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VICE News

Bride Kidnapping in Kyrgyzstan

Kubanti's aunts work their charms on the kidnapped girl hoping to convince her that their family's boy (aka, her abductor) is Mr. Right.

In the Issyk-Kul region of Kyrgyzstan, tradition is king. Polo's still played with a freshly killed goat and the men still marry their women the old-fashioned way: by abducting them off the street and forcing them to be their wife. Bride kidnapping is a supposedly ancient custom that's made a major comeback since the fall of Communism and now accounts for nearly half of all marriages in some parts of the country. We traveled to the Kyrgyz countryside to follow/aid and abet a young groom named Kubanti as he surprised his teenage girlfriend Nazgul with the gift of marriage/kidnapping.

In part 3, Kubanti's aunts work their charms on the kidnapped girl hoping to convince her that their family's boy (aka, her abductor) is Mr. Right.