In five years, a hermit from the Yaroslavl highway established life in his dugout. How a modern hermit lives Why did you choose a clearing near the Yaroslavl highway

On February 28, 2018, taking a travel companion with me, I left St. Petersburg. We caught the car quickly. Immediately to Pereslavl. That's where I needed to go. The driver drove at 180 km/h and already at 8 pm we were at the place - at the Hermit Hobbit. Unreal luck.
I made an appointment with the Hermit in advance, but whether I would go alone or not alone, I didn’t know until yesterday, and I didn’t have time to warn. He was waiting for one person, two arrived - it turned out awkward.
We arrived at the wrong time - the Hermit was recording the tale on video. He asked me to be quiet and not to move. I put the phone on a tripod, sat in front of the camera and began to read a fairy tale. Then he fed us “pea food” and treated us to tea and cookies.

I offered to cook my own buckwheat, but the owner of the dugout said that he didn’t mind the cereal, it’s not such a valuable thing, the most valuable thing is my time and attention. While eating, I asked how best to communicate - in “you” or “you” - I read many articles where journalists mostly communicated in “you”, but Yuri was categorically against it - and gave an example that in English language there is no word “you” at all, but intelligent and educated people They say "you" to each other. I gave the Hermit a book and a pack of wheat flour, which he did not want to accept because he does not eat such things. And the video of him baking pancakes, it turned out, was made for hype for Maslenitsa. In fact, he doesn't like to cook anything.

We didn’t manage to communicate - Yuri was busy with installation work, and we went to sleep on the bunk, where the table was and the rabbit was running. At night, the Hermit did not sleep at all, he kept re-reading the fairy tale, and it was not clear when he slept. “Or maybe he’s an alien and doesn’t sleep at all?” - suggested the driver who picked us up.

The dugout is good - clean, dry, no insects. There is no garbage, there are exhibits - for example, socks hanging on a line. The stove maintains about 20 degrees, by morning the temperature drops a little, but even in my summer sleeping bag it was warm.

At six in the morning I woke up and took my pills. The hermit pushed my fellow traveler aside. Now Yuri was more talkative. He talked about why he went to live in the dugout, although I did not ask such a question. The fact is that he studied in Moscow (he wanted to go to St. Petersburg, but they didn’t accept him) - having set himself the goal of definitely graduating from one of best universities Russia. Lived in a hostel, worked. But the living conditions did not suit him, and there was no time left for his life. Then Yuri Valentinovich said to his boss: “Can I work half as much?” The boss replied, “Then you’ll get four times less.” He stood in line for improved living conditions, but was not given an apartment. As always, it went to someone official. And then he went into the dugout. And he seems happy. You are your own boss, you don’t owe anything to anyone, you don’t need to stand in traffic jams and be nervous, it appeared free time to mind your own business. When Yuri talks about the production of the video, his eyes light up. “Imagine, before, to make a movie, you needed a movie camera, like this. On television, in order to film a program and have it watched by an audience, you need a lot of people and equipment, but now it’s enough to have a phone, a tablet and Internet access! I have it on my channel statistics, my video was watched at the same time... man, that is, this is... cinemas " - Yes, - I nod - in digital age You are your own actor, director, editor, and so on. I asked if Yuri makes a profit from his channel. It turned out that commercial profit is not the goal, but the goal is to convey information, to use YouTube as a means of mass influence on people. This is the only tool available to everyone and free from censorship that the government does not yet control. There is also LiveJournal, but who is on LiveJournal now? Bloggers who write articles are mowed down by the FSB for articles. They tried to close YouTube after the scandal with the oligarch, but failed.

In addition, there was time to read books. There are a lot of them here - a whole library! Previously, Yuri was fond of bookcrossing. Now he fills in the gaps and reads classic literature and fairy tales that are still relevant today.

As a farewell, Yuri gave me an autographed postcard and a clay chip with the inscription “Talent”.

In general, the hermit, of course, is not the same as he appears in his funny videos, such a friendly, cheerful hippie, he is smart, well-read. a very serious, purposeful and hardworking person who clearly knows what he wants.

He acted very wisely - he needs to get out of the country before it’s too late, or at least go to the bunkers. So as not to depend on slave conditions. After all, the pension contributions we are paying now are disappearing. Everyone knows this, but no one is indignant, everyone is forced to pay. In addition, rent and food eat up your salary, not even your home, from which you can be evicted at any time. So, the water was turned off in our house - and it’s a mess, we can’t wash ourselves or make tea. And in the dugout there is always a spring or snow/ice. The snow in the city is dirty, and they melt it with reagents. In the forest, the snow is clean, the air is coniferous, it’s pleasant to breathe, the sun is shining.

For five years now, 42-year-old hermit Yuri Alekseev has been living in a dugout on the Yaroslavskoye Highway, 60 kilometers from Moscow. Once a successful Moscow lawyer, he gave up everything, dug a dugout, got a rabbit and now reads books all day.

As the man admits, he is tired of the drab office life.

My employers were good people. At first they told me: well, if you don’t want to go to the office every day, then go at least three days a week. Then they offered a day, then a few hours. But I thought: why should I sit in this Moscow and pay rent? So, what is next? Take out a mortgage for some cell in a residential area? And this is life?

That's why Yuri now lives in a dugout.

There are solar panels on the roof of the dugout, and the electricity generated is stored in batteries. So Yuri always has light and connection with the outside world - there is a computer and the Internet in the dugout.

Yuri considers his library to be the main treasure of his home. All his books are registered in the world bookcrossing library. People who come to visit Yuri can take something to read from him and leave their books in return.

Among the pets is the rabbit Parsley.

Yuri spends all his free time reading, music, thinking and talking with guests. The hermit does not maintain relations with his relatives: they do not come to visit him. The downshifter was married, but admitted that the issues of starting a family and leaving offspring, so that he would have someone to give a glass of water to before his death, did not bother him.

Yuri has a 33-year-old girlfriend, Klara, who continues to lead a life in Moscow that he so hates: she rents a house, pays off a loan, and works in the document management department. On the weekend, Clara fills her bags with groceries and goes to the meadow. It was thanks to her efforts that the solar panels, generator, gas cylinder. She bought insulation for the dugout, a saw, an ax and even a water pump. But I’m not ready to move into the dugout forever.

Numerous guests also come with gifts. Yuri opened a page on the Internet “

For several years now, Yuri Alekseev has been living in a dugout next to the highway.
Yuri built his dugout in two months, and has been living in it for several years.

Nowadays, many articles have already been written about Yuri Alekseev (this is the name of the “hermit hobbit”) in various public pages, and most of them begin with the story of how Yuri, being a successful Moscow lawyer, quit his highly paid job and moved to a dugout, abandoning material wealth . There is indeed some truth in this story, but the journalists are a little disingenuous.

In fact, Yuri can hardly be called a hermit and an ascetic - he has so many guests that they often bump into each other at the door or walk one after another. So that regular guests would not be so annoying, Yuri even installed a kind of intercom - a telephone at the beginning of the path, through which guests must report who they are and for what purpose they came to him. And so that those wishing to take part in bookcrossing would not disturb Yuri again, he moved his library to a separate shed.

Yuri's asceticism is also peculiar, or one might even say hipster. His home really looks more like a hobbit hole: almost everything is made of wood, there are a lot of carpets, blankets, bedspreads, even the door is deliberately round so that the association with hobbits is even more complete. But at the same time, there is a music speaker above the entrance to the dugout (from it audio recordings of Yuri can be heard, in which he recites classic works of Russian literature), there are solar panels on the roof, and inside you can see a computer, a synthesizer, an audio system, a tablet, a laptop, a phone and quite stable lighting.

Lives with Yuri White Rabbit named Petrushka. He also sometimes becomes a participant in videos of the Moscow Hobbit. Yuri even calls his channel that way - “Channel of the Hobbit Hermit and Parsley.”

Seven years ago, Yuri Alekseev actually moved from Moscow to Yaroslavskoe Highway. Then he worked as a lawyer, now he works as a blogger. Yuri considers his blogging to be quite a serious job, and, admittedly, he succeeds: now there are more than 125,000 subscribers on his Youtube channel.

“If previously power and the parameter of success were measured by money, now they are measured by subscribers in in social networks“says Yuri Alekseev. “Just imagine, I worked in an office, everything was boring and monotonous. And now I have a colossal project here - 100,000 subscribers!”

Almost every day Yuri uploads a new video - sometimes about his life, sometimes he records his thoughts, he has quite a lot of videos in which he reads Chekhov, Pushkin, Turgenev and other classics aloud. Sometimes he asks his subscribers to become sponsors of his channel and transfer money to him. When journalists contact him and ask for an interview, he may also ask them to bring certain foods or medicines.

“There is nothing outstanding about me,” says Yuri. - I don’t like existing in the city, fighting for survival in the metropolis. I don’t associate myself with a hermit or a downshifter - I just chose this way of life. Life is organized, there is no need to work, there is no need to pay rent, there is enough communication with people - everything is fine. Fate itself will help me find a way out of any situation.”