My Wedding Ceremony in Kazakhstan

My name is Mika. I am from Kazakhstan and finally got married to my boyfriend on March, 4th, 2017 after 10 years of Dating!!! So, I decided to write about the Kazakh Wedding Culture since I have lots of foreigner friends who ask me about it a lot.

First of all, in order to get married, you have to get blessings and financial support from your parents, which is kind of the same in Asian Countries, like Korea. To get engaged the parents of the groom have to visit bride’s house and show their intention to be bound as a family by wearing the earrings on to the future bride. That’s a ceremony of engagement in western countries, but the difference is we use the earrings instead of engagement rings.

After I got the earrings our family started preparations for the wedding. We had two big ceremonies. The first one is called “Kyz Uzatu toy” which means the family of the bride officially giving away their precious daughter to a new family. In my case, we made it in a restaurant where were invited all the bride’s family and friends. For this ceremony, only a few people from the groom’s side were invited. Usually, it is feasting with some good food, drinks, and music. At the end of the ceremony before 12 a.m. groom takes the bride to his home. You know the part of the ceremony in the western wedding where the father passes the daughter to the groom, in Kazakh wedding 2 zhenge (the elder brother’s wives) takes the bride's hands and sing the goodbye song called “Syngsu”. They make the special white road for that called “Ak Zhol” from the bride’s house to the car, in my case from the restaurant to the car which symbolizes the new beginning to a new family.

Usually, the wedding day begins in the morning when friends of the groom and bride rent the luxury cars beautifully decorated with ribbons and balloons. They go to the wedding hall where they register their marriage officially and get the marriage certificate. There in the presence of an authorized official and witnesses, the groom and bride agree on being the husband and wife, and exchange rings. After that, they go to the mosque to get approval from the Mullah. In my case, we did this part in the separate day because we wanted to enjoy the whole marriage preparation as long as we could. But generally, to save the time and budget, they do it in one day.

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At the evening around 7 p.m., the groom and bride with friends arrive at the rented restaurant where the rest guests are. Here they start the ceremony with the walking in of the groom and bride with their groomsmen and bridesmaid.
The main point is that the bride’s face is covered with the veil.

After that the ceremony called “betashar” (opening the veil) starts. The most respected person called “Akyn” composes the song and makes the bride to greet bowing the groom’s relatives and friends. And whenever “Akyn” mentions the name of the relative or friend they come and give money to show the willingness to open the veil and see the bride’s face.

As long as the list of guests is over the “Akyn” reveals the face of the bride using the national instrument called “Dombra”.

And then all fun and eating feast starts. We enjoyed it a lot. We usually hire professional MC to host the wedding. During the ceremony all guests have the opportunity to speak out laud their blessings and wishes to the newly married couple.