They are born of the soil, and they belong to the skies. Why I feel proud being a brushoo. Earlier this year, I visited a relative, he was a science teacher by profession. I was speaking in pure Burushaski ( language of Yasen) at least I was trying to sound like that.
There were signs of awkwardness on his face. He said to me ” dear you are an educated person and you are speaking in plain Burushaski“. His words startled me. Why would I contaminate my language with the language of the west “English” or with the language of the moghols “Urdu”.
Why every educated person take pride to contaminate his ancestors’ language. Why we are not proud of our culture, our mythology, our language? Why we are striving to ruin the culture which gave us a unique identity?
I feel pity on those people who have this uncensored hatred towards their uniqueness, towards their culture. I truly feel pity on those of my youth who take pride while speaking English or Urdu and adopting an alien culture.
You know we broshoo people were having a religion, it was said to be the Bon religion which existed in Tibet to this date. Today I was totally mesmerized when I read that 10% of Buddhists belong to the broshoo religion / the Bon religion.
Our broshoo people are said to be existed with their unique cultural aspects more then 10,000 years ago. Many of the vedic scriptures, and core ideas of both the Hinduim and Buddhism derived from the Bon religion.
The bon religion is expected to be existed when myths prevailed science and religion. Mythologies are not bad because they were the only source of hope to life at the time of the hunter-gatherers.
The stories which took the shape of myths were leading the people to live a life while worthly believing in a gleaming future. Here I will introduce some of the myths and customs which make the livings of the people thrilling and unique to other cultures.
Dokhna: In the words of Abdul Hameed Khan “dokhna is a mass of burning ashes and cinder containing some sprinkled flour, with wild herbal leaves and seeds of Qehqer( juniper branch), and Ispandoor(Isphand) . Dokhna has its spiritual and physical usage . The broshoo people in tribute to Nanishtaro(faires of mountains ) go through the processes of dokhna. There are myths that show that the Nanishtaro ( faires of the mountains) lead the broshoo people in times of difficulty and while hunting they assist the broshoo hunters.
There is also a legend behind the two villages’ names Yasin, it is said that there were two brothers namely Yasoo and thasoo from them derived the names of Yasen and thawoos respectively.To add on, there is a word Asaqal which means an elder person with great insight of the broshoo values.
Take pride in your values and customs and be the Asaqals of the time. The language of the broshoo people brushaski and its scriptures are said to be hidden rather than lost. But unfortunately we don’t have any linguist to study the language analytically and critically.
Furthermore, I want to shed some light on a very core and splendid custom of the Broshoo people of Gilgit.
It’s phataki dochom: its a traditional way to welcome the guest in a hospitable way to the home of the broshoo people . In succint words phataki dochom is sparkling some flour on the shoulders of the guest. This custom is believed to be of good omen ,in brushaski good omen called “penin manis“. Brushaski is an intricately and firmly formed language.
To sum up all my ideas, I direly wish my people, the broshoo people to take pride in their game bola(polo) rather then becoming obsessed with cricket or football. I wish the Broshoo people to feel proud in their customs and myths rather then emphasizing about Valentine’s day.
I truly appreciate the broshoo youth to be above their hights because they belong to the land where three mountain ranges come together under one sky(Hindukush, Himalayas, and Karakorum meet at one point near Joglot and Bonji) rather then feeling soothe about the gardens of babylon or the pyramids of Egypt.
It’s one of my dreams to see the Broshoo people depic the beauty of Giri(ibex) rather then becoming electrified about the Gujrati or Saraiki buffalo. O people of the broshoo ” You are the takht(throne) of this world” so stay revered and don’t feel agonised of the culture that exists in the domain of humanity.
Good luck
Worth reading. Precious thoughts. Proud of you.
A very succinctly and artistically written passage, having a plethora of information. Be blessed
Well explained
As a Hunzai Burusho I feel proud while speaking my mother tongue and teach different words to my friends. But I feel sad about how we are losing our unique identity with other languages and traditions. The population of Burusho people all across the global is about 1-5 million and in a world with population of 8 billion, if we’re not going to speak, teach our language who’s going to do that? No one