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0169 The Pulse of Asia : vol.1
The Pulse of Asia : vol.1 / Page 169 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000233
Citation Format: Chicago | APA | Harvard | IEEE

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After much discussion, a boy was sent to fetch both milk
and cream, while the host placed on the dirty cloth a metal
tray containing small pieces of bread and sugar. The bread
was in the form of cubes half an inch in diameter, such
as I had seen the plump, red-cheeked women cooking like
doughnuts in hot fat at the bottom of enormous iron bowls,
the sole cooking utensils. Among the strictest nomads bread
is a great rarity, and I have had the pleasure of giving a
piece to children who had never tasted it before. After the
tray was in place, our host took some china bowls from their
nest in a round wooden box, and having wiped them with
another greasy cloth, filled them with tea. By the time this
had cooled, the boy returned with news that his quest had
been successful. At his heels followed a fat Khirghiz house-
wife, who dived into the small woman's sanctum behind the
ornamented screen of reeds which invariably stands on
the right as one enters the door, and with a wooden ladle
scooped almost solid cream from a large wooden bowl into
a small china one, and then poured milk from a leather flask
into another smaller wooden bowl. As she handed the milk
and cream to one of the men, she saw that bread was needed
on the tray. Kneeling before a red and green leather-covered
box, she reached behind her heels for the silver-loaded
bunch of keys suspended from her long braid of straight
black hair, and, finding the proper key, took from its safe
repository a handful of carefully treasured bread. Now the
tea-drinking began, and it continued till the supply was ex-
hausted. Each guest had three or four bowls, but even that
was not enough, so each one finished with a wooden bowl of
"kumiss," the fermented milk that still remains one of the