A third of all marriages in modern Kyrgyzstan are kidnaps.
From the ICAHK website:
Typically, a man abducts his bride by force or deception, enlisting his family to break her resistance to the wedding through hours of persuasion. If successful, the next morning the bride will sit quietly in a curtained-off area wearing the traditional white wedding headscarf and an imam will be called in to marry the couple.
The Kyrgyz phrase ala kachuu describes this process – literally, it means "grab and run". Some brides are kidnapped by strangers, others by men they know. Some escape after violent ordeals, but most are persuaded to stay by tradition and fear of scandal. In Muslim Kyrgyzstan, where virginity is revered, a girl who has been kidnapped and then leaves is considered to be tainted. If her family refuses to allow her back home because of the shame, she has few options. With their purity in question after a night spent at a man's house, many women accept what they believe is their fate.
There's a photo essay here - a link at the Wiki page on ali kachuu - from The Spektator: "Your monthly guide to what's happening in and around Bishkek". Go to page 10. The reporter struggles between his desire for a good story and his horror at being complicit with what's happening:
Talant thrusts the car door open and pulls out a tiny girl. There is a gash below his left eye and his gold teeth are flashing. He carries the girl screaming to the door of the house where he sets her on her feet, "Ah my sweetheart!" he crows. Old Mother lunges in with the marriage scarf. The girl powerless, just shouting pathetically, "Grandmother, no! Not that! Please don't put it on me. Please don't."
The borsok bread goes flying as the other girls laugh while chucking it at her face. Cheap wrapped chocolates are also thrown - an unexpected addition. The look of sheer distress on the girl's face makes me shudder....
[The next day] And what about Galiza, the girl sitting in the corner while the villagers come in and inspect her like a prized sheep? What is she thinking as this strange foreign man interrupts her crying, coming in with a video camera and asking all kinds of obvious questions, probably to report negatively on her culture? What would you think if, like her, you have a boyfriend you love and have been dating for two years and have dreams of marrying and going to live in the big city? And if yesterday, a drunken man you have never met before kidnapped you and now your family and society declare that this is the man you must now spend the rest of your life with? "Why am I doing this?" I ask myself. And I am hating myself for being a part of this, for being there. Surely her answers are obvious....
"I always thought I would resist, would fight and not let myself be stolen, but they steal you all the same," she tells me between tears and long sighs to herself. "Women are just dolls to be thrown about."
Interestingly, the only voice of dissent is the groom's father, who seems disgusted by the whole thing. It's the women who make all the running.
There's another ali kachuu story here, with video.
"It's the women who make all the running."
One of the meanest by-products of absolute patriarchy is this complicity of some women in it. Something about not allowing another woman to escape the suffering they were subjected to themselves.
I'm reminded of the rape scene in Richardson's novel "Clarissa" in which the heroine is lured into a brothel and raped by a man who wants to force her to marry him by leaving her little choice in the matter. It is all quite shocking but what lingers most in the mind is the complicity of the brothel manager and the other prostitutes in the rape by holding down Clarissa for the act to proceed.
Posted by: Noga | March 30, 2010 at 04:23 PM