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#kazakhstan #culturalheritage #festival

-Script-
Terisakkan Village is one of 15 villages in the District of Ulyta. All those villages are famous for their stockbreeding husbandry. However, only in Terisakkan, since time immemorial, through Soviet Epoch up to our days, all the villagers always come together on the same day (on the 1st or the 2nd of May) to conduct the rites biye baylau (“tethering mares”) [the first milking day] and ayghyr kosu (joining stallions in herds). Over time, these rites turned into a folk festival. Now we celebrate it as an ethnic festival. Here, in Terisakkan, in Ulytau, this tradition survives in its almost original state, that is not the case for the other regions of Kazakhstan. Besides, it is alive in the Kazakh ethnic diasporas in China and Mongolia. Therefore, we undertake safeguarding and awareness rising efforts, introducing ethno-festivals in the modern reality. Therefore, we try to safeguard this festival and to extend public awareness of it through introducing ethno-festivals in the modern life.
Kymyz muryndyk is one of the most ancient Kazakh folk festivals. Being the traditional horse breeders, the Kazakhs since time immemorial spent their lives for breeding and lived on koumiss and horse meat. People said if after long and wasting winter they received at last the first foals and the first koumiss, then everything will go well and the year ahead must be good.
Before tethering mares in spring (biye baylau), the foal slips are to be prepared. Daughters, daughters-in-law and the elder women of the family come to do it together. We wash, paint and treat wool. Then we weave foal slips. We make as many foal slips, as many foals are expected. Slips made of wool are brightly colored and soft (so they cannot cause harm to willful foals).
Then slips are used for putting on foals and tethering them to zheli [rope] near mares, their mothers. Foal slip weaving is a Kazakh tradition that still survives, being transmitted within families from the elder women to the younger ones.
In Terisakkan every year in early May we conduct a festival of kymyz muryndyk. Beforehand we cut and collect new juniper that just appeared. We use it for burning up and treating with its smoke a qubi [a special wooden vessel for making koumiss]. A smoke of burning juniper gives koumiss its specific taste. Prior to smoking, qubi should be washed and dried, and then greased inside with fresh May butter. Then qubi is treated by smoke of juniper burned in samovar. Only juniper and not any other wood is used for the qubi smoking rite.
These festive events are traditionally held every year in late April - early May. They consist of several parts. The first part, called biye baylau (‘tethering of mares’), involves the separation of milky mares with foals from herds for milking.
The elders (aksakal’s) and all villagers always regard biye baylau with a high responsibility. They discuss it in advance – where it will take place, who will participate and who will drive down the first peg. When everything is agreed, some sunny day of May they go together to outskirts of their village and choose a place with grass. Then one of aksakal’s ties a piece of white clothes to a wooden mallet and drives down the first peg for a zheli [rope]. After tightening a zheli on pegs, strong young men put slips on foals and tether them to it.
We grease ropes and pegs with butter, wishing for good offspring of foals. At first foals suckle their mothers’ milk, then we start milking mares. During the first day, my three mares gave 1,5 litre of milk. I put milk in a qubi [a wooden vessel for making koumiss], along with leaven prepared beforehand. I add fresh milk in a qubi every hour until it becomes full. Mares can be milked 4–6 times a day.
Next morning, we start whipping milk with a special whish, up to 1000 whips a day. It is believed that the May koumiss should not be whipped too much, otherwise it can lose its good quality and become sour. However, in other months koumiss is whipped up to 2000 – 3000 times every day. Usually children and daughters-in-law do it, each one 500 whips a day.
In Eurasian steppes, a cult of horse is the heart of human behavior. One can see a living illustration of that in Terisakkan Village. Here it is – a mare in foal, followed by ayghyr – a stallion. Here they are – foals brought to the world. Here is also the main studhorse whose image is comparable to that of Kambar Ata [a mythical patron of horses and horse breeders]. This mythologeme, brought through millennia notwithstanding of culture, ethnos and timespan, is the essence of human behavior.
The crowning part of celebrations starts some days after the “first milking day”. For that, tables are laid generously with traditional food, and all villagers and guests are invited.

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