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 Yurts - Round and Unbound
By Becky Kemery
In the view of philosophical mathematicians, numbers and their associated shapes represent stages in the process of becoming … Each has a life of its own and a unique role in the cosmic myth … Each represents a different problem-solving strategy in the cosmic economy.
—Michael S. Schneider, “A Beginner’s Guide to Constructing the Universe: The Mathematical Archetypes of Nature, Art and Science”
A
place to come home to. A secure roof overhead to shed summer rains,
and walls that protect from winter winds. Most people would think
“house”. I prefer the concept of “shelter”,
which allows my home to be moveable. And it doesn’t have
to be square.
For
a while I had the nickname Yurt Woman. That was because I lived
in a particular form of semi-permanent, round shelter. Not a tent,
not a teepee, but a yurt. Yurts were originally nomadic shelters
used on the high plateaus of Central Asia. Having proven themselves
over centuries, they remain one of the oldest indigenous forms
of shelter still in use today.
In
Mongolia the frame of the yurt is covered with felted wool; here,
the covering is canvas. The yurts I’ve lived in (three of
them) had lattice walls six feet high encircling a 24-foot diameter
space, with a conical roof leading to a skylight at the top. Pacific
Yurts, an Oregon company, fabricated one yurt; a woman who later
became my friend built the other two. In all three yurts I lived
in the woods, near a creek or river. The sound of rushing water
washed through my ears 24 hours a day. Birds woke me in the morning.
At night I fell asleep looking up through the skylight bubble
at the moon and stars.
My
favorite yurt—in fact my favorite shelter experience of all
time—was a yurt in the Cascade Mountains located just 50
feet from the Breitenbush River. A magical path led through lush
woods to Adirondack chairs at the river’s edge. The floor
of the yurt was made of cob (clay, sand and straw, a mixture similar
to adobe). It had a radiant heating system, meaning there were
pipes running through the cob floor that carried hot springs water
and warmed my feet—and the yurt—through the snowy winter
months. In the center, under the skylight, was a 10’x12’
rectangle of sand, not cob; a rubber hose of hot springs water
wound its way through. I placed reed mats over the sand and it
became a favorite spot for women friends on their moon time to
come, to curl up on the soft warmth with a good book.
Shimmering
sheer fabric hung from the roof rafters across the foot of my
bed. On the opposite side of the yurt was an air mattress on the
warm floor, a space occupied by guests who came and went about
half the time that I lived there. I’ll never forget all the
gatherings that happened. Twelve community members sitting in
a circle toasting and grinding spices by hand during a new-moon
ritual with a visitor from South Africa. Faces glowing in the
light of dozens of candles as twenty or more friends came together
on various occasions to play music, sing and dance. The faces
changed, as did the events, but the magic … oh, the magic.
It was something I’ve never experienced, never could have,
in the right-angled, rectilinear places most of us call home.
There
is a reason that ancient nomadic tribes chose to live in circular
spaces. The reason goes beyond the consummate efficiency of the
circle (which allows for the largest possible floor space using
the least amount of materials and minimal exposure to the elements).
Beyond the fact that circular structures provide less wind resistance.
Even when the Native American tribes settled into square structures,
they continued to use round spaces for rituals and meetings.(1)
The
Oglala Sioux elder, Black Elk, offers an explanation
Everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because
the power of the world always works in circles, and everything
tries to be round …. Even the seasons form a great circle
in their changing, and always come back again to where they were.
The life of a man is in a circle from childhood to childhood and
so it is in everything where power moves. Our teepees were round
like the nests of birds, and these were always set in a circle,
the nation’s hoop.
There
is something about the very shape of the circle that provides
us a “glimpse into the wholeness, unity, and divine order
of the universe,” says mathematical philosopher Michael Schneider.
“The circle is a reflection of the world’s—and
our own—deep perfection, unity, design excellence, wholeness,
and divine nature.” (A Beginner’s Guide to Constructing
the Universe, p.4) Somehow the very shape of the circle connects
us at a primordial, cellular level, to the unity of all things—to
our inter-connectedness with each other and our connection to
the whole.
The
Ger
The yurt, or ger (rhymes with “air”) as the Mongols
call it, was birthed in the context of Shamanism, an ancient consciousness
that held to the connectedness of all things and sought to maintain
balance therein. Every aspect of the ger and life within it has
spiritual connection and significance, from the placement of the
door and furnishings to the central fire and the direction in
which one walks inside the ger.
The
internal floor plan of the ger, every ger, is based on the four
directions, much like the Native American Medicine Wheel or the
Navajo hogan. The door of the ger always opens to the south; the
north side is sacred. Yin and yang are east and west, the masculine
side being to the west, the feminine in the east. Family possessions
are laid out according to this floor plan. Women’s tools
(for cooking, weaving, etc.) are kept on the east side. Riding
tack, saddles and the tools that men use are hung on the west
side. If there is an altar it is to the north. The fire in the
middle is the sacred center, doorway to the world beneath. Smoke
rises up through the skylight smoke hole, doorway to the world
above. Mongolians believe that these worlds must be kept in balance;
it is the balance of all things in the one, the circle.
Perhaps
spending time in circular environments might help shift our fragmented,
linear consciousness to a way of being in the world that is more
whole, connected and cyclical. Children growing up in or attending
school in yurts, for example (and their number is growing), may
well develop a consciousness quite distinct from those who spend
their school hours, days, and years locked away in buildings of
squares and rectangles. It will be interesting to observe the
difference over time.
Yurts:
an Oregon Love Affair
So how did Mongolian nomadic shelters wind up in North America?
It’s another of those unique Oregon stories, Oregon via the
East Coast. In the early 1960’s Harvard doctoral student
Bill Coperthwaite saw a National Geographic article by Supreme
Court Justice William O. Douglas about his visit to Mongolia (Mongolia
at the time was closed to most Western visitors). Photographs
of Mongolian gers inspired Bill. He designed his dissertation
(in education) around building wooden yurt structures with groups
of students. He went on to establish The Yurt Foundation and over
the years has helped hundreds of groups build yurts as educational
or community projects. One of the students working on the first
projects with Bill was a gifted 17-year-old named David Raitt.
Inspired, David went on to pursue yurt design and building as
his passion and vocation, building yurt communities in New Hampshire
and California and establishing California Yurt Works.
Across
the continent from Bill Coperthwaite, a group of visionary hippie
tree planters called the Hoedads were living in the woods and
replanting Oregon’s forests. Hoedad Charlie Crawford (mathematician
on sabbatical) decided the yurt would be a perfect Hoedad shelter,
being comfortable and cozy and also portable. Charlie modernized
the yurt structure to include aircraft cable around the top of
the lattice walls, and produced numerous canvas yurts for the
Hoedads under the name Centering Shelterworks.
It
was Alan Bair who put canvas yurts on the map. Picking up where
Charlie left off, Alan started Pacific Yurts (www.yurts.com)
in Cottage Grove, Oregon, and introduced innovations like NASA
insulation and architectural fabrics. While continuing to perfect
yurt design, Alan and his team spread the word about yurts locally
and nationally, eventually marketing canvas yurts worldwide. It
was Alan who first sold yurts to the Parks Department for use
in campgrounds, yet another Oregon initiative that has become
a national movement.
Back
east again, architectural student Morgan Reiter caught the yurt
bug in the 60’s while visiting a community with yurts designed
by Bill Coperthwaite. The combination of Morgan’s study of
indigenous architecture with exposure to Bill Coperthwaite’s
and David Raitt’s designs inspired Morgan to build a yurt
for himself when he moved to Oregon. Friends asked Morgan to build
them yurts as well, and Oregon Yurtworks was born. Oregon Yurtworks
(www.yurtworks.com)
uses a pre-fabricated frame-panel system for building wooden yurts
that reduces the costs for clients and keeps the wooden yurt homes,
while not exactly nomadic, still more portable than their conventional
counterparts. Oregon residents are in the unique position of having
convenient access to both canvas and wooden yurts, made by local
companies.
Nomad
Shelters
Canvas yurts are great for modern nomads and people in transition.
Typical of nomadic shelters, they use minimal materials and are
light on the land. The wooden deck for a yurt takes carpentry
skills and few days to complete, but putting up the yurt itself
takes less than a day (my 20’ Pacific Yurt took 5 people
about 5 hours to get up), and taking it down and loading it is
about the same. The Mongolians spend 30 minutes to an hour putting
theirs up, but then they do it many times a year and are better
practiced at it.(2)
Yurt
dwellers often find themselves in challenging situations typical
of nomads attempting to live within a settled culture. Building
officials may try to run yurt dwellers out of town, or make them
comply with restrictions designed for permanent housing. Nesting
Bird Yurts (www.nbyurts.com),
a yurt company in Port Townsend, Washington, has made building
code issues a priority. It is possible to purchase a yurt from
Nesting Bird that complies with applicable Uniform Building Code
restrictions, and the company works closely with clients seeking
to comply with local building codes.(3)
Settled
cultures historically have tended to misunderstand nomads and
to try to control their wandering ways. One might say that trouble
between settler and nomad started when farmer Cain, son of Adam
and Eve, killed his brother Abel, a nomadic herder (Genesis 4:1-16).
Bureaucracies in every age have tried to force nomads to take
on settled ways and become more “controllable”. A tragic
example of this is the First Nations of this land, who fought
to maintain their nomadic existence but eventually were either
eliminated or placed on “reservations”. In a similar
vein, Stalin decided in the 1930’s that the yurt dwelling
Kazaks of the Soviet Union should become cotton farmers; they
resisted and a quarter of their population (of 4 million) were
killed; 80% of their herds were lost as well. They are now cotton
farmers and live in square concrete-block housing.
In
studying the ways of nomadic cultures I have become convinced
that contemporary Western culture, especially, needs to learn
from nomadic ways. The simplicity of life, connection to the natural
world, and sense of community that the ancient nomadic cultures
maintained are things we must learn if we are to live harmoniously
and live well on this planet.
Take
simplicity, for example: numerous books on simplicity are being
written right now, but nothing matches the simplicity that inevitably
occurs naturally when carrying one’s possessions from place
to place. For nomads, possessions are of necessity few; each item
must serve multiple purposes and is chosen with care and an eye
to beauty. This is an extraordinary alternative to our settled
consumer society where families must rent storage units to hold
their excess possessions.
Likewise,
nomadic cultures do not overpopulate; their way of life will not
sustain it. Nor will it sustain injuring the earth with impunity.
Nomadic herders only survive because they have learned how to
live in harmony with the natural world and with the animals that
sustain them. The cruel horrors that western agribusiness enacts
on farm animals would be unthinkable to these people, who treat
their animals with a love and respect that is beyond our cultural
comprehension (e.g., singing to them, celebrating them in song
and dance, and caring for the weak and sick ones by the fire).
People
become nomads in modern Western culture for the same reasons they
do in every culture: the freedom of the road, the call of Spirit,
the need to travel for work (origin of the term journeyman). Different
now is the means of travel (Volkswagen bus and airplane instead
of gypsy cart and camel); communication is much easier with voicemail
and the internet. We still meet up with each other when in same
vicinity, and we gather with the tribe every summer season for
barter faires and music festivals and in the tent cities that
spring up annually in wilderness and deserts across the land,
events like the Oregon Country Fair and Burning Man and the Rainbow
gatherings. Here we share the stories of our journeys, trade goods
and, in the evenings, gather around the fire to sing and dance,
recite poetry, sometimes talk politics and often drum through
the night. Participants are a mixture of full-time nomads, semi-nomads
and nomads-for-the week; they are all participating in nomadic
events and the ways of nomadic culture.
And
the Yurt? The yurt is a gift, an ancient nomadic shelter that
has been made available to modern culture, thanks largely to Oregon
visionaries. Versatile, beautiful, and spiritual, it gives us
an option for shelter that is gentle to the planet. In its combination
of ancient design and modern materials it is a fitting symbol
of 21st century nomadism. Yurts provide the opportunity to live
in the round, to expand our consciousness, and we are fortunate
in Oregon that, if we choose to settle, we can move from a nomad
shelter to a more permanent wood panel yurt.
Whatever
form of shelter we choose, it is important to incorporate shapes
that hold us well and assist our evolution and that of our families.
And it is important, for us and for the planet, to learn from
nomads old and new, to respect nomadic culture and help create
a system where nomads and settlers can live mutually complementary
lives.
Becky
Kemery is currently hiding out in north Idaho working on a
yurt book she is writing with co-authors David Raitt and Annie
Raitt, but she may well be a nomad again by the time you read
this. If you have stories about yurts or know of interesting yurt
situations, let her know at beckykemery@hotmail.com. Her new web
site (www.yurtsource.com) will be a comprehensive yurt resource
page and should be online in July sometime.
References:
1. The Anasazi, considered the foremost architects of the ancient
tribes for their multi-storied apartments and city formations,
built round kivas for their sacred ceremonies. Tribes in central
California were still building roundhouses for community gatherings
just fifty years ago.
2. It is also possible in a dry climate to set a yurt up on the
ground. For extra warmth in the winter you can dig down six inches,
put down plastic sheeting, fill it in with sawdust, and place
your yurt and rugs over that. A yurt community in Jackson Hole,
Wyoming has lived this way successfully for many years. (It also
helps to have a rock-filled trench around the perimeter of the
yurt for drainage.) For further information see “Yurts in
Cold Climates” in The Last Straw Journal, Issue 32,
Winter 2000.
3. Jenny Pell of Nesting Bird Yurts is available for questions
on this topic and can be reached through www.nbyurts.com.
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