FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

VICE News

Bride Kidnapping in Kyrgyzstan

Thomas Morton travels to the Issyk-Kul region of Kyrgyzstan to investigate the Central-Asian tradition of bride kidnapping. In episode 1 we meet Kubanti, a young man who is determined to be married by sundown.

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. 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.