There is a common expression in Kyrgyzstan: “It only takes one frost.” The implied second half of the saying is, “to lose everything.” In the Tien Shan mountains the temperatures can swiftly drop to -35° celsius. If the sheep are out overnight, they will all die. An entire family’s livelihood can be lost. A snow packed valley littered with frozen sheep, still upright like thousands of stone statuettes is a common sight and one that embodies the precarious existence of village life. Injuries, illnesses and blood feuds can change the course of a family’s history. The elements that carve away at the rocks, likewise chisel into the souls of the shepherds. What is left are the essentials of the human spirit. There is no pageantry or superfluous emotions; only principles and millennia old dogma shaped by necessity and hard won experience remain. Hospitality to strangers, filial piety, loyalty till death and the immense value of a person’s word form the substance of their inner domains and dictate their conduct. This is the world of Ottuk, tucked away in a valley, surrounded by mountains, steeped in legend and un-ravaged by time.