For the Kyrgyz, this is New Years.
The Kyrgyz celebrate New Years much as secular Americans would celebrate Christmas. I had quite a bit of confusion in class differentiating the two holidays, until I got across the point that Christmas was really a Christian holiday centered on the birth of Jesus, and New Years for Americans was just a party. Nonetheless, when my students presented their Venn diagrams on the subject, it still surprised me just how much of American Christmas transferred over to celebrations of the Kyrgyz New Year, a major holiday in this Muslim country. It makes sense if you think back to Kyrgyzstan’s Soviet era, as Orthodox Russian celebrate Christmas, but it’s not celebrated until January 8th and that connection certainly wasn’t made by most of my students (who almost certainly have never seen an Orthodox church, as there aren’t any in my province).
There are a few differences, of course. For instance, Santa’s (“Aiaz-Ata”) yuletide partner is his daughter (“Aiaz-Kuz”), not Mrs. Claus. Trees bear shiny ornaments and lots of tinsel and garlands, but the multi-colored garlands are usually strung vertically rather than horizontally around the tree, and in such a number, you can hardly make out the tree behind them. Despite their abundance in the mountains, trees are expensive, so my family made do with just a juniper branch this year. It had two decorations—a pinecone someone painted gold and a brass ornament my parents sent from the Shenandoah Valley.
The holiday itself, January 31st, is spent largely at home in the company of family (which is particularly notable, as most holidays include the whole neighborhood). My family’s holiday started the night before when my host dad came home bearing candy and oranges as presents “from Santa.”
Before going to bed, I instructed my host sibs to leave out their socks, just in case American Santa came to visit. I woke at 6 a.m. to stuff these “stockings”. I always thought my Dad’s stories of getting oranges and nuts in his stocking as a kid were quintessentially old fashioned, but oranges (mandarins from China, now relatively cheap in the bazaar), candy, dates, and hot chocolate packets were exactly what I filled my siblings socks with now. I threw in some stickers I had as well, and the weight eventually pulled all the socks of the door (see the “before” picture at right). The sign they left me reads “Thank you Santa.”
So for breakfast—a good four hours later, we had a veritable sugar feast, as withholding candy or explaining the concept of “saving for later” to a Kyrgyz 3-year-old is just not done. At some point, Tangnuru decided the crocheted Christmas tree my parents had sent from the states would make a nice hat. I agree.We spent the rest of the morning making “boluchka”, or sweet rolls. Mine never turn out as nicely twisted as my host mom’s, but since she makes the dough, they all taste good. Actually, it’s very akin to challah, but made into individual rolls. The afternoon was spent snacking on various elements of our later meal and playing games. Daria put up a good fight, but in the end, I soundly beat her in chess. Tangnuru (3) on the other hand, beat me in a matching game of color flashcards.
Around 7 o’clock, my host parents, 11-year-old sister and I headed to our neighbors—an aunt and uncle’s—for the first of our New Years celebrations. My host brother Beksultan headed up the mountain behind the village with his classmates to light a bonfire. I’m not sure how and with what they scrambled up the icy slope in what were negative 15-20 degree temperatures to light such a blaze, but the fire was pretty impressive as seen from the village. Apparently it’s a New Years tradition.
Nurai Ege (my host aunt) made manty, or Kyrgyz dumplings, for our feast. Hers were particularly good, actually, with a higher onion to fat ratio than normal and beef instead of mutton. Still, the requisite of proper manty seems to be that the copious grease ooze down your fingers until congealing like candle wax (my host mom’s recipe calls for equal parts meat and cut up bits of solid fat). Once, in an attempt to cutout some of the fat, I actually “milked” the dumplings onto my plate, leaving enough fat for my host mom to save for later cooking. What to do once your fingers have solidified into wax sculptures? Just rub it in. It’s actually a pretty good hand salve (and much needed in winter).I suspect just one manty is cause enough for a heart-attack, yet Kyrgyz hospitality would never permit such a portion. (And in fact, the Kyrgyz unfortunately do have a very high rate of heart disease.) I’m usually started off with 4 or 5 dumplings, and when finished, despite protests that I’m quite full, more are inevitably put on my plate. In Kyrgyzstan, apparently “no” means “yes”—at least at the dinner table. You’d be a bad host if you acted otherwise. The solution is, after at least politely finishing one portion, to leave the second or third on your plate. Cleaning your plate will not get you excused from the table; you’ll just get more.
The drink of choice for the evening (and every other Kyrgyz party I’ve ever attended) was the traditional bozo, a frothy fermented barley beverage (not at all like beer), naturally alcoholic but usually supplemented with a drought of vodka for good measure. In my region, bozo is drunk sour. In my friend Brooke’s rayon, just three hours away, good bozo is always sweet from added sugar. The usual toasts proceeded with wishes of good health (“den-so-luk bol-soong”), good fortune (“bai bol-o-lu”), warm clothes (“jiloo kee-eem bol-soong”), and peace (“tinch-tuk bol-soong”). We left shortly there after. If you’ve never walked home on iced-over dirt roads in the pitch dark, you should try it some time. It’s a real trip.
Back home, with three hours to go until midnight, we did what any family would do to kill time til the ball drops: we turned on the TV. But instead of overly-hyped pop performances and a lot of filler from announcers and camera pans of giant crowds in New Years, the Kyrygz national educational channel was broadcasting staged performances of traditional vocal, instrumental and dance pieces. Naryn Oblast (the “most Kyrgyz” of all oblasts) was the home of at least half of the performers. Many, I was told, were in fact from neighboring villages, and on more than one occasion my host mom pointed out a singer who was a brother’s wife, niece, or relation of some kind. I guess in country of 5 million, that’s bound to happen.
With the rest of the family entertained, my host mom and I turned to the other tasks at hand—making more food, of course. First on the prep list was a second “salad” (we’d make Kyrgyz potato salad earlier in the day). Salad or “salat” just means anything that is not a main course, usually has some form of vegetable in it, but never consists of a leafy green. Two of my favorites include layers of tomato slices and fried eggplant with garlicy mayonnaise between the slices and “funchosa”, a cold Chinese noodle salad with strips of red pepper and carrots doused in oil. “Bird’s nest” salad, as she called the one we made this particular evening, turned out to be the strangest salad I’ve ever seen in Kyrygzstan.
We started by mounding pomegranate seeds in the centers of three plates. (Note: I’ve never seen my host mom buy the rather expensive pomegranates before this.) Next, we added a ring of canned peas around the tart seeds. This was followed by a ring of apples bits coated and mixed with mayonnaise, and outside that, a layer of diced dill pickles. The outer ring was chopped hardboiled egg. (See picture). As if this wasn’t enough, the masterpiece was then covered in mayonnaise and sprinkled with a light dusting of chopped walnuts. I will concede that it was very pretty. And fortunately, it was actually not as bad as it sounds, though, you have to like a sweet-sour-oily mix and not mind it tasting different every bite. I admit, I did my best to steer clear of the peas in the same bite as the pomegranate, and the pickles in the same bite as the mayo apples. Even my host dad and the relatives that came over later were wary of it.
Having stuffed ourselves with manty earlier in the evening, my host mom and I both thought forgoing our plans to make the main dish was a good idea, but I think my host dad protested or my host mom just got bored with two hours left ‘til midnight.
In any case, at 10 o’clock I found myself helping to roll out noodles for logman (pronounced “log-mun”), a traditionally Dungun (a Muslim Western-Chinese ethnic group) hearty noodle soup. My host mom had made the dough earlier, a simple mix of flour, water, and salt. Now she cut off slices and rolled them into thick coils. I took the coils and began rolling and lengthening them between my fingers. They were then oiled and re-coiled, and the process was repeated.
Finally, we took the now 6-foot-long noodle, strung it between our fingers like Cats Cradle string (see picture) and literally whipped the noodle against the table like we were beating laundry. The finished product was super thin and over 10 ft. long (and we made about 20 of these). The noodles were boiled in salty water, then transferred to cold water, like you’d make any noodle. 
These were then ladled into bowls, and a fried mix of turnips, carrots, potatoes, and meat was poured over top. Logman is quite possibly my favorite meal in Kyrgyzstan, and certainly fun to eat. Daria (left) and Ainuru (right) demonstrate.With 2nd dinner finished and still a half-hour to go ‘til midnight, my host dad decided he was tired and didn’t need to wait til midnight to start the toasts. I had bought a “children’s” non-alcoholic bottle of champagne in Karakol, and he decided we’d start with this. The picture at left shows my family’s response as he maneuvered out the cork.
(In actuality, it hardly even made the ‘popping’ noise.) After our carbonated juice (for that’s what it really was), we opened the real bottle. I think I preferred the fake stuff; Crystal is the high end of champagne to be found in Kyrgyzstan, if that tells you anything. And this wasn’t Crystal.Nonetheless, toasts were made all around. It is Kyrgyz custom for everyone, kids included, to offer a toast at a gathering, and this was no exception. Then at 5 minutes ‘til midnight, President Rosa Otumbaeva came on TV for a national address of hope and peace in the New Year, speaking first in Russian, then in Kyrgyz.
We drank our final drops of champagne at midnight and headed outside to shoot off our two fireworks. Our neighbors were also shooting off sparklers and the like, all of which combined to scare 3-year-old Ainuru to tears. (I have to say, I myself was scared for my host sibling’s hands as they held the fireworks through the length of their incineration). I’m told in other villages, the shows were pretty fantastic, but I didn’t stay out long enough in the freezing temperatures to see the extent of ours.
By 12:30, the last of the well-wishing New Years SMS’s had rolled in (both me and my host father had been sending and receiving texts on our cell phones all evening) and I crawled into my sleeping bag. жаңы жылыңыздар менен куттуктайм! (Happy New Years everyone!)
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