Last horsemen of Hunza: Pakistan Buzkashi diversion faces final whistle
This sketch taken on Jan 27, 2017, Pakistani horsemen ready to contest for a cattle physique during a diversion of a normal competition of Buzkashi in sleet lonesome Chapursan encampment of Hunza Valley in northern Pakistan. In a remote northern Pakistani hollow surrounded by hulk ice-capped peaks, villagers accumulate to watch a diversion of Buzkashi, an ancient equestrian competition once seen as a pivotal exam of concentration that is now struggling for survival. PHOTO: AFP
HUNZA: In a remote northern Pakistani hollow surrounded by hulk ice-capped peaks, villagers accumulate to watch a diversion of Buzkashi, an ancient equestrian competition once seen as a pivotal exam of concentration that is now struggling for survival.
Baksh Dil Khan, a late schoolteacher is saddling his equine as his mother sprinkles a splash of flour over a animal for good luck, disturbed that a layer that blankets a Chapursan Valley will make a day’s compare too treacherous.
PHOTO: AFP
The burly, moustached 52-year-old is one of a sports’ final dual dozen players in this segment of roughly 2000 people, that shares a limit with Afghanistan to a easterly and a north. A black goat is led out to a center of a drift for a players to inspect. Some collect it adult before nodding their approval. It is taken away, after returning as a headless, disemboweled physique and is placed in a round in a centre of a field.
This Pakistani lady left her six-figure pursuit in Islamabad to learn children in Hunza village
This physique is a esteem a horseman will shove over in a game, done adult of a array of rounds in that they aim to chuck it behind into a circle. Goals are met with eager shouts of ‘Halal’ from a crowd, a pointer they trust it was legitimately scored.
PHOTO: AFP
Buzkashi is a approach for players to uncover off their equestrian skills and manliness, though there are also prizes and money to secure. Baksh has won PKR 4,000 ($40), 3 packs of cigarettes and a cellphone.
“I roughly pennyless my neck for these 3 packs of cigarettes and we am not even a smoker,” he jokes — he fell twice from his equine during a game.
Unlike in beside Afghanistan or Central Asia where a competition stays vibrant, Baksh fears a tradition will die out in Pakistan.
“It is failing down and there are usually half a dozen aged players left, a new era is not holding most seductiveness in a diversion and we have usually around a dozen immature players,” he explains.
Now even anticipating adequate horses can be a plea as many locals have sole their steeds to buy complicated comforts, says 38-year-old Taj Muhammad.
“Buzkashi will be only an eventuality of a past, a story for a children,” he muses.
PHOTO: AFP
For Aziz Ali Dad, a informative anthropologist, a decrease of a bloodsport is a pointer of Pakistan’s abating informative ties with Central Asia, where a diversion originated.
In Hunza, it has prolonged been a buttress of a Wakhi people, who are also found in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Xinjiang in China.
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But Aziz says a miss of hit between them currently means Buzkashi is “on a verge of annihilation in Pakistan.” Defiant, Baksh vows to float on, even if others give up.
He insists: “I will continue to play even if we am a final player, a diversion should during slightest tarry compartment my death.”
Article source: https://tribune.com.pk/story/1412760/last-horsemen-hunza-pakistan-buzkashi-game-faces-final-whistle/