The pain and gain in the Afghan game of buzkashi

In Pictures

Afghan rider Sarwar Pahlawan blinked away pain from the new stitches between his eyes as his buzkashi team chased tournament victory. The ancient sport is still steeped in risk but now offers modern-day rewards.

Played for centuries on the country’s northern steppe, the national sport, sitting at the heart of Afghan identity, has evolved from a rough rural pastime to a professionalised phenomenon, flush with cash.

“The game has changed completely,” the horseman, soon to turn 40, said after returning home victorious from the tournament final in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif earlier this month.

After 20 years as a buzkashi rider, or “chapandaz”, Sarwar welcomes the changes to the game, which is played across Central Asia and features elements akin to polo and rugby.

“They used to pay us with rice, oil, a carpet or a cow,” he said, but today the chapandaz have professional contracts.

The best players can now earn $10,000 per year, with winning teammates sharing $35,000, three camels and a car offered by sponsors after clinching the title.

Traditionally, buzkashi is played with the headless body of a goat.

Today, more often a 30kg (66lb) leather sack stands in for the carcass that riders try to pull from a fray of horses and drop in a “circle of justice” traced on the ground after doing a lap of the arena at full gallop with competitors in hot pursuit.

Training has changed too as the national league’s top teams have evolved.

Robust horsemen no longer hang from trees or split wood to build muscle – they lift weights in gyms.

“Before, when we returned from a tournament, cold water was poured on our shoulders, now we have hammams [bath houses] and saunas,” said Sarwar, known as “the lion” for his strength.

Bei