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Kyrgyz stringed instruments

Comuz - crafted from a single piece of wood, with three strings that are played by plucking. The modern comuz is about 85-90 cm long with strings made of kapron. A special feature of the comuz is the ability to tune the strings in variety of ways to suit the music being played. To play the comuz, the performer holds it in a horizontal position while seated or - more rarely - standing. Numerous playing techniques are possible and mastery of the right (plucking) hand technique especially allows for playing of a variety of difficult and complex compositions. The comuz is a standard member of any Kyrgyz folk music group. According to legend, the first comuz was made by the hunter, Kambar. He himself was a master performer (komuzchi), and Kambarkan became one of the distinctive creative genres of Kyrgyz folk music.

Kyyak (kyl kyyak) - a string and bow instrument 60-70 cm in length. The traditional kyyak is made from the wood of an apricot tree and has two strings of untwisted horse hair. Horse hair is also used for bow. The kyyak is played by a master performer (kyyakchi) in a seated position with the instrument held vertically, while the stretched hair on the bow is drawn gently across the strings. The fingers of the left hand do not press the strings to the fingerboard; they gently touch it, producing colorful, harmonic tones similar to certain techniques used in violin playing. Given two options for tuning, the upper string is melodious while the lower string is resonant. The traditional kyyak is an instrument transposing one octave down. The majority of the traditional compositions for the kyyak are very lyrical and heartfelt, which is completely in accordance with the musical nature of the instrument.

National cuisine

Kyrgyzstan hosts over 80 distinct cultures and nationalities. Unsurprisingly, its diverse multiethnic environment has influenced a variety of national cuisines and beverages particularly from Kyrgyz, Russian, Dungan, Uzbek, and Korean traditions.

Kyrgyz food is heavy on meat, dairy, and bread, and light on spices. This is less true of Dungan and Uighur dishes. Each meal ends with the "omin," a face-washing-like motion, which gives thanks to God.

Besh barmak
For Kyrgyz people, besh barmak isn't just an ordinary meal - it is a ceremony complete with its own traditions and customs. A whole sheep is cut up and boiled in a kazan (iron pot) until the soup from this pot is ready to be drunk and the bones with meat on them are ready to be distributed. The dish (boiled pieces of meat with home-made noodles) is eaten with the fingers (besh barmak means "five fingers" in Kyrgyz). After besh barmak, the best dish to serve the honored guest is plov.

Plov is generally served as an enormous mound of rice with onions and carrots, and pieces of boiled meat on top. Among other main dishes there are also manty(fist-sized steamed dumplings filled with mutton and onions), lagman (a Dungan dish of thick home-made noodles in a relatively spicy sauce, with cabbage, onions, and tomatoes), chuchpara or pelmeni (smaller dumplings filled with onions, mutton and fat, and served in a soup), kuurdak (slices of fried mutton beef, with onions and spices, served on a plate garnisned with herbs), shorpo (soup with potatoes, vegetables, and a big hunk of mutton on the bone).



The guests are also offered the different snacks as kuiruk-boor (a slice of sheep's tail fat and a slice of that sheep's liver, served together with spices or shashlyk - smoked kebabs of mutton (or beef, chicken, liver, or various fishes), served with onions in vinegar.

Among a variety of drinks one should be mentioned separately. Kymyz is the most popular drink on the jailoo, made from fermented mare's milk. Bozo is a thick fermented millet drink, slightly carbonated and drunk mostly in the winter. Jarma: A drink of fermented barley, ?drunk mostly in summer.

 

 

Canada (2)

Canada is situated on the north of Northern America, washed by the Atlantic Ocean in the east, the Pacific Ocean in the west, and the Arctic Ocean in the north and in the northeast by the Baffin Bay and the Davis Strait, which separate it from Greenland, In the south and in the north Canada borders on the USA. It is a land of vast distances and rich natural resources. Canada became a self-governing dominion in 1867 while retaining ties to the British crown. Canada's territory is the world's second largest country, surpassed in size only by Russia. It includes many islands, notably the Canadian Arctic Islands, also called Arctic Archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. Economically and technologically the nation has developed in parallel with the US, its neighbour to the south. The total area is about 10 million sq km. Canada is slightly larger than the US. It is an important manufacturer, and its major cities, such as Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa, Edmonton, Calgary and Winnipeg are centres of commerce and industry.

The climate of Canada varies from temperate in the south to subarctic and arctic in the north. The highest Canadian point is Mount Logan 5,959 m. The population of Canada is about 32 million people. There are two state languages: English and French. English is spoken by 60 % of population; French is spoken by 23 % of people.

Most of Canada's inhabitants live in the southern part of the country and vast areas of the north are sparsely inhabited. The country is divided into ten provinces (Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, Saskatchewan) and three territories (Northwest Territories, Yukon Territory, Nunavut Territory). The third territory called Nunavut, to be carved from the present Northwest Territories, was created in 1999.
The name Canada is derived from an Iroquoian term meaning «village».

Among the great rivers of Canada there are the Saint Lawrence River, draining the Great Lakes and emptying into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence; the Ottawa and the Saguenay rivers, the principal affluents of the Saint Lawrence River; the Saint John River, emptying into the Bay of Fundy.

The government type is confederation with parliamentary democracy. The capital of Canada is Ottawa.

Canada became independent from the United Kingdom on July, 1, 1867. Legal system is based on the English common law, except in Quebec, where civil law system based on the French law prevails.

The racial and ethnic makeup of the Canadian people is diversified. About 35 percent of the population is composed of people of the British origin. People of the French origin total about 25 percent of the population. The vast majority of French-speaking Canadians reside in Quebec, where they make up about three-fourths of the population; large numbers also live in Ontario and New Brunswick.

French-speaking Canadians maintain their language, culture, and traditions, and the federal government follows the policy of a bilingual and bicultural nation. During the 1970s and 1980s the proportion of Asians among the Canadian population increased, and today those who count their ancestry as wholly Asian make up 8 to 10 percent of the population. More than two-thirds of the Asian immigrants live in Ontario or British Columbia. The remainder of the population is composed of people of various ethnic groups, such as German, Italian, Ukrainian, Netherlands Dutch, Scandinavian, Polish, Hungarian, Greek, and Native American. Blacks have never constituted\a major segment of the Canadian population. Indigenous people make up nearly 2 percent of Canada's inhabitants.

The largest religious community in Canada is Roman Catholic. Nearly half of Canadians who are Roman Catholic live in Quebec. Of the Protestant denominations in Canada the largest is the United Church of Canada, followed by the Anglican Church of Canada. Other important Protestant groups are the Baptist, Presbyterian and Lutheran. Nearly 2 percent of the population are Orthodox. Muslim and Jewish adherents each number about 1 percent. A substantial number of Buddhists, Hindus and Sikhs have been brought to the country in recent years by immigration. Nearly 13 percentofCanadiansclaimnoreligion.

 

 

The school system of Canada is very much like the one in the USA, but there are certain differences.

Education in Canada is general and compulsory for children from 6 to 16 years old, and in some provinces — to 14. It is within the competence of the local authorities, and therefore it may differ from province to province. For example, Newfoundland has an 11-grade system. Some other provinces have 12-grade systems, and Ontario has even a 13-grade system. Grades 1—6 are usually elementary schools, and grades 7—12 are secondary schools.

In some provinces there is a kindergarten year before the first grade. Elementary education is general and basic, but in the junior high school years the students can select some courses themselves.

Most secondary schools provide programmes for all types of students. Some of them prepare students for continuing their studies at the university. Vocational schools are separate institutions for those who will not continue their education after secondary schools. There also exist some commercial high schools. Some provinces have private kindergartens and nursery schools for children of pre-elementary age. There also exist Roman Catholic schools and private schools in some provinces. In most provinces private schools receive some form of public support.

Admission to the university in Canada is after high school with specific courses. Getting a degree in law, medicine, dentistry or engineering usually takes 3—4 years of studying. University tuition fees vary among different provinces. All provinces also have public non-university institutions. They are regional colleges, institutes of technology, institutes of applied arts, colleges of agricultural technology and others. Criteria for admission to these institutions are less strict.

 


Date: 2015-12-17; view: 1163


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