FREEFORUM

Report from Chicago. The Irad Day banquet was on Saturday in the Mission hall, about 190 people. Beshbarmak (beef), Mrs. O's plov, beet suzma, both anthems, a bata from the pastor, and the raffle (a shyrdak, won again by a family that already has two).

We toasted Talas, Nurzhan, Iyık Janyl and the valleys. And FREECHAT, quietly. How did others mark the day?

In Talas we marked it with a parade for the Governor and a power cut for everybody else. Your raffle sounds better. I will not fill the form.

There is no form for the banquet. ...Yet.

Toronto: potluck in the parish hall, 34 people, one komuz, one guitar pretending to be a komuz. The kids sang the anthem from Iradi words written in English letters on the back of a calendar.

11 March 1992 I was in the square with my wife. Snow. Nobody had a flag, so a woman cut one from a tablecloth. Wherever you are today, that is the day. Not the parades.

olddog, somebody has to film this. I am serious. The tablecloth.

Moscow: the Jerdeshteri people did a small evening. Speeches, one singer from Nurzhan, and an argument whether to sing the anthem first or the Neftchi song. Neftchi song won. Not proud.

Proud.

This year the Irad Day friendly in Talas is suspended. We have not sent a Chicago team in many years (Danny's penalty in 1998 is still our only goal, and he still tells it), but every March some of the old players watched whoever was playing on a laptop in the Mission kitchen. Not this year. The banquet goes on. After this February it feels like more than a dinner.

Toronto: the biggest Irad Day we've ever had. 120 people. Half came because of the news. A Canadian neighbour asked "is this a protest or a party?" Yes.

I drove to Chicago for the banquet. Mr. Temir put me at the head table, I tried to refuse, he said in Irad you don't refuse the tör. I ate four plates of beshbarmak. I got a feedback form. I gave it 5/5. Irad satylbayt.

TD_fan_Ohio posted:

I got a feedback form.

WE DID NOT. STILL NO.

Banquet 2026: 205 people. At the toasts somebody asked us to drink to "the Governor, wherever he is". There was a long silence. Then the pastor said "to the health of all the sick", and everybody drank. That is how we do it in Chicago.