Nikolai relays stories about ghosts and spirits that he heard from others:There is a hill in my native village of Arshan-Zelmenskiy. The elders used to say that after midnight a ghost in white clothes sits and cries on that hill. Long ago, in the late-1960s, when there was no asphalt road laid there, a misfortune happened in that place. A girl fell out of the car, under the wheels, and died. Her mother went crazy, and in white clothes she ran around in search of her daughter. I also heard that on the western side of the farm Deed Lamin there is a place where evil spirits (shulmus) make night travelers go astray. What happens is that people go around all night long and cannot leave that place. I think we are not the only (sentient) beings that live on Earth. Sometimes you walk, and you feel that someone or something has just run nearby, although you cannot see what exactly. Sometimes you hear strange sounds and voices. There must be things out there, although I have not encountered one yet. One of my younger brothers does not want to work on a cattle farm because he sees all sorts of spooky things there. I tease him, ‘Since you see things, you’d better start healing people. Become a shaman. Then people will come to you queueing.’ Of course, it is just a joke.