Old Classmates

Recently my former classmate from out here posted the following statement on his blog:

I have to admit, though they drank way too much, there was lots to be enjoyed there. Here was a group of classmates approaching sixty years old. They still get together once or twice a month. They laugh, reminisce about old times, and continue to share life together. There is something special in longevity of relationships like that. Though I have thoroughly enjoyed life until now, I've often missed the familiarity that comes from being in one place and having continuity of friendship.

He was referring to the local woman who he calls ‘mom’ and all of her classmates. The entire class still gets together regularly for lunch and renewing their relationships. They are not the only classmates in this country that keep in community 50 years later. I have a Uyghur grandmother in her 70s, who invited me to join her chai (Uyghur women’s party were money is exchanged), ever month she meets with 12 of the women she went to elementary school with. I don’t even think I could name 12 kids from my grade school days, much less see them regularly and still be part of their life.

When we step back and look at social structures in the life of the Uyghur community, the classmate network is very influential. In North America we talk about looking out for our “friends and family” (interesting enough in that order)… my Uyghur friends often talk about “family, neighbours and classmates” – it is assumed that their friendships have grown out of those close relationships.

As my friend mentioned our culture is very mobile, moving from place to place and influencing structures to friendships. This flux allows us clean starts and the opportunity to hear the different opinion of new people. My Uyghur Grandmother has complained about the longevity of relationships, people who have known you all your life “know everything dumb thing you have ever done… and they still gossip about it 3 decades later”. At her chai she says they sit around and retell the same stories that haven't been news in years. The way she sees it doesn't have the same idealistic slant that my classmate perceived the situation to have.

House Warming

As if going to visit all of our new neighbours over the holiday wasn’t enough, we decided to throw a housewarming party for ourselves and show off how local our new home looks. We knew our neighbours were all curious to see inside because anytime our door was open even a little; people would try peering through the opening or flat out walk in. One day a lady at the front gate offered to help carry my groceries in, and then took the liberty of walking all around our apartment and commenting on everything.

To waylay their fears and satisfy their curiosity we invited all the Uyghur families living in our stair well (8 households in all). We had no idea how many people would actually venture to come. While extending the invitation I made sure to inform them that our house was halal, and that we bought all our food from Muslim stores so that they didn’t need to worry.

We pushed back all our furniture and put the servring space on the floor, just like they would in the Uyghur country side. We made sure there were plates and plates of snack food, even though they barely touch any of this stuff.

My roommate and I both showed off our hand at making traditional food. K made Pollo (rice cooked with lamb, carrots, and raisins) and I made da pan ji (literally big plate of chicken, which is chicken, potatoes, peppers and local spices). Wearing the head scarf in the kitchen really does help prevent the oil from settling in your hair (Uyghur food is very oily), just like the apron almost kept it all from splating on my nice atlas top.

When the guest finally came we spread kurpas on the floor to create a soft place to sit. In the end five women and eight children came over. They didn’t eat much of our feast, but they did all seem to have a good time. The kids stole the camera and got this great shot of two very tired hostesses. Tired or not we are now officially part of the neighbourhood.

My Amazing Mind Boggling Abilities

I was invited to join my teacher at another Chai she was giving. However this time she had to go early, and I had a few earns to run first, so I promised to come on my own later. We were meeting at the same restaurant as last time (which is only three bus stops down from my school).

When I arrived one of the women was very surprised to see me. She had assumed since I didn’t come with my teacher I wasn’t coming at all. The whole idea that I a rather young (I think she thinks I am only 18 or 19) foreigner could find my way around town with out being guided by a local, seem totally impossible. She kept questioning me: “how did you get here?” “I took the bus” “What bus did you take?” “101” “How did you know to take that bus?” “Because we are only a few stops down from my school” “How did you know what stop to get off at?” “Because I have been here before, so I knew where the restaurant was” No matter how many questions I answered this woman still remained totally amazed at my ability to make my way down the street on my own. The fact that I had been there before, or that I have now lived in this city for over three years, the fact that I can speak some of both of the local languages, or that I ride that bus at least once every single day still left her flabbergasted.

Fast Money

In Uyghur Culture there is a simple way to get cash fast… throw a party. They call it a chai it is more like a money borrowing system with your neighbours and friends. A group of ten to fifteen people take turns throwing a chai every month. Today I had the honour of joining said party and learned a lot about the culture and how money and friendship interact here.

The party I went to today was made up of a group of fifteen ladies; they are all retired and from the same hometown. Some of them have been friends since middle school. These ladies know everything about each other, good and bad. Trust me when I say that don’t let anyone forget any of it. There was so much gossip spinning around me at such a fast pace I was actually glad I couldn’t understand it all.

We went to a very fancy restaurant where we were given our own private room off to the back. The room had one large table, a TV and DVD player and a small dance floor. The meal itself was very extravagant, taking us more than three hours to eat it all. In order to join the Chai each one of the ladies was expected to bring 150 kuai with them (about 20 dollars, which trust me is a lot considering I can normally go out and eat at a restaurant for only 1 dollar). You can do the math 15 ladies X 150 kuai = 2,250kuai (or about 280 dollars). As we were eating the ladies made sure to ask the hostess how much the meal cost, and then compared the price with how much they had spent the last time they hosted the chai. It seemed that on average the hostess spent about 400-500 kuai to throw a chai. This means they make at least 1,700 kuai. That is a lot of money here. But as I said early a chai is just a way to borrow money from your friends and neighbours, because next month they will be invited by someone else in the group and expected to pay 150 again to join the party. In one day they can make some fast money and then spend the next year paying the loan off to their neighbours. And trust me they keep track, if one person missed one chai, the hostess of that chai is not expected to pay the other person for attending theirs.

The Uyghur people have a saying that says “good friends keep count”. This is true at chai, or any other time you go out to eat. I remember in college when a group of people would go out to eat, the bill would come and we would spend twenty minutes trying to break it apart and figure out how much each person owes, we would add in the tax and count down to the penny. But Uyghurs hardly ever split the bill evenly. One person is always treating. Fights break out over who will give the money, but even as everyone is fighting they all know whose turn it is. Part of being good friends is remembering who paid last time and making sure to pay them back next time with an equally valuable meal. It gets complicated after a while if you have a lot of friends.