TNT History Travel Log: From Istanbul to the Altay Mountains (1911)/Part IV

//Ed. note:  After visiting some other friends along the 
Volga, Halim Sabit returns to Samara to resume his train
trip east.  He passes through Bashkortistan to Ufa and 
makes some interesting observations about the native 
Bashkirs.//



I boarded the train in Samara and we headed northeast toward Ufa,
to the Ural Mountains and into the land of the Bashkirs, and the
gateway to Siberia.  Since the earliest times of history, this vast area
has been considered as Bashkortisan.  Even after it came under
Russian administration, and after Siberia and Kazakhstan had been
invaded by the Russians, the Başkirs were essentially left on their own.

Consequently, in European Russia today Russian and Turkish farmers
have plots of, at most, 5 acres, whereas Başkirs have plots of about
150 acres.  However, the Bashkirs have still not made the transition
from nomadic to settled, agricultural life.  They cultivate only a small
portion of their land and the rest is either left empty or sold to Russian
and Turkish farmers at cheap prices. 

The Bashkir villages are very poor and basic but when the summer
comes they leave their fields and villages and head for the high
pastures along the rivers in the Urals, where they drink 'kımız'
(fermented mare's milk) and enjoy themselves. 



Their addiction to nomadic life has made them indifferent to the toil
of farming but now they are paying the cost of idleness, as strangers
from adjoining areas flood into Bashkortistan to buy cheap land.  Only
recently have the Bashkirs come to realize that they have given up
their best land to outsiders.  Today there are about one million Bashkirs
here, along with Tatar, Bulgars, other Turks and Russians, who are all
much more in tune with schools and medreses than the Bashkirs. 

As the train moves along, I see many Bashkirs at the station stops and
I'm eager to chat with them, to bring them greetings from their Turkish
brethren far away.  But the hurrying train lingers for only a minute or
two at each stop so I have to content myself with exchanging waves
with them from the window.

I will never forget that as noontime approached we were nearing a big

town, where the other passengers said we could find 'kımız'.  Sure

enough, when we reached the stop, a group of Bashkir children were

waving bottles of 'kımız' at us - but the train kept on going without 

stopping there!  We were all downhearted at this turn of events.

Nevertheless, I consoled myself with the thought that I was heading

toward places where everyone knows about 'kımız' and before long I'd

be able to drink it to my heart's content. 

Now, on either side of the railline, the frequency of Bashkir villages, 

with women and children working in the fields and the minarets of 

village mosques evident, increased.  This indicated that we were

approaching the Bashirs' capital Ufa, which is an important center 

for the Moslems of northern Russia.  Nonetheless, anxious to get to 

Kazakhstan, I decided that I would visit Ufa on my return trip. 

//END of PART IV//