“So this is how it worked now: everyone would keep warm separately, not kindling fires together. But in the days of Vanu’s youth it was by those very fires that people warmed themselves so they could live. Out of small, soot-stained pots and bowls, the big pot would be filled, which saved many a family from dying of hunger.
"People get stingy around their fires. They cook hearty meals over them, then drive away those who are freezing, those who, in life’s bad weather, couldn’t keep their table full. But it wasn’t so long ago that the old Nenets would say: if you can’t warm an unfortunate person by your fire, if you don’t have a piece of meat – don’t punish yourself, you still have a kind word, which is as mighty as a fire, as nourishing as a piece of meat.
"As soon as children could stand on their own feet and begin to understand why the sun was in the sky, they would be taught to recognise and understand these commandments. But what had our children been taught? To lurk like beasts of prey. Life was not a hunt, and it didn’t seem to require the habits of a beast.”