When I play the komuz, I can feel the thousands of years of my ancestors behind me: how they lived, what they felt, what their days were like.
I grew up in a Muslim family, and most of what I know about faith comes from Islam. But beneath it runs something older: the traditions of the Kyrgyz people, left to us by our ancestors. In those traditions, everything is sacred — the sun, the rain, the river, and the lake near my home.
01
The Horned Mother Deer
Мүйүздүү Эне Бугу
- Kyrgyzmy people
- Buguthe deer · the largest clan
- Yrysraythe people by the lake
- MeI am Bugu
Long ago, lost children wandered alone through the wilderness, close to death. A mother maral, a great red deer, found them. She had just lost her own fawn to hunters, and she took pity on them. She adopted the children, guarded them from predators, and raised them on her milk deep in the mountains.
My people believe we were saved by that deer. The legend of the Horned Mother Deer has been passed down from our ancestors, and it is the most sacred story we have. It explains how the first people survived, and it shaped the whole Kyrgyz tribal confederation. That is why the largest Kyrgyz clan is called Bugu: “the deer.”
I am Bugu. Over time the clan divided into smaller branches, and mine is Yrysray, the people who live by the lake.
I first heard the legend at school, from my Kyrgyz language teacher, and it thrilled me. It was the beginning of my love for our history: how the Kyrgyz once stretched all the way to the Yenisei River, and how our grandfathers were the true heroes, the soldiers who defended us and our neighbours.
The Tien Shan
As nomads, we see the mountains and their peaks as pillars holding up the sky.
02
Everything Is Sacred
Touch each one.
03
A Summer in Kyrchyn
No phone, no electricity. Water from the river, heat from the fire.
In summer I lived far from civilization, in the mountains of Kyrchyn, today one of the most famous places in Kyrgyzstan. We kept many horses and sheep, and the grass was so green and plentiful that there was enough for every animal. That summer is when I truly came to know my own culture: what is sacred and what is not, and how close we live to nature.
No phone, no electricity. Water from the river, heat from the fire. A life given over completely to nature.
04
We do not say
We do not say wolf. We say “dog-eater.”
I noticed that we never call a predator by its real name. We have a word for wolf, but we don't say it. We say “dog-eater” instead, because we are afraid it could come for our animals at any moment. More than once, we lost many sheep right beside our house.
We know the wolves will come now and then, and we accept it as a gift: better they take an animal than a child.
They are hungry. That is the only reason they come down.
05
The Komuz
Three strings. Pluck each one.
My mother used to tell me that her father played beautifully. She lost him when she was a child and missed him all her life. I never met him. That is why I started to learn.
I went to music school and finished my degree there. Seeing my mother happy made me happy.
I played at every family ceremony and gathering. Bringing joy to the whole community showed me what my music could give to people.
The elders praised me and called me a future akyn, one of the most respected people among us. To them, this music was sacred too.
06
At the Table
Every member of the family has their own part.
At family gatherings, whether in a house or a yurt, the elders sit in the place of honour. They are served the most respected part of the animal, whether sheep, horse or cow, reserved only for them. Every member of the family has their own part of the boiled meat. Men and women receive different pieces, and giving someone the wrong one is a sign of disrespect.
It taught every one of us, from childhood, to respect each other and our elders. I saw all of this with my own eyes.
Nooruz & sumolok
Nooruz is our new year, from the time when we followed a different calendar. For it we make sumolok, in honour of a mother who had nothing to feed her children. She put everything she had into the pot and boiled it for three days and nights, singing to her children that it would be ready soon. Sometimes there were even stones in it. To me, it is a story of pure care.
My mother is the wife of the eldest son, so the wives of the younger brothers help her cook it.
Weddings
At a wedding, both families celebrate together.
07
A Ceremony I Question
Not every tradition is just.
If a man liked a girl, he could simply take her as his wife. It was common. My grandmother was kidnapped and married to my grandfather, and she told me the story herself.
She was not angry. Her friends and relatives had all come to their husbands' homes the same way. That was the culture: a man's duty was to provide for the family and keep everyone happy. She had made her peace with it.
Fifty years ago it was normal. Today almost everyone is against it, and when I think about it now, it seems crazy.
We oppose it because it hurts to imagine my own daughter or sister being taken that way.
08
Far From Home
Kyrchyn
≈ 9,800 km
Tacoma
Баткан күн кайра чыгат, бирок жоголгон Мекен кайтып келбейт. Ошондуктан ата журтту көздүн карегиндей сактоо ыйык парз. The sun that sets will rise again, but a lost homeland never returns. So guarding the land of our fathers like the pupil of your eye is a sacred duty. Kyrgyz saying
Living so far from the country where I was born, I sometimes wonder: am I lost? Did I go too far from Kyrgyzstan?
But one thing I know for certain: I miss the people, the land and the culture.
Distance has changed how I see my country and the world. So many people have to leave their towns and families to study and chase their dreams, and that breaks my heart.
Yet being this far away only makes my feelings for home stronger. I fall in love with it even more.
09
Muras
All of this changed how I see the world: a place where people and nature become one and live together in peace. Growing up among my parents and relatives, learning from the elders, I came to truly care about our traditions, about what we hold sacred, and about nature.
I care because these traditions bring peace to a community: trust, respect, everyone on the same path. And because what our ancestors left us is sacred. We call it Muras.
10
Connections to the Readings
Suzanne Crawford O'Brien, Climate Anxiety and Spiritual Resilience, Preface and Chapter 1
Kyrchyn is my Iona
In the Preface, the author tells the moments that shaped her spirituality: the island of Iona, where she felt Spirit in every stone and hill, and the holy well at Ardmore, in the land of her ancestors.
Yes, I have a place like that. Kyrchyn is my Iona: the place where I came to know what is sacred and how close we live to nature.
A relationship with everything
Chapter 1 defines spirituality not as what a person believes, but as lived relationships: with ancestors, with future generations, and with the beings of the natural world.
That is how I feel. For me, it is not one thing. Everything is a relationship: the Mother Deer, the wolf, the rain, the elders at the table. How I feel about all of it is a relationship with everything.
A changing Kyrchyn
Chapter 1 describes how change to a place can affect people's wellbeing, and uses the word solastalgia for the distress of watching your home change.
Kyrchyn is changing too. People are starting to build roads there, and that makes everything easier. More people live around there now, and having neighbours in such a harsh environment is a good thing.
But the biggest change is in how I feel about it. Visitors come and leave their trash in nature, and that hurts me. It changes slowly, and I know that is what happens over time.
My aunt and my brother are still there. My brother got married and carries on what our father was doing. It has been more than four years since I was last there, and I really hope to go back.
I miss the sound of the river, the endless fields of grass and hills, and the taste of homemade kymyz. It feels like I left a part of myself there.