There are lots of crazy people walking around on our planet, and even if they honestly believe some of the things they say — that the Earth is flat, or a mysterious hidden planet is going to slam into the Earth — they’re not really worth listening to. A 20-year-old Russian man named Boriska Kipriyanovich may very well be crazy, but his claims that he is a reborn former Martian has stolen headlines thanks to his unusual life story, and oddly specific “knowledge” of the cosmos.
Kipriyanovich was reportedly something of a child prodigy from the very first years of his life, allegedly learning to read and write before the age of two. As he grew older, he began telling a tale of a previous life on Mars that would make for a great sci-fi movie, but the young Russian claims it’s 100% real.
Kipriyanovich says that he once lived on Mars many years ago, and that he died when then planet was in the midst of a nuclear war. He says that as a Martian he stood seven feet tall, and that he was 35 years old, though that’s only because Martians had mastered the prevention of aging and all martians stopped aging and became semi-immortal at 35 years of age.
He further claims that he was part of a Martian military organization and flew raids both on Mars as well as traveling to Earth, where Martians freely interacted with the ancient Egyptians. The iconic Sphinx has some kind of a mechanism built into it that allows it to be “opened,” he says, and doing so will unlock “the secrets of the universe.”
Of course, scientists have never stumbled upon any remnants of a Martian civilization, but Kipriyanovich has an explanation for that, too. He says the surface of the planet was wiped out in a nuclear holocaust, and that while Martians do still live on the planet, they have actually made their home deep underground, and breathe carbon dioxide.
It’s a wild tale, and the timeline of the entire thing doesn’t exactly match up with what we know thanks to space agencies and researchers from around the world, including Russia. In an interview, Kipriyanovich’s parents note that, thanks to his ability to read at a very young age, he would often read books on space and astronomy. Is it possible a 3-year-old brain studying space literature fabricated it all? Well, it’s more likely than Mars being destroyed in a nuclear holocaust, that’s for sure.