Baikal Quotes

“It reflects like an optical instrument and responds to changes in the weather so sensitively that it seems like a part of the sky rather than of the land. And along with all that, Baikal is distinctly Asiatic: if a camel caravan could somehow transport Baikal across Siberia to Europe, and curious buyers unwrapped it in a marketplace, none would mistake it for a lake from around there.”
― Ian Frazier, Travels in Siberia

“Russia is usually readier to ascribe misfortune to conspiracies rather than to the more probable screwup.”
― Dominic Ziegler, Black Dragon River: A Journey Down the Amur River at the Borderlands of Empires