The morning following the Uyghur bachelor party was an early one.  Merely hours after all us guys had returned from partying it was time to awaken for the wedding ceremony, an event that would stretch from 6am in the morning to late that night.  Were it not for my excitement over being part of this celebration, I probably would have been slow to get out of bed that morning.

A Uyghur wedding in rural Xinjiang

Uyghur weddings, as with every culture, can take on many different forms.  There are traditional weddings, modern weddings, short weddings and lengthy ones.  Some brides wear white, some drift to other colors.  There are rural weddings and city weddings, each unique in their own right.

The differences between these diverse celebrations can be confusing; however there is one part of the process that has remained practically unchanged for centuries in the Uyghur culture: the ceremony.

Early Morning at the Bride’s Home

I couldn’t believe that anybody would want to get married at this hour.  It was 6am Xinjiang time (which translates to 8am Beijing time) and a line was forming outside the bride’s home.  As sunlight barely began to peek out over the horizon I was relieved to discover that I wasn’t the only one experiencing sleep withdrawals.

All of the visitors filed into the 6-storey apartment building that was home to mostly Uyghur people.  The neighbors weren’t bothered by the loud raucous being made in the stairwell because they, too, would be attending this wedding.  I have found that the Uyghur community tends to work like that.

Fortunately for me I had met Ahmajan’s wife-to-be on previous occasions.  She was a sweet woman with long, thick hair and beautiful eyes, but right now they weren’t visible.  She was wearing a white veil and I learned later that she would continue to wear this veil in public until late that night during the wedding reception.

The small apartment was quickly overcrowded with Uyghur, primarily family and very close friends who greeted each other with hearty handshakes or hugs.  Hundreds of people were preparing to arrive for the celebration that night but only a select few made it to this part of the wedding.  They call it a “nikka” and it didn’t officially begin until the imam arrived.

A Uyghur Nikka in Xinjiang

Once the imam, a leader at the local mosque, sat down and indicated that he was ready, conversation and noise in the room quickly died.  In the eyes of the Chinese government these two were married the moment they received their red books a couple weeks ago (equivalent to a marriage certificate), but for everybody present in the room that morning the moment was now.

The veiled bride stood separated from her groom, both attended to by their closest friends.  All seats and couches in the living room were taken and many more were standing behind them.  Despite the early hour everybody was dressed in their best clothes and all eyes were on the imam.

His prayer, which could be described more like a low chant, almost put me to sleep.  The melodic hum of his voice gently bounced off the walls of the concrete home and immediately granted importance to this ceremony.  I didn’t catch a word of what he said but I think it is safe to assume he was asking a blessing on this marriage.

When he completed his prayer everybody present wiped their face with their hands, a traditional Islamic form of closing prayer.  The imam followed his prayer with more talking which, again, I could not understand.

Uyghur Wedding Unlike the West

It was while watching this that my mind had time to register how bizarrely different this wedding was from any other I had attended.  After you live amidst a foreign culture for a certain number of years you become numb to things that are “different” because most everything you experience is new.  Once I forced myself to really look at what was happening, however, I noticed quite a few things were not what I expected.

First of all, throughout this entire wedding process nobody ever stepped foot inside a mosque.  The couple was Muslim and the ceremony was religious, for sure, but no religious building was used.  The entire ceremony was performed at the bride’s family home.

Also, it took me a moment to realize that the bride wasn’t wearing a wedding gown.  Her dress was formal and her face was covered, but it was not her wedding dress.  It makes sense now that I think about it.  Brides all over the world spend hours preparing to wear their wedding dresses and to do so here would mean waking up at 1am in the morning.

Finally, when thinking about the ceremony I was struck by two events I noticed missing: 1) the exchange of rings and 2) a kiss.  These two symbolic gestures made no appearance that morning and only one of them made it into the celebration that night.  According to one friend the exchange of rings is a practice that only recently has become popular with Uyghur newlyweds.

Not once during the entire wedding did I see my Uyghur friend kiss his bride.

Post-Ceremony Celebration / Pre-Reception Preparation

The bride is the woman on the far right (before the wedding and without a veil)

After exchanging a Uyghur form of “I do”, another prayer was offered and the ceremony ended. At this point the women of the household quickly snatched away the bride to the back of the home where presumably they began to work on her hair and makeup for that evening.

Meanwhile the men took turns congratulating Ahmajan, extending their personal blessings before exiting the home.  The calm atmosphere commanded by the presence of the imam had disappeared the moment he had finished the ceremony and as far as I could tell it was never again found for the rest of the day.

Controlled chaos reigned in the household until lunch time when the men left for a restaurant meal.  Again, only family and close friends were present at this meal, yet somehow it lasted between 3-5 hours.  Meanwhile, in a Uyghur banquet hall only a couple kilometers away, cooks and servers were preparing to receive hundreds of hungry guests for the pinnacle of the wedding celebration: the reception.

But before this could take place there was one thing left to do.  What happens next in a Uyghur wedding can only be described as one of the most fun, unique and hilarious customs I’ve ever witnessed.

And I have a video to prove it!

Check out the rest of this 4-part series on Uyghur Weddings:

1. The Bachelor Party
2. The Ceremony
3. The Parade
4. The Celebration (Reception)

I never knew it was possible to eat so much food.  Greasy, oily, irresistibly tasty Uyghur food.  It wasn’t long into my first experience with a traditional Uyghur wedding, however, before I realized that I shouldn’t have worn my belt.

I had been invited by my Uyghur friend Ahmejan to attend his wedding in August of 2009.  It had only been a month after the problems in Urumqi but that didn’t seem to have any effect on the marriage celebrations.  This might have been because Ahmejan was a respected citizen in our community but more than likely it was because his bride-to-be was the daughter of the highest ranking Uyghur official in the city.

“If you’re coming to my wedding” he told me, “I want you to also be there for our guys-only party the night before”.  This, I assumed, would be the Uyghur equivalent to a bachelor party.

Food at the Groom’s Home

The evening started in front of the groom’s home in a small community inhabited mostly by Uyghur.  All of the men, mostly in their late 20’s and early 30’s, arrived in semi-casual attire.  For this group of guys that meant a collared polo with slacks and polished shoes.  When I came up most of them were gathered around the community announcement board.

“Look at this guy! He looks like he hasn’t taken a shower in weeks!”

“That’s not a Uyghur name.  These two must be Han, and they look just as ugly.”

It took me a moment to realize that they were commenting on posters that had been put up all over the city.  These posters displayed the men and women wanted in connection with the previous month’s unrest.  If these guys were worried about what these posters meant for Uyghur people in Xinjiang, they didn’t show it.

While all of us were chatting outside, waiting for others to arrive, a group of 15 women were frantically cooking and preparing for an invasion of 20+ Uyghur men (and one American).  At the appropriate time we filed into the house and sat down around a table covered with bowls of fruits, nuts, candy and breads.

Immediately the room filled with booming voices and boisterous laughter.  Although I couldn’t understand most of what was being said, I smiled at the animated expressions and obvious camaraderie shared by these guys.

On the streets most of these men were calm and straight-faced, but in here, even though liquor had yet to be poured, they were displaying their passionate side.  Separated from the tensions of Xinjiang society – at least for the moment – they had let down their guard to enjoy the evening.

Once the food arrived the flow of plates never seemed to stop: fried whole fish, pollo, meat pies, pollo, noodles, and more pollo.  The women who had cooked and were now serving us were the mothers of the men present and they obviously knew their way around a crowded kitchen.

An hour later the meal ended in an unexpected way.  As if on cue, everybody rose from their seats and the tears started to flow.  All the women of the house were bawling, not the least of which was Ahmajan’s mother.  She gave a final blessing to her son, who by this point was spilling tears, reminding him of his duties as a husband and how proud she was of him.  It was a touching moment followed by a prayer and a slow exit.

The reason for all of the emotion was made clear to me by a friend later during the night.  This final exit from the house represented Ahmejan’s step out of the protection of his family.  He was now his own man who would soon have a wife to care for.

Food at the Restaurant

After such a delicious meal I was ready to hit the town and find out what was next on the bachelor-party agenda.  I jumped into the backseat of one of the cars and then cursed myself for moving too quickly.  Uyghur food sits heavy in my stomach and I had no desire to revisit the fabulous Uyghur home-cooking.

But before my stomach had even had a chance to begin the digestion process, the car pulled up to our next destination…a Uyghur restaurant.

“You’re kidding me!  This is our next stop?” I asked my friend.

“Yea” he said with a smile. “Now we can open the beer!”

Alcohol at home with the women present would have been offensive, but here in the restaurant anything was fair game.  Bottles of “Jonny Waker” (not a misspelling) were produced along with baijiu (white wine) and numerous bottles of Wusu beer, the pride of Xinjiang.

Food again covered the table although most people were eating slowly.  It became evident to me that this time together was less about food and more about the company.  The only person with permission not to drink was the groom who had to be up quite early the next morning for the wedding.

As the level alcohol in the bottles decreased, so did the level of each individual’s inhibitions.  The conversation was louder, the jokes were funnier, and slowly my presence in the room was forgotten.  While previously much of the conversation had been spoken in Mandarin for my benefit, now everybody was slipping back into their Uyghur language.  They graciously still included me in the conversation but had obviously forgotten that I couldn’t understand a word they said.  I just nodded my head and smiled.

By the end of this portion of the party I looked at the table in surprise to see that we had somehow finished off most of the food here as well, including over 200 lamb kebabs.  It’s no wonder some of these men were, how shall I say…not slim?  The amount of food we ate could have fed an army.

Some people were beginning to leave and I would soon follow, but there was still one more part of the party left.  By now I was too numb to register shock that this, too, would involve more food.

Food at the Best Man’s Home

The groom’s final night before the wedding apparently isn’t spent as his parent’s home.  The last leg of the party moved to the best man’s house where snacks were out and the TV was on.  By this point, now well past midnight, the tornado of activity had died down to a low thunder.

Only a few people participated in this part of the bachelor party, mostly those who would be present at the actual wedding the next morning.  I decided it was time to finally leave, assured that the party was over and all that was left was small talk.

I said goodbye to my friend Ahmejan and thanked him for allowing me to crash his bachelor party.   I double-checked the time for the wedding the next day and shut the door behind me.  Here the groom would sleep the last night of his single life away.

Check out the rest of this 4-part series on Uyghur Weddings:

1. The Bachelor Party
2. The Ceremony
3. The Parade
4. The Celebration (Reception)

It’s been a long time in the making, but I’m excited to finally be able to share with you one of my favorite experiences living in Xinjiang.

This week will be dedicated to an incredible Xinjiang tradition known as the Uyghur wedding. I’ve had the privilege of attending many weddings in Xinjiang over the past few years and I have already written about my experiences taking part in a Chinese Wedding.

But much has already been written about Chinese weddings.  Too much, probably.  However, if you begin searching Google for information about a modern Uyghur wedding you won’t find any decent material in English.  I hope to change that.

This series is divided into 4 parts:

1. The Bachelor Party
2. The Wedding Ceremony
3. The Wedding Parade
4. The Wedding Celebration

I hope I have been able to succinctly and accurately portray this part of Uyghur culture that not many people get to participate in.  Please enjoy and I encourage all feedback, either through the comments section, on Twitter or on the Far West China Facebook page.

Last year I had fun compiling a list of trivia about Xinjiang that the average person probably wouldn’t know (see: 5 Things You Probably Didn’t Know about Xinjiang).  Since then I’ve kept my eye out for other useless, yet entertaining, facts about the largest province in China.

You won’t find these facts in the Guinness Book of Records and you won’t read about them in any China travel guides.   These fun tidbits are usually buried behind mounds of more important information, but today it is my pleasure to share them with you.  5 MORE facts about Xinjiang you probably didn’t know.

1.  Xinjiang Has the Highest road in the World

Completed in 1957, the Xinjiang-Tibet highway (also known as national highway 219) is the highest road in the world.  Its pass through the Kunlun Mountains onto the Tibetan Plateau reaches over 6,000m in elevation and is arguably one of the more difficult ways to travel from Xinjiang to Tibet because much of it isn’t paved.  As a side note, part of this road passes into the “disputed zone” between China and India (i.e. they both claim the land to be theirs).

2.  Home to China’s only Wild Camel Reserve

The two-humped camel, also called the Bactrian camel, is currently found wild in only three places in the world – the Taklamakan Desert, Lop Nur, and a part of the China/Mongolia border.  The camel reserve was established in 1999 and covers 65,000 square kilometers of barren nothing-ness.  Thankfully camels seem to be immune to the effects of nuclear radiation. (See a map of the camel reserve)

3.  You’ve Probably Seen it in the Movie Theater

Xinjiang has been the setting for quite a few Chinese films, but more than likely you haven’t seen any of them.  There are, however, a few movies you probably have seen that you might not realize were shot in Xinjiang.

The Kite Runner was entirely filmed in Kashgar, a city on the western tip of Xinjiang, while a scene from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was filmed at the Karamay Ghost City in the north.

4.  Bill Gates Spent his Honeymoon Here

Ok, so not *all* of his honeymoon, but he did stop here.  For those who have read Oracle Bones by Peter Hessler, this fact won’t come as much of a shock but what’s interesting is that I can find no other evidence to back up this claim.  Regardless, it’s a pretty fun trivia fact.  According to Hessler they only spent a few hours there checking out the museum mummies and meeting with a woman who is now Xinjiang’s #1 enemy.

5.  Home to the Oldest Chinese Papercut

Apparently an ancient Chinese soldier got pretty bored while being stationed in one of the garrison towns along the Silk Road.  His paper creation was found and dated back to the 5^th or 6^th century during the Southern and Northern dynasties.

h/t to the Bovey Blog

“[Residents have] hailed the strategic plans that help bring prosperity to their hometown.” Xinhua

“Xinjiang should fulfill the goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all aspects by 2020…” China Daily

“The government is trying hard to reduce regional income disparities…” Shanghai economist in Business Week.

News about Xinjiang’s new development plan dominated the China news cycle last Friday, covering the front pages of many major China newspapers.  The package was unveiled after a three-day conference in Beijing attended by President Hu Jintao and the new Xinjiang Party Secretary Zhang Chunxian.

The goal of this package? Raise Xinjiang’s GDP per capita, currently ranked 21^st in the country, to the national average by 2015.

Xinjiang GDP per capita:      19,798 RMB
China Avg GDP per capita:  25,125 RMB

How are they going to do this? Apparently they’re going to utilize massive investment coupled with new tax policies.

Investment in Xinjiang 2009:    214 billion RMB
Projected Investment  ’11-’15:    2 trillion RMB

Where is all this money coming from? Some of it is being funneled from other provinces while my guess is that a good portion will come from a new 5% resource tax on oil and gas in the Xinjiang.

How will this affect the average Xinjiang citizen? This, I believe, is the crucial question.  I received an email from a reader named Bruce last week who admonished me for using “macro” thinking to describe a problem that takes place on a micro level.

Posing questions in macro terms, e.g., “How did this affect Xinjiang economically?” is something the Chinese media likes to do because it puts the focus on something abstract — the Xinjiang economy — and takes our eyes off the people behind the statistics.  I would argue that the Han (who are concentrated in Urumqi) definitely suffered economically, but many non-Han throughout Xinjiang who were already at or below the poverty line suffered far worse.

From what I can gather, most of the investment will be passed along to local governments, transportation initiatives,  and regional businesses, primarily those involved in mineral and oil extraction.

Now I want to begin my criticism by saying that I’m glad the government is focused on Xinjiang right now and I admit that it would be virtually impossible for any governing body to come up with a perfect plan.  That said, I think they’re approaching the problem like some men approach a bad marriage: throw enough jewelry/money at her and hope that the problem will just magically go away.

A lot of this investment may never reach the poorer Han, and definitely not the non-Han because employment for them in Xinjiang is an uphill battle.  I focused on this difficulty in my review of the book Under the Heel of the Dragon, where Kaltman shows that the employment disparity has a lot to do with language barriers and language barriers are a result of the education system.

Why not take even a portion of this investment and direct it toward schools that from my experience need an upgrade.  Why not invest in a program that offers incentives to grab more bi-lingual minority teachers?  I believe it would benefit a lot of Xinjiang people if they invested in centers that offer free Mandarin courses for non-native speakers.

The government has addressed some of these issues before, but I believe that if they’re really hoping to ease ethnic tension the investment focus should be toward the next generation.

Will this investment scheme work? When it comes to the Chinese government, I’ve learned not to underestimate their resolve.  I have no doubt Xinjiang’s GDP will reach the projected goal by 2015, but I don’t think this will properly reflect what is happening on an individual level.

So 10 years from now, will we look back on this investment package as a turning point for Xinjiang?