Kares Le Roy | Buzkashi

Photo © Kares Le Roy -All Rights Reserved

Buzkashi! The word just fills the mouth with an exotic flavor, doesn't it?

It literally means "goat dragging" in Persian, and is is a Central Asian sport in which horse-mounted players attempt to drag a goat or calf carcass toward a goal. Originally, free-for-all games could last for several days, but in more regulated tournaments, the games are time limited.

It is popular in Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

Some mistakenly attribute the game of polo as having its origins in buzkashi, but the two are two separate types of horse riding contests. The goat (ideally, a calf) in a buzkashi game is normally beheaded and disemboweled and has its limbs cut off at the knees. It is then soaked in cold water for 24 hours before play to toughen it. Occasionally sand is packed into the carcass to give it extra weight.

Kares Le Roy was in Tajikistan, and features his Buzkashi gallery on his website.

Kares travelled for 2 years through a dozen countries in Southeast Asia, South Asia, East Asia, Central Asia and Middle East.  The countries he photographed in range from Tibet, Nepal, India, Bali, Cuba, Cambodia to Morocco. He traveled through 56 000 km of land and humans: faces, smiles, eyes, monuments, cultures, and events. He has recently started his travels again, and we look forward to see more of his extraordinary work.

Jehad Nga: Silk Road

Jehad Nga for The New York Times-All Rights Reserved
The New York Times features an audio slideshow by Jehad Nga, one of my favorite photographers. However, I found his photographs of Tajikistan, Kyrgystan and Uzbekistan in this feature did not have his wonderful characteristic style; his use of shadows and dark spaces (as in his masterful work out of Ethiopia, for example) is not in evidence here.

As we know, the Silk Road is the popular name for a system of caravan trade routes that dates back more than 2,000 years, an important economic artery that stretched roughly 7,000 miles, from the Mediterranean to China’s Yellow River Valley. Earlier this year, Jehad Nga, on assignment for the New York Times' Travel section, spent three weeks retracing part of the historic route in central Asia, driving from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, to Dushanbe, Tajikistan.

I expected Nga's photographic mastery in this slideshow, so I was rather disappointed by the photographs in the Silk Road: Ancient Road, Timeless Trip feature as they are shot in a basic photojournalistic style. Notwithstanding, I enjoyed it because of Nga's calm and sensitive narration....but after it was done, I admit I had to go back to my earlier posts here and here to re-savor his images of Ethiopia and Africa.

The New York Times' Silk Road slideshow. (Registration may be required by New York Times).

Christopher Herwig: Tajikistan

Image Copyright © Christopher Herwig-All Rights Reserved
Christopher Herwig is a Canadian travel photographer/photojournalist currently based in Monrovia, Liberia, having spent 3 years in Almaty, Kazakhstan, putting together a collection of images on Central Asia. He completed photo projects for international organizations including several UN agencies, the Red Cross and the British Council , as well as commissions from magazines and newspapers in worldwide. He explored the Central Asian region and estimates that he covered over 40,000 km on foot, horseback and back-country skis, by boat, car, 4x4 and train.

Although his earlier work experience was primarily commercial, he has concentrated on travel photography. The photographs of Central Asia on his website are a mix of mainly portraits as well as landscapes, city and industry to illustrate where people live and work.

For TTP, I feature Christopher's photographic gallery of Tajikistan, the roof of Central Asia. Tajikistan means the "Land of the Tajiks", and most likely originates from "Taji," one of the family names of Arab-Muslim invaders during the conversion of Central Asia to Islam and its annexation to the caliphate. In the 19th century, the Russian Empire began to spread into Central Asia during the Great Game with Great Britain, and it took control of Tajikistan. Now, it remains of vital strategic importance because of Afghanistan.

The photograph above is of Buzkashi players; a traditional Central Asian team sport played on horseback, where the objective of a player is to grab the carcass of a headless goat or calf, and then get it clear of the other players and pitch it across a goal line.

An interesting, and out of the mainstream, photographer...here's Christopher Herwig's Tajikistan website. Be sure to visit his other Central Asian galleries.