Monthly Archives: March 2019

More Than a Game

Feature Report

Success at go requires the tactic of the soldier, the exactness of the mathematician, the imagination of the artist, the inspiration of the poet, the calm of the philosopher, and the greatest intelligence. — Zhang Yunqi, Weiqi de faxia, Beijing, Internal document of the Chinese Weiqi Institute 1991, p. 2

K-chk! The sound drifts to my ears as I make my way past stacks of books and people comfortably reading in plush chairs by the windows that span the wall. K-chk! It comes again as I progress through the library. Before I know it, the stacks open up to reveal cream-colored wooden tables and chairs inhabited by an assortment of people bent over in focused intensity. The source of that resounding snap is in front of me: the snap of slate stones being played on a large wooden board. I stand and watch for a moment, the players oblivious to my presence.

I first came across Go when I was in middle school. I have always been a voracious reader–you name it, I read it–but somehow, I moved from reading Homer and Jules Verne to books less highly regarded- i.e., manga. One of my favorite series was Death Note, so I was thrilled to discover the artist had illustrated another series, called Hikaru no Go. The series is an inspiring coming-of-age tale about a young boy haunted by the spirit of an ancient Go master. Initially resistant, the boy comes to learn and love the abstract strategy game and grows up to become a pro in his own right. I became enthralled by the game, reading books about its history and solving puzzles; before long I was looking online for people to play against.

The rules of Go are simple; two players take turns placing black or white stones on a 19×19 grid board, and whoever captures the most territory is the winner. However, if the rules of the game are simple, the strategies needed to obtain victory are complex. Considered more strategically challenging than chess, Go inspired chess grand master Edward Lasker to say

While the Baroque rules of chess could only have been created by humans, the rules of go are so elegant, organic, and rigorously logical that if intelligent life forms exist elsewhere in the universe, they almost certainly play go.

That’s fitting, given that the number of possible board configurations in Go (2 x 10170) exceeds the number of atoms in the universe (1080), while chess has just 1050 legal positions.

The game is played on a solid block of wood, called a Goban in Japanese, which represents the earth. Each right angle signifies uprightness. The black and white stones stand for yin and yang, while their placement across the board represents the heavenly bodies. Unlike in chess or checkers, in Go the stones are placed at intersections. Nineteen thin, lacquered black lines run parallel to each edge; as a result, there are 360 plus 1 different positions at which to play. 360 represents the number of days in the ancient lunar year, the one is seen as supreme and the source of the other numbers, and governor of the four quarters. The four quarters of the board represent each of the four seasons. The 72 points around the edge of the board come from the weeks of the calendar, and the 9 black circles, called stars or hoshi, which correspond to the nine lights of heaven and mark the locations where handicap stones would be placed if they are used.

The best boards are made out of Kaya wood. Kaya boards have a bright, vivid color and a hardness that is ideal for use with shell and slate stones, which produce a lively and resonant click when struck without damaging the board. However, the wood is slow-growing and boards are typically cut from trees over 700 years old, leading to high prices.  Thus, more affordable spruce, also called shinkaya, has become the popular choice for the modern player. Go boards also come in several other woods, all of which are hard woods and have a resonant quality so that placement of the stones results in a clear, sharp sound.

Arguably the oldest of all known intellectual games, Go is the national game of Japan. It originated in China and is commonly attributed to Emperor Shun, who reigned from 2255 to 2206 B.C.E., which would make it approximately 4200 years old. Go was introduced to Japan in the year 735 C.E., when it was brought back to the country by an envoy to China. Originally played by the noble class, it would eventually reach samurai, monks, and even tradespeople. All three of Japan’s greatest generals, Nobunaga, Hideyoshi, and Ieyasu, were devotees of the game as it was the cognitive equivalent of a martial art. The first state institution opened to teach Go in the late 1500’s, and the Go Academy was founded soon after Ieyasu became Shogun in 1603. The game has only continued to increase in popularity over time. A 2016 survey by the International Go Federation’s 75-member nations found 46 million players worldwide, although the actual number is likely to be even greater.

Part of the game’s modern popularity is due to its reputation as a martial art for the mind, with Go seen as having strategic value in business and political communities, in children’s education, and in tournaments where victory is a way to display national pride. The game can help children to improve their focus and memory. Children who are especially talented can join Go schools as young as five and turn pro before their twelfth birthday like Lee Se-Dol, one of the greatest Go players of the modern era. Professional Go tournaments are held around the world, with prize purses as high as $500,000. The major Japanese tournaments come with titles and purses in the hundreds of thousands. With dozens of competitions held each year, star players can earn millions of dollars. Even those who do not become household names can make a good living from the game through local tournaments and teaching.  The publication of the international thriller Shibumi and the translation of Nobel prize winner Kawabata’s The Master of Go in the 1970s, as well as the appearance of Go in movies like A Beautiful Mind, helped to spread the game to the West. But, it was the emergence of the megahit manga and anime series Hikaru no Go that sparked the most recent resurgence of the the national sport of Japan both at home and abroad.

K-chk! That resonant clack as stone hits board calls me out of my reveries. The people playing in the Cambridge Public Library today are members of the Massachusetts Go Association, which is just one division of the American Go Association. This is but one of many meets that are held each week across the Boston area, each of which attracts a wide range of people. Go doesn’t appeal to just the young or the old. Its appeal doesn’t vary based on where you come from, how educated you are, or what gender you are. It is a game full of possibility and inundated with a rich cultural history. Here in the library today I see men and women, children and adults, and skin that runs the gamut of colors. I smile, glad for the chance to finally play in person against someone else who loves the game. I greet a woman whose game has just finished and slide into a seat.

Unity and Diversity in “Stories: Our American Journey”

Feature Report

A crowd of Ismaili Muslims lines up outside the brightly-lit Manhattan Center on West 34th Street. A brisk city wind ruffles their blazers, dupattas (scarves), and colorful tunics as they wait for the doors to open to a theatrical production created and performed by their religious community. The crowd is clad in attire ranging from American business casual to Central and South Asian ethnic wear, a reflection of the congregation’s cultural diversity. This wide-ranging dress hints at the essence of the show they are about to experience, which describes Ismailis’ diverse journeys to the United States and the formation of their American Ismaili identities.

The global Ismaili community numbers approximately 20 million and populates over 25 countries from Canada to Kenya. Though members come from different cultural backgrounds, they are united by shared religious beliefs and values, as well as by their allegiance to an Imam, their spiritual leader.

While Ismailis currently reside in most states in America, this was not the case six decades ago. The first Ismailis to immigrate to the United States arrived in the 1960s, coming from countries such as Syria, India, and Uganda. Most arrived as students and ended up settling, enticed by opportunities to advance their education and careers. They paved the way for subsequent waves of migration from their homelands, resulting in the establishment of Ismaili congregations across the United States.

The narratives of these immigrants and their families are what bring Ismaili Muslims to Manhattan’s West 34th Street to see the production “Stories: Our American Journey.” This show brings to life the experiences of American Ismaili Muslims through song, dance, skits, and documentary-style videos. It memorializes their efforts to assimilate into American society as they seek to retain their native cultural roots and uphold the tenets of their faith. The stories presented in the show are based on real-life experiences, collected through video submissions from over 1,100 individuals.

Some of these stories chronicle the physical journey of arriving in America, landing in an unfamiliar country with one suitcase, a handful of cash, and the telephone number of a prospective host written on a slip of paper. Others reflect the cultural clash immigrants encountered after arriving in a country more liberal than their homelands. One community member describes coming out as gay to conservative elders in the congregation and tells of their disapproval. Still other stories illustrate the experiences of first-generation American youth growing up with immigrant parents and struggling to find their place in society.

Interlaced with these solemn accounts are stories of positivity and hope, revealing how community members seek strength from their faith. A mother describes her anguish when she first found out her son was born deaf and mute. She explains in a video clip that it took her months to accept her son’s condition, before she finally decided that she was entrusted with this child because “God felt she could offer him the love and support to help him grow.”

Though the stories feature individuals from different cultural backgrounds and experiences, many of them express common sentiments. From a number of performances emerge themes of migration, nostalgia, and hardship. Other stories evoke fear, apprehension, and uncertainty.

It is not just the skits that highlight unity within the congregation. One song and dance focuses on the phrase “Ya Ali Madad,” a greeting exchanged between Ismailis all over the world. The dancers dress in multicultural attire while the song features soundscapes from various musical traditions, the culmination of which embraces the unifying nature of “Ya Ali Madad.”

Through various forms of artistic expression, the “Stories” production highlights differences in the experiences of the American Ismaili congregation, while also tying them to one community and one faith, reflecting a culture of unity within diversity.

Etching in the new Seasons of Migration

Feature Report

Sudan’s most influential printmaker, Mohammed Omar Khalil, collaborates with the Beirut-based experimental publishing house ‘Dongola’ to bring a classic postcolonial Afro-Arab novel to life.

Mohammed Omar Khalil in his Long Island studio. (PC: M. AlSayyad)

Set in a “small village at the bend of the Nile” and filled with tales of sexual conquest, passionate murders and challenges to coloniality, Tayeb Salih’s Season of Migration to the North quickly grabbed worldwide attention. It was translated into English only three years after its publication, but in Sudan, Salih’s home country, it did not make it past the censors. Despite critical acclaim, the novel was banned for thirty years due to its explicit sexual imagery. This, however, did not hinder the Arab Literary Academy from recognizing it in 2001 as “the most important Arab novel of the twentieth century.”

Fifty years after its publication, in a small town south of Tangier, Morocco,  Season of Migration to the North was to become the topic of discussion between two people who would give it new life.  

“I met Sarah in Asilah and explained to her that I want to publish a book on Tayeb Salih’s novel.” recounts Mohammed Omar Khalil, the master Sudanese printmaker currently living in New York. “She responded by saying ‘No. We’ll publish it,’ and told me about her new publishing house in Lebanon. It was called Dongola.” He smiles. “I liked this name, Dongola, because it’s the name of an ancient village in Sudan. So I said yes. And here we are.”

Dongola Limited Editions is an independent experimental publishing house founded by Sarah Chalabi. It specializes in limited edition artists’ books and focuses on creating collaborations across the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia. These books are not about art, rather they are art.  

Season of Migration to the North flips the post-colonial narrative of the time on its head. Instead of the white European man going south to ‘liberate’ the Africans from themselves, the African man was now writing his own narrative, and he was doing so while headed north. Equipped with certain remnants of colonialism—an elite education and fluency in the occupier’s language—the main character, Mostafa Said, engages the minds of London academics and conquers the hearts and bodies of the white women who fall prey to his charm. He plays the part that is expected of him with malicious accuracy, turning his room into a “harem,” dim with incense and burnt sandalwood; a trap for the orientalist woman-victim of the week. The book has been widely regarded as a reversal, the antithesis even, of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Mostafa Said is a product of the post-colonial crisis of identity. He is powerful and yet powerless, a victim and a perpetrator—“he loved a woman that treated him like dirt.” And eventually, he lost his grasp on life. “He never left England,” Mohammed Omar Khalil explains. “He carried it with him on his back, even when he went back to Sudan.”

Khalil was born in 1936 in Bourri near Khartoum, Sudan. He immigrated to the United States in the 60s and made a home for himself in New York City. He is regarded as one of the most important contemporary Middle Eastern painters, and as a pioneer printmaker. He has influenced more than two generations of artists as a teach and mentor. His work has been featured in the Met, the Brooklyn Museum, the British Museum and the Jordanian National Museum, among others.

I visited Khalil in his Long Island studio, a vast warehouse-like space where the only place to walk is amongst piles of dusty books, CDs and large canvas paintings leaning against each other in seemingly endless rows. The ceiling is high and large windows covered in white curtains let in the sunshine, which illuminates every corner of the studio. He makes us a pot of cardamom coffee before settling into his favorite chair. His workstation is cluttered with books, etching knives, snippets of magazines and ink rollers, organized in a manner only clear to the artist himself.

Switching between English and Arabic, he recounts his own tales of migration and art. He tells me the story of the first time he took an art class in Italy, where the nude model was, in fact, naked; after the semester, she told him that he had scared her initially, “because you come from Africa.” Shifting in his chair, he explains how he wrote his letter of resignation to the faculty of Arts at the University of Khartoum after becoming fed up with administrative corruption. When he told his colleagues, they laughed. The next day, he left the country, not to return for another 27 years. Mohammed Omar Khalil distances himself from Mostafa Said, the novel’s main character, a womanizer who murders his sadistic wife with a knife during a passionate sexual encounter. “I’m not like that. […] He was horrible with women.” Khalil grimaces. But despite everything, he adds, “We all have a little bit of Mostafa Said in us…” As he chronicles his own journeys from Sudan to the US and Europe, I picture Khalil as the unnamed narrator of the novel, a voice of reason and balance, both disgusted by Mostafa Said and in admiration of him.

. . .

Season of Migration to the North is Dongola’s most recent project and will be published in a limited edition of 30 copies. Each will include an original Dongola publication of the Arabic novel designed by the acclaimed Iranian graphic designer Reza Abedini and a used English copy acquired from online retailers. Finally, each artists’ book will include a series of ten original etchings, printed, signed and numbered by Khalil himself. The project has already caught the attention of l’Institut du monde arabe, which will host a live book signing in Paris in March of this year.

Tayeb Salih’s novel was published ten years after Sudan’s independence from British rule and is widely recognized as one of the most powerful works of post-colonial Afro-Arab literature. Censored in Sudan, it was finally serialized in the Lebanese journal Hiwar in 1966. Now, more than fifty years later, it has found its way back to a publishing house in Beirut, at a time when its themes seem ever more relevant to the world we live in. Today, Beirut is going through its own identity crisis and Lebanon has witnessed season upon season of emigration and immigration. And the book? Well, the book has been touched by the magic of Mohammed Omar Khalil, joining the ranks of artists’ books that reinterpret the very notion of what it means to read a book.

The Recipe for CQ? Add Mandarin

Feature Report

In our ever-interconnected world, Cultural Intelligence, or “CQ”, is supposedly the latest measure that attempts to quantify one’s awareness and understanding of cultures other than their own. Professor Hu Ying-Hsueh of Taiwan’s Tamkang University, a distinguished linguist, advocated for its importance in a recent lecture at Wellesley College, entitled “How to Cultivate Cultural Intelligence”. I attended the lecture under the impression that I’d learn how one can best develop a tolerance of other cultures. Instead, I simply heard Professor Hu make her case for the development of Chinese Cultural Intelligence in a world where she believes Chinese is steadfastly rivaling English to become the world’s global language, otherwise known as a lingua franca.

A lingua franca is a language that two non-native speakers often use to communicate with each other, which thus has a purpose beyond its native community. Lingua francas exist on every continent, but English is the ultimate lingua franca; it is the language of international relations, business and science. Hu explained that Mandarin currently operates as a lingua franca on a smaller scale than English, and that she believes it will rise to challenge English in the future. This would mean that Mandarin speakers would soon stretch to every corner of the globe, and that Mandarin would replace the international command of English.

In Hu’s opinion, Mandarin establishing itself as a lingua franca would allow the masses to develop a Chinese CQ. She bases this belief on the Whorfian Hypothesis, the social theory her latest research has explored. The hypothesis stipulates that the linguistic patterns of a language lead the speaker to assimilate the structures of the language’s culture, that in turn influences how they see the world. To test this, Hu ran an experiment which entailed teaching a class of international students about Chinese culture, coupled with intensive Mandarin language training. She tracked the progress of the students through surveys and journal reflections, and came to the conclusion that her results proved the hypothesis correct. These foreign students believed that they developed a greater understanding of Chinese culture as their Mandarin skills grew; and according to their reflections, this shaped how they viewed the world around them. The more Mandarin they learnt, the higher their Chinese CQ grew.

Although this experiment seems to rely heavily on her “Mandarin as a lingua franca” theory, I found the results unsurprising. They easily could be explained without a fancy hypothesis as backing. It seems obvious that the students would learn more about China as they continue to learn Mandarin, because without the language skills, foreigners are automatically barred from many “culture-learning” experiences. How can one fully appreciate Chinese culture in all its nuances if they can’t understand museum plaques or read a menu, much less interact with locals? Language is what bridges the gap between being an observer and being a participant. However, Hu uses her linguist background to argue that the the Whorfian Hypothesis is the reason why the students’ Chinese CQ developed. She argues that the construction of the Mandarin language itself plays a significant role in developing this cultural intelligence, because it drives one to grasp the template of Chinese culture.

Both of Hu’s theories-that Mandarin will replace English as a lingua franca, and the validity of the Whorfian Hypothesis- were presented in a convoluted fashion, leaving the audience wondering if we need Chinese CQ in the first place. It’s also clear that her theories come with their flaws, though Hu was reluctant to admit as much. Not only were her experiment’s results entirely based on her students’ self-perception and subsequent self-reporting, she also eventually conceded that “the class was easiest for the Japanese students” on account of the numerous similarities that Japanese and Mandarin share. Hu elaborated on the struggles faced by the European students in the class, taking to the blackboard to illustrate how the construction of Chinese characters can pose difficulties for foreign learners with no grounding in a language that lacks an alphabet. She showed us how the meanings of “radicals”, components that form a character, can be derived, allowing Mandarin learners to develop cognition patterns. She then illustrated how these same radicals exist in characters with irrelevant meanings, undercutting the argument she had just advanced. By conflating oral and written language by assuming one must know how to write a language in order to speak it, Hu’s Chinese CQ theory is only muddled further. If one can already speak Mandarin, why would the Whorfian Hypothesis not be in effect if one simply struggles to write the characters?

Moreover, Hu’s “radical” example only illustrated how far Mandarin is from English, and inadvertently challenged her belief that Mandarin could replace English as a lingua franca. We can look to the dominance of English to garner what makes a successful lingua franca, and perhaps its greatest quality is how similar it was to its predecessor. English succeeded French in lingua franca status, and it can be argued that the similarities between the two languages allowed for this worldwide transition to occur. Hu unearths the stark differences between English and Mandarin, and the challenges in adopting a character-based language if the learner has no basis. If Mandarin was significantly easier for the Japanese than the European students in Hu’s class to acquire, I’m left wondering whether or not it truly has the power to dominate English as the world’s global language.

Despite being central to her lecture, Hu fails to identify if Chinese CQ is something we should be actively developing through our own undertaking of Mandarin- in an attempt to see the world from another perspective- or if it is something we will inevitably adopt if Mandarin becomes the next world language. Will Mandarin ever defeat English to achieve true lingua franca status? Will the Whorfian Hypothesis then cause us all to develop Chinese Cultural Intelligence? I’m unsure. Although Professor Hu’s experiment seems to raise more questions than it answers, it does invite us to consider the value of a linguistic perspective on cultural understanding.

Armenia!

Feature Report

Armenians made an unusual pilgrimage this year. Although many diasporan Armenians do try to return to the homeland during their lifetime, this year the journey was a bit shorter for many of them. From September 2018 to January 2019, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City held an exhibit titled Armenia! to celebrate the art and culture of this small nation.

I made the pilgrimage this year, albeit by accident. For the past three years, I have been making a different kind of pilgrimage. Ever since working at an Armenian summer camp, I have been getting more involved with my Armenian heritage, and have been making my way down to New York City each January to reconnect with my friends from camp. This year, my voyage serendipitously coincided with the MET’s Armenia! exhibit. Looking for something to do, and figuring that as American-Armenians we really ought to go, my five friends and I made our way to Manhattan.

The exhibit featured the largest collection of Armenian art ever displayed in a museum. The exhibition hosted over 140 objects from medieval Armenia, including intricate stone work pieces, gilded reliquaries, illuminated manuscripts, woven silk textiles, impressive carved woodwork, and altar frontals. A common element among the pieces, and in Armenian art and culture in general, are the deep Christian roots of the nation. Armenia was the first nation to adopt Christianity, and as such, the religious spirituality is deeply ingrained in the culture of the people, and is reflected in the artwork. Some of the most entrancing pieces of the show were the stone crosses, or khachkars. These crosses were so intricately carved that I found myself staring and wondering about the artists who devoted their lives to creating these expressions of faith. As I made my way through the exhibit, I paused to admire the delicate textiles, ornate reliquaries, and detailed carved wooden doors. But what most caught my eye were the inscriptions on the illuminated manuscripts. These elaborate manuscripts were brought to life through vibrant and gilded images as well as the calligraphically written Armenian alphabet. The Armenian alphabet was developed around 405 AD by the linguistic and ecclesiastical leader Mesrop Mashtots, and is still used today. Though I cannot read Armenian, the experience of seeing the language of my people on display in one of the nation’s greatest museums was a moving one, for myself, as it must have been for the many others who passed through this exhibit.

Armenia! did not exude the same glamour as some other installations at the MET – it was a simple exhibition structured like many others devoted to the medieval period or Christian artwork – but what brought life to this exhibit was the overwhelming feeling of representation in the room. Armenians have faced a long history of persecution and strife. Slaughtered and forcibly removed from their homeland by Ottoman forces during the – still unrecognized – Armenian Genocide of the early 20th century, Armenians have not had it easy. Armenians were a minority Christian people living under the Muslim Ottoman rule in the early 20th century when World War I broke out, and a systematic extermination of the Armenian people began. The genocide drove tens of thousands of Armenian people to escape their homeland, creating the widespread diasporan communities we see today. Though forced to flee far and wide across the globe due to their religious beliefs, the Armenian people have never lost their sense of self and their ties to the homeland.

This exhibit served as a beacon of hope, for the first time displaying the art of this small and turbulent nation on a such a large platform. I looked around and listened in on the overlapping chatter of voices. I heard families speaking Armenian, some who had moved to America over 100 years ago to flee the genocide, and some who had recently immigrated. I saw older people, young children, and even ran into a different friend from camp. More astonishing, however, were the crowds of non-Armenian people in this space, looking on with the same wonder as those whose culture these artifacts represent. Speaking with my friends afterward, I found they shared my sense of pride at seeing the story of our small nation get told through artwork not only to our people, but to such a diverse audience. One of my friends told us how her parents visited the museum as often as they could, and how her father became emotional when he observed the many enchanted non-Armenians and saw his culture projected on such a large platform through a lens of wonder and admiration.

The history of the Armenians may be one of erasure, but the persecution has been unable to stop our people and culture. Our story, like the Christian roots of the nation, is what ties together the many people worldwide who claim this small nation as home, and is what has fostered such a strong community. Art is a way of celebrating a people, and so to the Armenians, seeing their art displayed alongside some of the greatest works in history was a glorious recognition and uplifting of a people once almost wiped off the map.

It’s All Fun and Games

Feature Report
Kok-Boru final match between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan

Welcome to the third World Nomad Games. On the northern shores of Issyk Kul, just outside of the small city of Cholpon-Ata, Kyrgyzstan, more than 1,920 athletes from 74 countries gathered to compete in a variety of games that harken back to a shared and glorified past of the nomadic peoples of Eurasia.

The World Nomad Games, first held in 2014 in Kyrgyzstan, seek to reestablish the cultural link between historic nomadic traditions and the modern identity of Turkic and post-Soviet states. The 2018 event showcased 37 different competitions, including the famous kok-boru.  Kok-boru, now a steady provider of gold medals for Kyrgyzstan, was traditionally a competition intended to prepare young men for the trials of battle. Kok-boru is played on horseback in which the objective is to move the body of a goat into a corresponding raised goal. It requires strength and balance, as well as the ability to control the horse as the rider scoops the goat off the dirt pitch. Imagine a rougher version of polo.

Opening and closing with massive ceremonies of more than 1,500 singers, dancers, and actors, the games welcomed tens of thousands of spectators and numerous heads of state. The arena sat opposite a colorful backdrop that represented the mountains of Kyrgyzstan and backed up against the deep jewel blue of the world’s second largest saline lake. While there was a wide variety of participants from around the world, most of the tournament’s serious competitors were nomadic Turkic peoples from Eurasia, Eastern Europe, and Anatolia. The next games are set to be held in Turkey next year.

The games have received relatively little coverage by Western media outlets. What did get reported was either a short summary of official details, such as those offered by U.S. government-sponsored Radio Liberty, or a feature piece such as the one run in the New York Times (“Horse Wrestling. Bone Tossing. Dead Goat Polo. Let the Nomad Games Begin.”) The New York Times article was less cringe-worthy than its title suggests, but nonetheless portrayed an idyllic image of nomadic traditions bound to titillate for the upper-middle-class cultural voyeur. However, neither type of reporting discussed the significance of the World Nomad Games in the context of the political and social milieu of present-day Central Asia.

The World Nomad Games, at least those held in Kyrgyzstan, take place in a region of the world where states and their identities are actively being crafted, influenced, and challenged both from within and from abroad. The traditions celebrated here are traditions that were discouraged, if not outright repressed, during the seven decades of Soviet rule.

Like the Olympics and the World Cup, the games cannot and do not exist outside of the political sphere. There is often more at stake in a match than the first-place medal. In some cases, this is recognition—a wrestler requesting to be introduced as an athlete from the Altai Republic of the Russian Federation or another with Bashkortostan written in blue Cyrillic on the back of his white jacket. At other times, the games are a display of patriotism and nationalism, and a test of superior skills between nations whose old conflicts have not been entirely resolved.

Outside of the platform they provide for confronting issues of ethnic minority rights, recognition, and border disputes, the games reflected the inescapable influences of the outside world that grow ever more prevalent as that world grows more connected.

It was at the games that I first saw a pan-Turkic flag, an image of a unification movement that defies current state structures and traditional colonial powers. Pan-Turkism, encouraged by Turkey and its allies, has gained traction in Central Asia since gaining independence. However, the influence of Turkey was far from the only tangible evidence of outside interests. The games were sponsored by Gazprom, a Russian natural gas giant with ties to the Kremlin and whose name figured prominently on the indoor sports complex. USAID sponsored multiple programs during the week-long tournament, and multiple infrastructure projects that made the games possible would have been extremely fiscally difficult for Kyrgyzstan without Chinese aid.

A ticket to the World Nomad Games is an opportunity to immerse oneself in the culture and traditions of Eurasia. It’s a chance to practice Russian with the Kyrgyz gentleman in the next seat. It’s a moment to enjoy a shot of vodka with the guest-house owner before heading to the arena for the kok-boru final. It’s an occasion to dance with near strangers to musicians from Kazakhstan, from Yakutia, and from Tajikistan.

But it’s also an opportunity to take stock of who-all is making the most of their respective opportunity. Humanitarian groups, political movements, businesses, and yes, formalized states are all vying for the attention of viewers everywhere. The rules, if so strong a word can be used, are neither collectively recognized, nor accepted with equal willingness. The days of relative peace in which to grapple with domestic struggles are lost to those states that came to be in the era of the 24-hour news cycle. Kyrgyzstan and its siblings, situated in a region deemed strategic by multiple world powers, represent the perfect place to play a strong hand.

There are many games being played in Central Asia. Not all of them are as straightforward as kok-boru.