The Central Asian Studies RIW is hosting an end of the semester celebration centered around both food and film. On December 12th from 4:00pm to 6:30pm in Tisch 1014 we will have both plov and boorsoks. Plov, or osh in Uzbek, is a dish that consists mainly of rice, meat (beef or  lamb), carrots, and, often, garlic. It can vary immensely not only country to country inside of Central Asia, but city to city, or even village to village.  Meanwhile, boorsak is a type of small fried bread made in Kyrgyzstan and Central Asia. One might have it with a bit of sugar, jam or simply plain as is. Both plov and boorsok are typical foods to be found at celebrations in Central Asia (be they the welcoming of guests, the successful defense of a dissertation, or a wedding).  Our celebration will mark the end of the semester and also our first "film night" (a tradition we will aim to continue annually). All of plov and boorsok will be prepared by   Baktygul Chynybaeva, a current Knight-Wallace  at the University of Michigan and a correspondent for Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty’s Central Newsroom in Prague. 
In addition to the food ( which will again will consist of plov, boorsok and some additional snacks), we will watch and then have a casual discussion of the 2014 Kyrgyz film , Kurmanjan Datka: Queen of the Mountains (trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIjhRQUsj_8 ). This film  centers around the real figure of Kurmanjan Datka: a Kyrgyz political leader born into the Mungush clan in the Osh region (now the south of modern-day Kyrgyzstan) , she was known as the Altai Queen and ruled during the Russian empire's annexation of this region and the remnants of the Kokand Khanate in 1876. Statues to this important historical figure can be found in the modern-day cities of Bishkek and Osh in Kyrgyzstan, and she also appears on the 50 Kyrgyz Som banknote. The movie, which will have English subtitles, will focus on Kurmanjan Datka's path to power, herdealings with the Russians, and reactions to her sons' discontent with Russian rule. The film will run 2 hours and 11 minutes long. We will plan to start the film at 4:05 and then have a brief, casual (and ideally fun) conversation following the film. Via the film, we will hope to touch on topics ranging from 19th century politics, to gender, to why a film regarding a Russian invasion might have been made in Kyrgyzstan in 2014.