The Red Tent

Invited round to G’s relation, a woman who trained as a lawyer and now works registering rural students at the University in Dushanbe and a few of her young female relatives, daughters and cousins and nieces. We were eight women, sitting around.

She lives round the corner from G and we went round there with her sister, her relation and the little boy. The flat was larger than this student flat but just as simply (to Western taste) furnished. No pictures on the walls or items cluttering anywhere at all. Not even any furniture in the main living room apart from the TV. You felt the steppe had entered this apartment block. Blowing through. A rich red carpet was covering the floor and an even more luxurious one on the wall. Partly mirrored walls reflected back this red room. There were no sofas but charpoys to sit on instead, I was placed next to the mother and given a cushion for my back. Similar too are Iranian homes, with emphasis on carpets rather than other items of furniture.

We sat, drinking tea and eating bread and sweets, me picking up the odd word of the quick fire Tajik conversation. I started talking to B. who had good English and was a history graduate, she spoke of her interest in comparative religion, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism. She was also interested in sacred spaces in Tajikistan, I was interested to discover the strips of fabric tied on trees only happens in Kulob, southern Tajikistan, not in Badakhshan where she is from.

She also spoke about Bukhara and Samarqand, although she has read so much about them, as a Tajik it is hard for her to get a visa to Uzbekistan. Many Tajiks have not visited the ancient cities that they consider their heritage.

We paid this visit, not just to sit and chat but to watch G’s sister’s wedding video; the ceremony had taken place only a month before in the Pamirs, in Istkashim. It was fascinating to see the dancing, which was particular to weddings in that region. The wedding is celebrated over two days, one for the bride’s family and the groom’s family to gather separately with their friends. On the second day the party comes together and where the marriage ceremony or n___ takes place with the religious leader. We see the bride dressed in red, but sitting demurely at the side of the hall, while her relatives and younger sisters dance and whoop, she is often on camera, talking to a friend sitting with her. On the second day she is properly dressed up, also in red a symbol of good luck and the colour for brides. Her hair is plaited in the traditional way and many bracelets and necklaces are pinned on her as well as sweet-smelling brooches. She is then veiled and remains this way for the rest of the proceedings, with head bowed low. Her husband to be is called the Shahma – the ‘king’ he wears a red hat and sits with his bride during the dancing.

The emphasis here is on tradition, even by the young.

Earlier we had visited the OVIR office to register my stay in Tajikistan. I knew that as a tourist, I didn’t have to register any more if I was staying under 30 days, however as I was not I wanted to check. The checking took rather a long time, even with a really helpful friend of G’s calling people. He is an international relations student, and you can tell that he will go far, he has the self-assurance to at any rate! We waited at this nondescript door with a crowd of people trying to get in, apparently to extend their visas. The steps are so that there is no barrier, which made for an interesting situation, when people were pushing past, up or down. The form was apparently, to give your name to somebody with a list, who eventually would call it out. It didn’t seem very clear to me!

Once we were finally through we got to another room where there were more people milling around trying to get the attention of the officials behind the glass. The ‘no mobile’ sign was useless; everyone seemed to be on their mobile, probably trying to expedite things one way or another. After a bit M, G’s friend returned (he had left me in a melee of people, not really knowing what this was all for, and what would happen, when or if I got to the front of the ‘queue’). We found out that I didn’t need any OVIR now, but needed to return to the OVIR office, which this wasn’t apparently, 30 days after I entered the country.

So after all that, it was fine.