking for deposits iron ore in the remote corners of Siberia, stumbled upon a log cabin. The family that lived there had no idea about the existence of civilization, dressed in matting and ate from home-made dishes. At the sight of the members of the expedition, they were horrified, and began to shout something like “This is all for our sins!”

Later it turned out that the Lykov family (as they called themselves) were not the only Siberian hermits. A similar group of people lived in the taiga in complete isolation, at least, until 1990.

All these people turned out to be Old Believers. In the 17th century, during the split of the Russian church, they fled from the massacre and settled away from outside world. And they lived like that for centuries. Siberia is too vast and inhospitable - no one would have thought to comb it to find a couple of dozen fugitives.

Agafya Lykova, 2009

5. Tribe Mashko-Piro

People from the Mashko-Piro tribe - half-naked and generally similar to immigrants from the prehistoric era, have recently begun to appear in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bone of the Peruvian rivers popular with Western tourists. Previously, any attempts to approach them were stopped by a hail of burning arrows. No one knows why they suddenly decided to discover their existence on their own. According to the assurances of the experts who contacted them, while their lively interest Cause mainly, metal cooking pots and machete knives.

How did they manage to stay away from civilization for so long?

The Peruvian government itself tried to limit contacts with the tribe and forbade tourists to go ashore near the habitats of savages. The idea was to protect these people from pesky anthropologists and greedy businessmen who are ready to make money on anything.

Unfortunately, there were and still are cunning private travel companies offering clients a “human safari”.

6. Pintubi aborigines

In 1984, a small group of Pintubi people met a white man in the desert. This would not be unusual if we do not take into account the fact that not a single person from this tribe had ever seen one before. white man, and that the first white settlers arrived in Australia in 1788. Later, one of the pingtubis explained that he initially took “ pink man" behind evil spirit. The first meeting did not go very smoothly, but then the natives relented, and decided that the “pinks” might even be useful.

They, needless to say, were very lucky to be found so late. They wandered through the desert all those years when it was easy to fall into slavery or straight to the next world, and met with Western culture exactly when it was already ripe for a ride in a jeep and treat them to Coca-Cola.

How did they manage to avoid civilization for so long?

There are two reasons for this: 1) they are nomads and 2) they roam the deserts of Australia, where it is generally quite difficult to meet a person.

This group may never have been discovered at all. Shortly before the first meeting with a white man, the Pintubi accidentally met with the "civilized" natives. Unfortunately, the appearance of nomads with human hair loincloths and two-meter spears was too exotic even for indigenous Australians. One of the "civilized" ones fired into the air and the Pintubis fled.