Kyrgyz New Year

On March 21st - 24th I celebrated Norus, the Kyrgyz New Year, with my coworkers and friends. One day I went to a sumalack party at one of my NGOs and one day I went to a village festival with some other volunteers.

Sumalack is a traditional food that is made once a year, on Norus. It is made from cooking ground wheat and wheat milk with oil and stones in a large outdoor kazan. The kazan looks like a giant wok, but deeper, and is usually mounted on bricks above an open fire pit. The sumalack needs to be constantly boiling and stirred for 24 hours. When it is finished it looks like a thick brown molasses; and is usually eaten with bread. I got to stir the sumalck with what looked like an oar, for about an hour. You’re supposed to make a wish while making your first stir, and later when eating it, if you get a stone that’s good luck. Sumalack is made in huge batches, then jarred and stored in the fridge. I was given a liter.

The village festival we stumbled upon was a bit of an accident. We had hear that oolack was being played in this particular village about 25 minutes outside of the city, so we jumped in a taxi and got dumped on the side of the road. Where we thought would be oolack (men on horses play a polo like game with a sheep head) the whole village had gathered for a Norus festival. At first people just stared and we didn’t feel comfortable, but then a few older women ushered us into their yurt and played music for us. There were 4 other yurts and a circle formed around a microphone. Throughout the day there were musical performers, speeches, dances, and a simulated wedding precession in the middle of the circle. In the yurts judges were going around scoring them on various traditional foods laid out, decorations, and entertainment. We got invited into each yurt and were given foods to try and tea to drink. Yurts are a lot bigger on the inside than they seem from the outside, and quite comfortable too.

On Norus, the city was teeming with people and families, everybody wearing their “Sunday best.” It was a gloriously warm day and all of the outdoor cafes were at full capacity. People were picnicking on every patch of green grass in the park, and young boys were playing on the riverbed in their underwear.