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A fascinating story from 2013. There was an interesting short follow up from the Siberian Times a year after the Smithsonian piece - the last surviving member

A fascinating story from 2013. There was an interesting short follow up from the Siberian Times a year after the Smithsonian piece - the last surviving member was seeking help, or maybe just tiring of isolation, in her 70s. http://www.businessinsider.com/agafya-lykova-asks-for-help-2014-1?IR=T http://www.businessinsider.com/agafya-lykova-asks-for-help-2...

pmoriarty 10y ago
"I am all alone, my years are big, my health is bad, I keep getting ill," Agafia said in the letter cited by the newspaper. "There is a lump on my right breast, and my strength is going. There is a need for a person, a helper, assuming there are kind people in the world, as the world has always had kind people." The thought of the elderly Agafia facing such a harsh winter is tough. But not all locals are sympathetic -- she has been offered a winter home in a local village before, the Siberian Times reports, but has refused it. "She is being a little cunning," Vladimir Pavlovsky, editor of the local paper Krasnoyarskiy Rabochiy, told the Siberian Times. "She has no hunger. She wants to attract more attention. She has enough cereals, bags of them lie on her porch, and everywhere. And she has enough potatoes." That editor sounds a bit heartless. She's clearly gone about as far as anyone can be expected to go, living virtually her whole life in isolation, and now she's 70 years old and is having a hard time taking surviving in one of the harshest environments on earth. After a while, your body starts to break down, and some cereal and potatoes aren't going to cut it. She needs things like firewood and water. Even simply cooking will eventually be impossible to do when one gets old enough, especially under those primitive conditions. Besides, she's probably lonely. Many elderly people suffer from depression and take their own lives because of their isolation. How hard can it be to have some sympathy for that?
- icebraining 10y ago
  He probably has less sympathy since "she has been offered a winter home in a local village before (...) but has refused it." I can understand how much it pains her to leave her home, but seems a bit much to ask some unrelated person to leave theirs to live with her.

pmoriarty 10y ago

"I am all alone, my years are big, my health is bad, I keep getting ill," Agafia said in the letter cited by the newspaper. "There is a lump on my right breast, and my strength is going. There is a need for a person, a helper, assuming there are kind people in the world, as the world has always had kind people." The thought of the elderly Agafia facing such a harsh winter is tough. But not all locals are sympathetic -- she has been offered a winter home in a local village before, the Siberian Times reports, but has refused it. "She is being a little cunning," Vladimir Pavlovsky, editor of the local paper Krasnoyarskiy Rabochiy, told the Siberian Times. "She has no hunger. She wants to attract more attention. She has enough cereals, bags of them lie on her porch, and everywhere. And she has enough potatoes." That editor sounds a bit heartless. She's clearly gone about as far as anyone can be expected to go, living virtually her whole life in isolation, and now she's 70 years old and is having a hard time taking surviving in one of the harshest environments on earth. After a while, your body starts to break down, and some cereal and potatoes aren't going to cut it. She needs things like firewood and water. Even simply cooking will eventually be impossible to do when one gets old enough, especially under those primitive conditions. Besides, she's probably lonely. Many elderly people suffer from depression and take their own lives because of their isolation. How hard can it be to have some sympathy for that?

icebraining 10y ago
He probably has less sympathy since "she has been offered a winter home in a local village before (...) but has refused it." I can understand how much it pains her to leave her home, but seems a bit much to ask some unrelated person to leave theirs to live with her.