(25 Feb 2020) LEAD IN:
On the frozen surface of the world's deepest freshwater lake, Lake Baikal in Siberia in Russia, hundreds have gathered to ring in the Buddhist new year.
For the Buryat people, the new year is welcomed by breaking animal bones, carving ice sculptures and by partaking in big communal circle dancing.
STORY-LINE:
The vast, frozen expanse of Lake Baikal is a fitting backdrop for the ringing in of the lunar near year - a festival known here is "Sagaalgan".
Here atop the depths of what is considered to be the world's deepest lake, festival goers are performing the "Yokhor", a traditional circle dance.
This event attracts people from the vast Siberian region, and from further afield.
Coordinator Sergey Batlaev says anyone can participate in the dance.
"The main rules are: the most important thing is to hold each other by hand - don't let the hands out while dancing," he says.
"The second rule is to dance according to the movement of the sun, or clockwise. And third rule is in all movements, we have to actively move our shoulders. In the past, Buryat and Mongol people used to ride horses all the time. Apparently, when they climbed down from horses, the movement remained."
Sagaalgan lasts for the whole of the first month of the year, and this year - according to the Buddhist lunar calendar - New Year's Day fell on 24 February 2020.
The first month is known as "white month", and here it's an important holiday.
The energetic dancing was the main draw for Tamara Gorokhova.
"It is, of course, (an) unbelievable impression, because it unites so much. The energy is very strong. I have so much energy, I got charged as a battery!" she laughs.
The Buryat people are the largest ethnic group in this vast mountainous region in eastern Siberia, and speak a Mongolic language.
According to UNESCO, their language is endangered, but organisers of events like this one say they are important to keep the culture alive.
Here atop Lake Baikal, eight ice sculptures have been painstakingly carved to mark the festival.
On the lake shore, carved into this hillside, there are natural ice formations which have been tamed too.
Here, sculptors have carved the face of a bearded man, and a crying young girl.
According to Buryat tradition, the bearded man is Lake Baikal.
The crying girl is his daughter, a human figure representing the Angara River.
The ice sculptures are attracting tourists to the event - which is a new tradition, held here on Lake Baikal for the first time in what organisers hope will become a new annual tradition to celebrate ancient Buryat culture.
The festival is known as "Olkhon".
Elsewhere, there's some vigorous traditional dancing on offer too.
The Director of the "Golden Horde" Ethnopark Antonina Kim says the dancing represents a local legend about New Year's Day.
"In the morning we meet the Goddess Palden Lhamo, who flies around Earth the three times (on this day)," she explains.
"During the flight, she looks inside those houses where there is light - where people are waiting for her - and she sends her grace to those houses where there is light, where the hearth is on, and where white food is served."
Amid more dancing on-stage, there's another tradition, passed from one generation to the next.
This is the belt- or sash-tying ceremony - a part of Buryat marriages - a tradition which is still observed today.
"This action would signify that the two families were becoming united, but by this exchange the marriage was considered, so to say, official."
After the official performance of the ritual, some festival-goers are able to try it too.
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