A Very Kazakh Christmas

I didn't know what to expect Christmas to be like in Kazakhstan. Kazakhs are Muslims and Russians are Orthodox Christians, neither of whom celebrate Christmas on December 25. Furthermore, Russian or Kazakh, this country is possibly the most secular I have ever seen -- Islam is very weak in Central Asia except for Uzbekistan. Nonetheless, the locals here know not to waste a good religious holiday and at the very least, they become family gatherings.

Christmas was ignored by many, but some people took advantage of the opportunity to throw a bit of a party. People don't understand much about Christmas here -- in fact, many people believe that the name of the holiday is "Merry Christmas" and asked me what one says on "Merry Christmas". "Do you say 'Happy Merry Christmas?'" Furthermore, most people think that Jingle Bells is the official song of Christmas and is the main carol. I've heard the techno version so many times that it became painful.

For the three volunteers in Zhezkazgan, Christmas amounted to a series of parties. Parties here are a lot different and first and foremost they require structure. Here, structure means a seat at the table and a well-defined agenda. Kazakhs hate any sort of mingling and generally become extremely uncomfortable when forced to do so, especially at a party where not everyone knows each other. Parties here generally consist of a big dinner with several courses interspersed with various dancing sessions and other games. Among other things, I've been to a party during which I was forced to wear a diaper and later was eating apple slices off of my sitemate. Yes, things can get weird. At our main Christmas party, we were surprised to be thrown without warning into a dance contest, so we did the best we could. Dancing all the time here has already become a norm so we didn't think twice about it.


On Christmas Eve my sitemate Drew organized a small Christmas festival at his school. It largely consisted of songs, skits, and a few games. To sweeten the deal for the kids learning Christmas carols, we promised to perform a traditional Kazakh dance. One of the younger girls tried to teach us but we proved to be poor students. Nonetheless, we did our best and this haggard performance was luckily our best execution: