Original subtitles

I had a short wave radio and I found

that you could get language programs

on some of the foreign radio stations, and

I was looking for a Korean language course

when I ran into a very strong Radio Moscow signal.

You get a lot of whistles and howls

and all sorts of weird stuff on short wave

that you can't identify.

There was this whistling that was melodic somehow

And eventually the lady came on and they said

''did you hear how that man sang two notes at the same time?''

and I thought God, now that's for me man

that's something that I could really get off doing.

For seven years I asked around and couldn't

find out who these people were

who had this kind of singing tradition.

So finally, I decided to check out

this little music store in the Mission, Round World Music

and I just happened to ask just as an after thought

''do you have anything on harmonic singing?''

And he says jeez, I don't know

I've never heard of it, but it's something about Tuva.

In some rather inexplicable way I figured out by the sound

what they were doing with their mouths how to create that sound

He had apparently picked up the Tuvan way of singing on his own.

And, I remember a week or two Later he comes in the door

I think I had my back turned like this

and I wasn't looking at the door

and I heard someone coming in singing in the Tuvan style

and it scared the hell out of me and

I looked up and there's Paul coming in.

I started out playing with John Lee Hooker, Bonnie Raitt,

Jerry Garcia, Merle Saunders, umm Muddy Waters.

After that was done came my time with T Bone Walker.

Well the band was fantastic

during Paul's time & my time it was one of a kind in the blues

because they played blues and jazz that was sophisticated.

After that I started doing an album that never got released

but an album from which one song was covered and released.

At that point in my life, my wife had been sick for a while

it was renal failure which meant that they could prolong her life

but that the odds were that it was supposed to get her.

My wife died, it was March 15, 199 1

and well for about six months I don't know what happened.

I just can't remember you

just want to be left alone until you get it cried or pounded out

and you find a shoe of hers or something like that and bingo

out comes the imitation Niagara Falls, the water works.

I did my best, but sometimes I just needed something for my own

mind to just be able to work on.

You know, I was losing it so I had a short wave radio

and I found that you could get language programs on some of

the foreign radio stations

and I ran into a very strong radio Moscow signal.

You just gotta get the hum

OK the base tone

but then there's also

and there's also

You've got three notes going

Serenaded by the sounds of a leaf-blower

Yeah, you could have a concerto for leaf-blower and orchestra

My mother is a painter, and my father was a musician

My grandmother and grandfather on both sides came from

the Cape Verde Islands, just off the coast of West Africa.

They brought this music with from there with them

that I learned to play when I was very young, first

on the piano, then on the guitar and other string instruments.

Hello, friends of Tuva. What is my connection with Tuva?

That, that's sort of a long story,

it was a dinner conversation back in 1977 and a

challenge as to where it was and I even doubted it's existence.

So I said 'oh you know about geography huh?' And he said

yeah, so I said 'OK, whatever happened to Tannu Tuva?'

I didn't believe it, but it turns out it was true,

Tannu Tuva was a real place

that put out postage stamps in 1930's when Feynman was a kid.

We looked it up on a map, Sure enough there's a Tannu Tuva

and where was it?

Just outside of Outer Mongolia, in the middle of central Asia

in the depths of Russia, far away from anything. And

it was no longer an independent country, it was part of Russia,

we saw the capitol, this is what did it the capitol is K-Y-Z-Y-L.

My wife and I and he at the same time grinned at each other, any

place that's got a capitol named K-Y-Z-Y-L has to be interesting.

We eventually got a Tuvan/ Russian/Mongolian phrase book

out of the Library of Congress.

We wrote this letter in Tuvan And sent it out into the abyss,

and a year and a half later something came back.

I received their first letter in 1980

They wrote: we are interested in Tuva, its culture, and

in the monument marking the geographical Center of Asia

we would like to build a bond with the people of Tuva

and we would like to visit Tuva.

In 1993 I succeeded in getting three Tuvans into the

Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena,

one of whom was Kongar-ol Ondar.

We had a series of concerts after the parade,

one of which, I would say the biggest was in San Francisco.

I met a stranger in a club, he said Tuvans were gonna be here.

We were on local radio station the day before

and when the concert came there were so many people,

there were something like 4000 extra admissions to

the Asian Art Museum where the concert was

Kongar-ol came out solo and entertained the people

in the lobby area of the museum.

accommodating the overflow crowd which included Paul Pena.

And I just remember his person- ality really shining through,

and how much he communicated with the audience there.

During the performance I noticed a blind man sitting in front.

This guy from in line said ''an autograph wouldn't do much good''

but if you got up near the guy and just cut loose like

you did outside, maybe you might get more out of that.''

When we finished the concert the man came up to me.

He seemed very excited.

He began singing a very famous Tuvan melody, ''Aarte Sayir''

I went up near where he was And when he wasn't

paying attention to somebody else I just

which was a song they hadn't done in there program yet.

They would later but they hadn't yet.

This impressed Kongar-ol so much

that he told Paul that every three years in Tuva

they hold a contest of throatsinging,

and that Paul should come to Tuva.

And he comes up to me and taps me on the shoulder

And says, 'Yes it is necessary for you to learn Tuvan

because, it is necessary that you be present in Kyzyl

in dozam-besh which is '95.

So I talked to Ralph and he said,

'Yeah, the music is from Tuva'

Eventually, I found out about a Friends of Tuva and stuff

and I started making an effort to hook up with Ralph.

'Would you be interested in recording this music?',

and I said sure, I'll try anything.

I hear Ralph telling the Staff at West Coast Live

''yeah he's going to Tuva in '95''.

One of the ideas of Friends Of Tuva is to do crazy things

and I thought that was crazy enough to qualify for

a Friends of Tuva project.

Then I said wait a minute the joke's going too far

He was pretty surprised When I called him up

and said I was going to shoot the documentary of his trip

Then I began to worry

like wow, like how and where

then I began to realize that like you know he was serious.

I thought well I wonder if he's gonna need someone

to go along with him?

Then all of a sudden it's like I heard about

that there's a couple guys from Chicago

who want to do a documentary film about the whole thing.

I guess you could say we weren't qualified

to shoot this but...

Then I heard about somebody else, a friend of Paul's

that wanted to go.

Tony was going to be Paul's assistant.

I'm Tony.

We've already got a freak group here with us.

My background has been tied up in radio for 25 years.

I heard this program by Mario Casetta on KPFK

he was playing some kind of strange music from

some part of the world

and I realized this is the place to play this record

of throatsinging.

This guy called and said ''I've got something''

he's heard me so he knew I played all kinds of weird shit

He said 'I bet you can't tell me what this is... listen.'

I decided just for fun to play a tape of it over the phone.

I said 'well I can't tell you exactly but,'

I'll tell you this, it's no musical instrument

it's all in the throat, and it's from a place in the area

more or less of northern Mongolia.'

I thought he'd faint. I thought he would faint over the phone.

He said, 'My God, how did you know that?'

I'm a tree trimmer by trade, I'm also a recording engineer,

and sometimes I mess around with film making a little bit,

and I play some rock and roll.

I was a director of an information center

on environmental issues in Los Angeles.

As soon as I heard the sounds coming out of Paul's mouth

and then the sounds coming from the CD he told me about

I went and bought it, and immediately I dreamed of

what Tuva would be like.

When my brother and I were growing up

our mom told us that the TV was broken

and that the only channel we could get was PBS

so we saw tons of documentaries.

Tonight on Nova, Richard Feynman: he won

the Nobel Prize,

he played the bongos, he investigated the

Challenger disaster,

and he collected stamps.

He was most of all an adventurer who in the last

years of his life longed to visit the remote

lost land of Tannu Tuva

Why would someone want to check out Tuva?

Well, I don't think it would be for a middle-of-the-roader

It is one of the last sort of adventure outposts

on the planet.

The chaos?

We hadn't slept in days

Mario arrived the night before

We didn't know up until the moment we left what equipment

we were going to use

We weren't sure about any interconnecting flights

It just seemed nuts

Even when we were standing in line to get on the plane

I thought we weren't gonna make it.

I really didn't know what to expect.

Have a good trip.

It wasn't until the plane lifted off

and that's when it's like OK this is it

there's no turnin' back at this point

'course unless the plane goes down over the ocean or

something like that.

On a Russian airplane everything is the bar

and smoking section.

There's no direct flight from America to Tuva.

Then we got on a domestic Aeroflot flight, which is

a unique experience in life.

It was like two days straight of traveling. It was just hell

Oh my God, I can't believe we made it.

We're here.

Man, I'm just hoping this is a stop for a while.

Well, you locate China on the map

and north from there is Mongolia

and over the Tannu Ola Mountains lies Tuva.

Tannu Tuva was actually an independent country from 192 1

until about 1944.

Before 192 1 it was part of Mongolia which was

part of China.

Tuvans, however, reject the notion that they a part of

either Mongolia or China.

For centuries Tuva was inhabited by various nomadic tribes,

from the Scythians from way back several thousand years ago,

through the Huns, the Turkic peoples, Khyrgiz, and Ouigurs.

The Turks left there language and culture on Central Asia

much more strongly than the Mongolians did.

Tuvans were traditionally nomadic animal herders,

who would move from place to place depending on

where there was fresh grazing available for their herd.

Russians filtered into Tuva over several centuries.

Russians came in search of gold when it was discovered

about 80 years ago.

In 1944 after the Tuvan cavalry fought along side Soviet troops,

against Nazi Germany Tuva became part of the Soviet Union.

It is presently in the Russian Federation.

Tuvan climate is extreme!

It goes from, well over 100 degrees

to minus 50, 60 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter.

Tuva is about the size of North Dakota.

There about 200,000 Tuvans and about 100,000 Russians.

Smattering of other nationalities.

The Tuvans who lived in the cities

were somewhat incorporated into the Soviet culture

A lot of the Tuvans who lived in the country were left alone.

We made it kid, we made it.

Well you can feel it. You feel the uh,

it's imprinted in the stone there.

Center of Asia!

A snapshot, I'd love to send one home to my mother.

I wish I knew how to translate that verse into Tuvan.

Roko, 'ride a horse'? I can't ride their horses, but I'm

glad to be here to sing with them.

Paul will also ride a Tuvan horse, yes, definitely.

I thought they were too small for me.

Shoot, I'm liable to kill a Tuvan horse.

They ain't got Tuvans big as I am.

Kongar-ol Ondar is an amazing guy,

and in Tuva he's kinda' like John F. Kennedy, Elvis Presley,

and MichaelJordan kinda' rolled into one,

as far as the way the people think of him.

In my youthful years I gave all of myself to my art.

I traveled a lot and worked hard and

I was honored to be awarded ''National Artist.'' Now I want

to pass on our traditions to the next generation.

I teach at the National Art School and I've organized a

children's ensemble. I want my students to see other countries

and my goal is to show them a way to continue our traditions

People should see children as well as old masters throatsing

Beautiful!

One little guys' kargyraa is just too bad!

My nickname is ''Earthquake''

Your nickname is ''Little Earthquake''.

Kongar-ol also arranged a surprise visit

by the members of Huun-Huur-Tu.

Hello, hello.

The human voice produces all kinds of sounds.

When we produce a note, or we sing a note,

there are a bunch of other notes that we make

that are way high which give us a certain characteristic

to our voice, because of these overtones, these harmonics,

these higher frequencies which are produced at the same time

that the regular note is being produced.

The Tuvans have figured out a way to isolate these overtones

and produce them one at a time, or a few at a time,

so that you can hear them individually.

You that I have ever heard.

How do you do that?

The didgeridoo is considered by ethnomusicologists

to be the oldest wind instrument in the world.

It is nothing more than just a branch of eucalyptus tree

hollowed out by termites.

I knew that the Tuvan people would have great

appreciation for the simplicity of this instrument

and the sounds that it could make.

I also special ordered seventy of these little nose flutes.

These are two of our most revered throatsinging masters.

Tumat? Tumat-Kara-ol. Yes! Yes, I've heard him on disc.

Yes, isn't it? I think so anyway.

Hey, and here's another one.

He's a master on the igil.

Oh, my teacher.

I want to learn how to play the igil.

And then we encountered the first

of the sheep-slaughtering ceremonies

Someone said that Genghis Khan was the person that introduced

this idea, that the blood of the animal is sacred

and that for some reason it should never touch the ground.

People in Tuva are proud to be a part of Genghis Khan's legacy.

People mistook Tuvans from Mongolians, but Genghis Khan

recognized the Tuvans as a distinct nationality with there

own culture and language. This is probably due the fact,

that his greatest general a General Subotai, was a Tuvan.

And Subotai was a general under whose command

Europe fell to Genghis Khan's armies in the 1200's.

Kongar-ol named his oldest son Chinghiss,

which is the Tuvan form of Genghis.

A sprig of parsley and a little oregano,

and a bottle of Greek beer

and I'll eat all of it. I'll eat the whole thing.

I had to read a book to find out what they did in the

sheep-slaughtering ceremony that they did in my honor.

The slaughterer basically sticks his hand in the sheep

and squeezes the aorta or rips it out,

essentially giving the sheep a heart attack.

And this we're going to

prepare with a Tuvan recipe, and it will taste great!

They make blood sausage out of it that they call Han.

No spices, no sauce, just straight blood sausage.

One of the very frustrating things about blindness is

that you could be there and not know what's going on anyway.

For Paul, the guest of honor, is the Fat of Lamb's Tail.

Mario is also an honored guest

so he will receive the meat of the sternum.

Tell him I'm vegetarian.

I don't like lamb.

Rack of lamb I like, in a Persian restaurant,

with lots of saffron rice.

In front of him is a huge Fat of Lamb's Tail, the butt!

All fat!

He should cut near the end.

All right guys, I don't believe what I'm doin' but.

Now Paul has to cut a little piece off,

and now hand the piece to me

and I'll go to the fire to make the offering.

Richard Feynman was a Nobel Prize winning physicist.

He and Ralph Leighton were probably the first Americans

to try to come to Tuva

and Leighton wrote a book called ''Tuva or Bust''

about their struggle to reach Tuva.

During the first day of the symposium

I was trying to help Paul practice a song

that he wanted to perform that night

by a guy named Vladimir Oidupaa.

Oidupaa is, as far as I'm concerned,

the number one master of the style kargyraa.

I'll try to sing it and you just check me.

So I wanted to do something that reflected my,

you know, my interest and respect for Oidupaa.

I'm just not sure what I'm doing

that's the only fucking problem here.

I was trying to learn the words and I couldn't.

Draw from memory your hometown when you were four years old,

and you'll get some idea of what this is like for me.

Avam kadaider would mean 'my mother is a woman'.

But then they say bergen which means 'gave'.

So 'My mother is a woman gave', what that hell that means

I just can't begin to figure out.

My head is gonna' pop,

I hope somebody's got some aspirin.

I gotta' rest. I can't

OK, do you want me to call Lyubov and ask for which

It ain't gonna' do no good when I get up on that freakin' stage

Oh Kongar-ol, what I do for you,

you make me run around like a damn soldier.

So you got three verses.

Hmmm, you got three verses.

Look what you got me into.

More than a thousand people had come to Kyzyl

to try out for the symposium

And one hundred and thirteen contestants were admitted,

including a few foreigners and Paul Pena.

It's the first time I can ever remember having stage fright.

I can speak a little Tuvan.

My name is Paul Pena.

I'm Oyun.

Oyun?

You could just sense the anticipation

of the days leading up to the event.

It was very obvious that it was a much needed reclamation

of the pride and the heritage of the Tuvan people.

Without question, very much was lost under the Soviets.

In the past, wearing traditional clothing was forbidden.

They robbed the minorities of their culture,

they forbid their language to be spoken,

they make them learn Russian in school,

and they smile through it all

and show you posters of happy nationalities.

Biggest scam in the world, let me tell you.

Immediately when I received a letter from my American friends

the K GB would stop me and interrogate me.

You talk about freedom,

there's many different kinds of freedom.

At one point I was asking this group of people

if they minded if I built a campfire like out in a meadow

and they all looked at me like I was crazy,

like you can do what ever you wanna' do, you know.

There's no fences, when you get out of the city,

there's no property lines.

You go where your herds wanna' go.

We live in such a beautiful place because our ancestors

fought for and protected our land for us.

We are heirs to their wisdom

and to their struggle.

Oidupaa is in jail somewhere and nobody, even the

president of Tuva doesn't know where the Russians took him

Their spirit is connected with nature and with the land itself.

And so no dogma or, you know, political philosophy can truly

ever take them over.

I've been told by people with experience that

what probably happened they took him away for being a dissident.

A few composers in Moscow supported my bid to create a

throatsinging symposium. They helped me get money from Moscow

& together we began seeking out traditional composers in Kyzyl.

If people live in friendship then peace prevails

and life becomes good for everybody.

Well, the first day of the symposium was totally crazy.

We didn't know when the performance times were.

They kept on changing the rules on us on an hourly basis.

In fact, at one point they actually said that

we had to go and get AIDS tested.

Or else we're going to get booted from the country.

And poor Paul, I mean, who

has to kind of rely on what he hears and what people tell him.

People who were organizing the festival would come to Paul and

us and tell us that 'Paul is about to go on,

and then come back moments later and say...

'No we're not', and then 'yes we are',

and then 'no were not', and 'yes we are',

and finally I just stopped listening.

I'm not sure how I got to be a judge exactly, except uh,

I think it was Kongar-ol that arranged it.

The opening night they called up all the judges to the stage.

I was thinking all along about Feynman,

and I got up on the stage and I shouted out, 'Feynman Lives!'

There are six basic styles of throatsinging,

and of those Kongar-ol's specialty is called sygyt,

and Paul's specialty is called kargyraa.

Sygyt creates a really loud intense harmonic.

The big thing about kargyraa is

that it allows the singer to get a note,

an octave below the note that

that singer is actually singing.

Kongar-ol was asking me, 'What is Paul going to sing?'

And he knew Paul was nervous.

He should sing ''ARTE SAYIR'' because it's the most famous.

Paul wanted to surprise Kongar- ol with the Oidupaa song,

but Kongar-ol kept asking, 10 minutes before he was gonna go

on stage Paul said, 'I'm gonna' sing the song by Oidupaa.'

He can't sing Oidupaa! Oidupaa is in jail now!

He is dishonorable now! To sing his songs somewhere else may be

OK, but not at the festival!

Oh! I practiced that stupid thing for nothing,

only to find out it's forbidden!

I didn't know what I could do to help.

I'm just not sure what I'm doing.

I was sort of worried when I saw Paul like that.

I basically decided that to myself that that was it:

Paul was gonna' come on stage and apologize for not being

prepared, because Paul is a humble guy.

And I turned to Lemon and I go 'Lemon, what do you think?'

and Lemon goes, 'No problem, Paul's a pro, he'll do fine.'

And I remember leaving Lemon, thinking he has absolutely no

idea what condition Paul was in backstage.

I've worked with Paul enough to know that he was a very

spontaneous person. 5 minutes before he goes on stage...

I said look Paul, 'Your main goal is to go and kick ass.

I mean you're American, you're comin' to Tuva,

it's like all these Tuvans have been singin' since the day they

were born and they're all up there tryin' to win that horse.'

Paul had waited twelve years for this moment.

Sure helps the stage fright to be with a beautiful lady.

Dear friends, I would like to introduce you

the man who I walked on stage with.

One of his Tuvan friends gave him a very good nickname.

He called him ''Earthquake.''

His friend called him Earthquake because when he

sings kargyraa the ground shakes.

He is blind... but he is a well known bluesman

in America, he's from San Francisco, California...

I proudly introduce you to: Paul Pena

Thank you very much

He didn't even know for sure what he should even perform.

I can speak very little Tuvan.

It feels like I have no head.

I got out there and said to myself,

'what have you got your ass into dude?'

To my dear friends,

the Tuvan people,

and to my friend from Chadaana,...

Kongar-ol.

My big time fifty word vocabulary

and my surface knowledge of grammar and all

that was what I was using.

If only...

I could speak Tuvan ...

very well.

Thank you very much.

They had other people perform

from various countries that are around Tuva,

but they'd never seen anybody from America,

and they'd never seen anybody play the blues.

They wouldn't let him get of for what,

fifteen minutes or something like that.

They just kept on making him do another one.

Little did I know what would happen.

I broke a string.

Ahh, you broke a string?

We need a dosh-poluur or another guitar...

A dosh-poluur or another guitar, do we have one?

Whatever.

Paul plucks a couple times

and then breaks out in

this very traditional Tuvan song...in Tuvan.

Thank you very much.

My Tuvan friends, thank you very much.

Where does a guy faint?

Really, where does a guy faint? I heard that.

I was so damned scared I almost fell on the stage.

Earthquake!

Yeah, Earthquake!

If they give him a horse, what's he going to do?!

He'll give it to me, won't he?!

Or to my son, Bayir?!

Only if he teaches me how to ride it first.

Ondar Daryma!

I'm Ondar Daryma, nice to meet you.

I heard you were great!

Fantastic!

In California...

I have been learning the ways of the shaman.

This is a great honor.

Feynman! He was very dear to me

and Leighton, my good friend,

please give him my warmest regards.

Paul wasn't going to perform again until the end of the week,

so we had some time to check out the country side.

We traveled for days, a number of times

we were totally lost, or seemed like we were lost

You know we were just going up and down mountains.

Professional drivers, they want to hear you sing kargyraa,

just a little bit, O.K.?

OK.

They want to hear it for themselves,

Just a little

To my friend, Kongar-ol, from Chadaana

and to all my friends in Chadaana,

I will sing my kargyraa.

He's from America, Paul Pena.

Let me shake your hand!

That was great!

So there's a huge line there but because of you

they let us go without a line.

Then we visited a monument that was erected in a spot

where the Dalai Lama had been two years earlier.

Although Tuvans were originally shamanistic they also embraced

Tibetan Buddhism 500 years ago, and the Dalai Lama

is the spiritual leader of the Tuvan people.

Holy Jesus! It's like a feeling, like something, I don't

know. I don't know whether you can get such a thing on a

camera or not, and I'm damned if I can say it.

It's like going back 1500 years to another world or something.

Kongar-ol told us that this guy was a Shaman

and he was speaking in a language so old that

even he didn't understand it.

And this is Tuvan araka distilled from fermented milk.

It's full...well half full anyway, ha ha.

Tuvan vodka!

You need to make an offering

to the North, to the South

the East and West, to Mount Hairakan, so that you will visit

Tuva again, so that you will throatsing beautifully and so

that the people of Tuva will be protected.

Amen.

Welcome, sit down please. Welcome.

Tuvan Vodka!

Not Smirnoff Vodka.

Here's to his grandmother

He said, 'Yeltsin, when he came, he also drank that.'

And that's why Russia's all fucked up!

Kongar-ol had some very specific places that he wanted

to take us. We visited his mom and spent a night

outside of Chadaana.

Hello, hello mother.

Mario would always crack a joke.

Twelve o'clock and all is well!

Deux cappuccino, garcon, deux cappuccino.

A little extra cinnamon in one.

We're always stopping at different rivers, and we'd sing

a few songs about the river because, I mean, in Tuva

a lot of the songs are about rivers.

Ask him what's the name of the river.

Chadaana River! Yeah, same as the town.

The Chadaana River is different

from every other one in the world.

There are so many songs about Chadaana,

I can't even count them all!

Paul, now you'll have a little bath in the Chadaana River.

Oh, right here. OK I get you now.

Ohhhhhhhh, Paul!

That much stronger will my kargyraa be now. Cause I

washed my face in Chadaananow my kargyraa will

be stronger. Something like that anyway.

Medicine from the west of Tuva, Chadaana water. Good?

Now we need a little araka.

Roko, Paul, I make this offering at the Chadaana

River the 23rd day of the 6 month of 1995. I am

grateful my friends from so far away could be here

in Chadaana, and I hope we will be here together

again in the future

Amen. Oh Christ I'm hot guys.

Totally, you must get totally wet.

It's cold!!!

Very good!

Oh, you're a devil.

I'm 'mo throw your ass in

I haven't learned how to say ''enough'' yet.

Now we're going to a desert where there are sand dunes.

This is my grandfather.

It was the roughest ride I've ever had in my life in

an automobile. But we finally got back.

This one time we were out in front of this banquet,

the area was being rented by a graduation ceremony

for a school of Russian young women.

There was so many places where all a sudden

there was like a gang of folks around man, and like,

it gets really confusing, I'm in new places

I can't ask questions, I just feel damn disoriented.

I'm afraid to take a step anywhere. As a totally

sighted person I can't expect you to understand

When I get into a situation where I'm disoriented that

I hardly know my name is or don't dare turn around or,

I just really feel, you know, why the hell am I here man?

these guys could do this shit without me, and a lot easier

cause they wouldn't have to worry about some yo-yo

to look after all the time.

Most people get 95%of their information with their eyes

that like puts me decidedly in the deviant category

among human beings.

I feel very alienated in America,

very unwanted.

Sometimes it's just people enjoying what I do,

my friends. Sometimes I don't get strength, sometimes

I wake up and wish I didn't have to wake up.

There are people who have lived here for many years

who do not speak Tuvan

so it was inspiring to see Paul throatsing so well

and perform songs he composed in Tuvan.

He understands our language and Traditions

so he sings with certain nuances that are

specifically Tuvan, and he performs them extremely well

you will all enjoy the next performer very much

because of how much you liked him during the first night.

Our guest from America, Paul Pena!

I guess there was some people

that just felt that my singing a melody that was

very identifiably one of Oidupaa's,

you know they weren't really sure how it would go over.

To my friends, the Tuvan people

and to my friend from Chadaana, Kongar-ol.

But I did, in fact, do on the second night

what I had intended to do the first night.

I will sing my Kargyraa for you.

Thank you very much.

Paul, they want you to sing again.

Thank you! Thank you very much!

In the eyes of the crowd, he was the winner, period.

Winner in the Kargyraa Division

and recipient of the Audience Favorite Award... Paul Pena!

I don't know what to say. Thank you very much.

To the other foreigners and to the Tuvan people

Thank you very much.

I don't know how to put it exactly into words.

I mean it was like, honor is a small word

to describe what it feels like

to have come out as I did on something like this.

We love you very much! ...from all Tuvan people!

Hi, Ralph! Paul is a winner in the Kargyraa division!

And then some bad things started to happen.

If I'm not in California by the time that ends,

you will have a dead or a crazy man to deal with.

It was perfectly timed where Paul's medication

would last until the end of the trip.

You've gotta' understand man, you gotta' fuckin' believe me.

Paul lost some of his medication.

We lose everything we gained man.

And all of a sudden it looked Like

he might have to cut his whole trip short.

Don't misunderstand man, I don't want it this way.

Kongar-ol was involved in a fight on the street

with a drunk and ended up breaking

his hand in the process of defending himself.

I collapsed in the middle of the night if I recall.

When we took Mario to the Hospital

they actually said that he had a heart attack.

This giant thunder lightning storm came in

and it was like, like the gods themselves were against us.

How did I feel when I thought Mario was going to die?

I don't know what I felt, I was numb,

because that wasn't what was supposed to happen.

Everything seemed to just go down hill,

just you know, call it like Siberian

voodoo, whatever you want, you know.

Shamanism is not the same as what you think

in terms of western medicine, you

know Shamanism deals with the spirit.

1990 to 1995, that's my depression son.

You get that initial sort of distress thought,

and then you quickly start making assessments,

cause the first thing is, you know: have you,

through your negligence, endangered other individuals?

Paul had less than two days of medication left,

and it was at least a two day trip to get back.

Do you know what I would do to stay here one more week?

It's hard for Paul to live in America.

That corner store is the only place in the whole world

that he can go by himself.

I didn't wanna' leave.

During one of the first Conver- sations I ever had with Paul,

he told me how he went to cash a check

and when he walked out on the street

somebody asked him directions.

And as Paul was trying to explain the directions

this guy snatched 400 bucks out of Paul's hand and took off.

Paul gets depressed and he takes medication for it.

And now Paul had to leave Tuva

because his prescription only lasted a short time.

I could see it, Kongar-ol was so confused.

He wants to be able to take Paul back to his home town.

We went to the Aeroflot office,

and they said they would not sell us tickets

because we were foreigners,

so we tried to get Kongar-ol to buy the tickets

and they wouldn't sell them to him either.

There's no life as usual in Tuva,

and so you have to be prepared

to work with things as they occur.

Have you seen Paul's prescription for this medicine?

I know that it effected him very deeply.

In fact he wrote two songs about being there.

There should never be, anyone happier than me.

Here I sit in the middle of Asia, feel like I wanna cry

'cause I can't find a way to say what I need and why.

All my little friends are here with me.

I love them, God knows they love me.

But here I sit in Kyzyl,

they'd help me if they could.

I can't tell 'em what I want

'cause I just can't talk too good.

It's such a hard life when you're stupid.

It's a hard life when you're blind.

Here I sit in the middle of Asia,

I can't find my way to tell 'em what I need

and why I just can't stay.

They say I'm a sick man, I know,

but the doctors, they just say No.

Here I sit in the middle of Asia And

I don't wanna go but some damn Law

and beaurocrat makes me hit the door.

It's such a hard life when you're stupid

Such a hard life when you're blind.

I don't know just what I've done

but I can't even sign

I ain't robbed nobody but it feels like doin' time...

The way Paul reads text

is by using a device that scans each letter,

then raises a series of pins

in the shape of that letter, that he can feel.

So the way that Paul learned Tuvan was by

translating Tuvan words letter by letter,

first into Russian and then Russian into English.

Because there was no Tuvan/English dictionary.

At some point somebody suggested to us

that possibly the cause of all these things

that were going wrong might actually be a spirit matter,

and that we should ask a Shaman to tell us.

We heard that we possibly had bad luck

because of this drum that we had purchased.

We had purchased a Shaman's drum from a musician,

and evidently this drum was not supposed to be sold to anybody.

It was supposed to be for Shamanic purposes,

it was not supposed to leave Tuva,

and we didn't realize this when we bought the drum

we thought this would be a great thing to bring back to Ralph.

If the drum has something bad going on with it,

then bad luck may follow it.

A shaman needs to inspect the Drum

to determine whether the drum has a tail

like a devil, an evil spirit... something inhabiting the drum.

No, I don't think there's anything there...

there shouldn't be.

And if there's a tail?

Well, if the drum does have a tail...

if we can find a shaman who will help us

they can cut the tail off, separating it from the drum.

So we consulted a Shaman

Pretty quickly, he decided that

it didn't have a tail and it should be fine.

I'm not sure exactly what took Place

but eventually things began to straighten out a little bit

We found some medication for Paul.

Kongar-ol's hand, he had it in a Cast

But he was playing fine, and Mario...

Who will be next to fall?

I'm gonna' call this

the doomed expedition of 1995 Tuva, right?

It was as if nothing had happened,

I was fine.

But that's the interesting thing about Tuva

and about that way of life, is that it's very spontaneous,

and you just have to be ready.

You have to be on your toes,

there's opportunities that present themselves

and you have to take advantage of them

whenever they come up.

If that drum doesn't have any spirit in it,

do you wanna try and conjure one up.

Paul had been studying Shamanism in America,

so Paul decided to try and summon

the spirit of Richard Feynman.

Richard Feynman is sort of an Obi-Wan Kenobi

type of a figure,

I mean, he was sort of the spirit behind all this.

He's coming

my guide Jo-Frank.

Jo-Frank means my grandfather Francisco Pena,

Padros Pena and he says, 'Feynman can hear us,

so either speak or think what you would say to him.

He's in our midst.

Tell Kongar-ol

all you Friends of Tuva tell them Thanks

I don't know you very well

I can't make you talk like me but I'm trying to do it

understand what I'm saying?

I think Paul felt a sense of freedom himself there.

It is a great honor for me to be called in this way.

Though he can not see,

Paul is a wise and extraordinary man.

He has inherited great shamanic powers from his ancestors.

Having known Paul, and knowing his passion for Tuva,

being there with him the day that he could finally breathe

Tuvan air, I was very happy to be a part of that.

Paul feels everything from nature,

from the wind, the earth, he is very unique.

Not everybody has been given the abilities which Paul has

His talents and sensitivities which enabled him

to become a great musician, to learn Tuvan, to throatsing,

and to understand people are truly amazing.

If this is what it takes to be a movie star man,

I don't want no part of it.

It's a nice horse man, it's a small horse,

and it's real gentle, super gentle horse.

This is gonna' have to be a short ride

or I ain't gonna' take no guts back to

America, you understand that.

Once you get up there you'll be fine.

I was so sick that day and I really wanted

to do it on a day that I, you know felt good.

I had no desire do some exterior decorating

on this poor horse, it didn't do anything to deserve it.

I'd much rather do it now for example,

you know, than the day that we did it.

Paul, you did it man.

Oh, let me sit down.

Kids love to be scared,

you know what I mean, it's weird but they do.

When you get older man that shit ain't the same thing.

This is Ime, the village where I was born

and spent my youth.

I went to elementary school here.

Paul, my friend, now,

a very significant moment has arrived.

I am deeply moved by the fact that Paul

came to Tuva and participated in the symposium,

where he won in the Kargyraa division.

Even more importantly, that it was his dream

to come to Tuva, to Chadaana, and most importantly

to the village where I was born

on the shore of the river Hemchik.

What I want to say is

The beauty which surrounds us, he can not see.

But through my hoomei, sygyt and kargyraa,

I would like to help him understand and feel that beauty.

They can't take that away from me,

that's an old song you don't know,

but that's what it's about. I mean it's about,

the song talks about memories,

and they say you can't take that away from me.

Well it's you know,

something that I'll always have to treasure.

How about yourself Paul,

what's in store for Paul Pena?

I don't have a clue man.

I'm only smart enough to know

that I don't predict the future.

I think Fred had it best about the future,

all he said was:

You got to move, you got to move,

you got to move child, you got to move

cause when that storm gets ready, you got to move.

Sometimes you're up, sometimes you're down.

Sometimes nobody knows if you're around.

But when that storm gets ready, you got to move.

You got to move, you got to move,

you got to move child, you got to move.

Cause when that storm gets ready,

you got to move.