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The fourth day of the World Nomad Games, themed as the “Gathering of the Great Steppe,” saw events taking place across Astana once more. TCA went to the Powerful Nomad competition, and took in national dances and some theatrical sabre combat: [video width="1920" height="1080" mp4="https://timesca.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/4.mp4"][/video]
Like most dominating worldwide sports, the World Nomad Games are top-heavy with male athletes. Yet while women don’t participate in all the categories, in the 2024 WNG, a noteworthy number of them have become the center of attention. Among the packed crowds of the Hippodrome and Ethnoaul venues, one competitor and two ticket holders had a few things to say on the matter of WNG women. Timea Janurik, known as Timi, is a folk musician and a PhD student in folk teaching methods, from Budapest, Hungary. She is competing as a player of the citera, the national stringed instrument of Hungary, at the Ethnoaul. The Hungarian representation at the WNG includes three men and three women, but Timi, who specializes in Turkic folk songs, is the only musician among them. While rehearsing in Astana, Timi chanced upon a Kazakh girl singer and asked her, “Do you want to join me in the concert?” Hence, a female alliance and a makeshift band were formed because Timi only knew how to sing one song in the Kazakh language. According to Timi, her new partner “can sing beautifully.” In Timi’s native Hungary, folk musicianship is an art form split evenly among men and women, but citera playing is dominated by women (and violin playing by men). [video width="848" height="478" mp4="https://timesca.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/WhatsApp-Video-2024-09-12-at-00.21.19.mp4"][/video] Timi is also participating in the female Assyk games, a type of traditional Kazakh board game in which players use small animal bones — assyks — to knock out multiple lines of their opponent’s assyks. The game rules differ according to gender. The male version of the game “is more popular,” says Timi, “because it’s more visible and looks so fancy to play.” [caption id="attachment_23070" align="aligncenter" width="1577"] Image: TCA, K. Krombie[/caption] British visitors Naomi Ocean and Andy Myer (an archer), from Wales and Devon, respectively, came all the way from the UK to Astana to watch the horseback archery. Even though they are well-traveled in other regions of Central Asia, this is their first visit to Kazakhstan and the WNG. They remarked that they hadn’t noticed the UK team participating in anything they have witnessed thus far, but what they have seen has been “interesting and exciting.” Having just seen the Turkey team being “trashed in the kok boru,” they were happy to see Turkey’s subsequent victory in the Traditional Turkish Archery, in particular the female team member who performed victory laps before an exhilarated, mostly Kazakh crowd. “We were glad,” said Naomi, “and we loved seeing the female archers.” Naomi was equally, if not more impressed by the “mixed teams” in the horseback archery category. Having watched and enjoyed the 2016 Kazakh language documentary film, The Eagle Huntress, Naomi and Andy look forward to the Kusbegilik games. “We’re expecting to see women handling eagles, which should be good.” [caption id="attachment_23071" align="aligncenter" width="2000"] Image: TCA, K. Krombie[/caption] A Turkish team victor, competing in Traditional Turkish Archery (mixed gender team), and an Uzbek athlete in horseback archery (with no specific male and female categories)...
On day four of the World Nomad Games, themed as the “Gathering of the Great Steppe,” TCA attended the finals of the Powerful Nomad competition, and spoke to visitors from the West about what had drawn them to Kazakhstan and the Games. “I'm an American traveling around the world,” Andy from Houston, Texas, one of a group of friends who’d met on the road in Central Asia told TCA. “I’ve wanted to come to the World Nomad Games for quite a few years, now, but haven't got the chance. I'm traveling full-time this year and figured I’d swing by Kazakhstan and check it out.” “It’s so cool to be here and see all the sports and cultures together,” Liam from Vancouver, Canada, added. [caption id="attachment_23061" align="aligncenter" width="2560"] Image: TCA, Stephen M. Bland[/caption] “We knew about the World Nomad Games from having lived in Kyrgyzstan,” Allison from Miami told TCA. “So, when we found out about this one, we decided to come because it's been on the bucketlist. It's been a blast!” “We’re here because we’re doing the five Stans; When we arrived, we found out this event was going on, so we figured we had to come. We really want to see the hunting with birds. Everyone's been very welcoming, and the food has been good,” Lauren from San Diego said. “I’m traveling in Kazakhstan because I wanted to do horseback stuff,” said Hellie from the UK. “I’ve never been to Kazakhstan before. I was curious about the Games, and it’s amazing how much I’m learning here. The tents from the regions are really cool.” [video width="1920" height="1080" mp4="https://timesca.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/IMG_3959.mp4"][/video] Reflecting the cosmopolitan crowd, on the field for the final of the powerful nomad strongman competition were athletes from around the globe: Cyprus, Armenia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Romania, China, Nigeria, Iran, Belarus, Spain, Kuwait, Russia, India, and Kazakhstan. Given the response from the raucous, flag-waving home crowd, you didn’t need to be able to hear the announcer to know which was the Kazakh competitor, but warm and hospitable as ever, all of the competitors were well supported, particularly the ebullient Jerry from Nigeria. [caption id="attachment_23063" align="aligncenter" width="2391"] Image: TCA, Stephen M. Bland[/caption] In the opening discipline of squats with a 100-kilogram bag – with four objects protruding which made it resemble a carcass - the hulking men strained every sinew, with some faring better than others, whilst one keeled over as if having suffered a hernia. It came as no surprise, as outside the arena a smaller, lighter weight set up to challenge spectators saw many fall afoul. Next up was pulling a trolley weighing 200 kilos, which resembled a horse carriage. “Bad luck; it was his first time trying,” the ever-comedic commentator chipped in after the participant from Kuwait managed three meters. Others fared far worse. The standout, however, was the tallest man in the competition, the entrant from Iran, who managed a staggering twenty-six meters. [video width="1920" height="1080" mp4="https://timesca.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/IMG_3968.mp4"][/video] “Wow!” the announcer chimed. “It will be very difficult to bring...
The Kazakh pastime "Togyzkumalak" has become the first board game to travel into space. Its launch was organized to promote the 2024 edition of the World Nomad Games, which are currently being held in Astana. Togyzkumalak is one of the oldest Kazakh board games, with a history dating back about 4,000 years. The game is played by two players, who start with 81 stones. Their goal is to "capture" their opponent's stones, and place them into a "cauldron". On September 9 Togyzkumalak was played for the first time at the Nomad Games. The Togyzkumalak tournament has 114 competitors from 41 countries, including Colombia, Bangladesh, the UK, France, Germany, the USA, China, and others. In 2020 Togyzkumalak was included in UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage, emphasizing its cultural significance for Kazakhstan and other Turkic peoples. After a successful launch, the board was eventually returned to Earth.
The third day of the World Nomad Games, themed as the “Gathering of the Great Steppe,” saw events taking place across Astana. TCA went to the Martial Arts Palace and the Alau Ice Palace to take in the in the Koresh (Tatar belt wrestling), Assyk atu, Mas-wrestling, Kurash, and Kazakh kuresi. Watch our video highlights from day three here: [video width="1920" height="1080" mp4="https://timesca.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Nomad_3-day.mp4"][/video]
Nestled among the yurts of the 2024 World Nomad Games Ethnoaul (Ethnic Village), one yurt in particular provided a promotional VIP space for the distinguished Russophone poet, politician, UNESCO ambassador, International Democratic Party Chairman of the People’s Congress of Kazakhstan, and anti-nuclear activist Olzhas Suleimenov. A hushed silence spread inside the circumference of the AZ i YA (a Russian play on the word “Asia”) yurt, named in honor of Suleimenov’s 1975 book about the conceivable Turkic origin of the epic Old East Slavic poem The Tale of Igor's Campaign. Bystanders were ushered out when the Almaty-born Suleimenov arrived. The aforementioned book caused controversy when it was released in the Soviet era and was almost banned when Suleimenov was accused of “national chauvinism” and “glorifying feudal nomadic culture.” By contrast, the purpose of the AZ i YA yurt is to educate the unenlightened and celebrate the thirteen elements of “Kazakhstan's Rich Cultural Heritage.” Those thirteen elements, as explained by the yurt’s translator and self-proclaimed “young scientist” Dana Tursynova, include Aitysh, a spoken word poetry contest with dueling dombra (two-string instrument), or the Kyrgyz komuz (two or three strings), in which two protagonists improvise on the topics of opposing ideas, retorts, and general frustrations. Tursynova described it as “conveying political problems” and “the sound of a nation [aimed at] the government.” At a neighboring yurt, Aitysh—delivered with gravelly belligerence—was audibly comparable with a modern battle rap. Another element is Nasreddin Hodja, a 13th-century folklore storyteller who—similar to the Aitysh tradition—used humor to air political grievances and other types of narrative. [video width="848" height="478" mp4="https://timesca.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/WhatsApp-Video-2024-09-10-at-23.43.20.mp4"][/video] A further element is Korkyt-Ata (translated from Kazakh as “granddad”), a 9th-century philosopher, who, in his pursuit of immortality discovered that death was always waiting for him. As he gained enlightenment, he somehow had enough free time to craft the kobyz, an ancient Turkic stringed instrument. Thus, he is known as the founder of Kazakh string and bow instruments. The yurt, the round portable homes of the nomads, is an element, as is orteke, where the dombra musician surpasses the average one-man-band status by operating moving wooden puppets connected to his fingers via the strings to convey multi-task theater. The sports elements comprise kazakhsha kures, traditional Kazakh wrestling, which in recent times has traded the long-established grass turf for a mod con carpet, board-type games, such as Assyk, designed to sharpen the intellectual and physical development of children, and Kusbegilik, or hunting with birds of prey, a Kazakh cultural heritage as well as a major sport in the WNG. Edible elements combine katyrma flatbread, an important part of Kazakhstan’s communal relations in the interchange of goodwill (e.g. “have a good life”) when sharing the bread, and horse breeder festivities, where kumis, fermented horse milk, is the culinary highlight. The main heading of the yurt’s pamphlet handout is the substantially worded International Centre for the Rapprochement of Cultures Under the Auspices of UNESCO. In one small yurt (on one big steppe), the cultural round-up of folklore, tradition, and...
