Began the day in Almaty with a visit to the Central State Museum which turns out to be a very interesting place. We first reviewed a map of Kazakhstan and talked about its geography, history, agriculture and political issues. Kazakhstan is the 9th largest country in terms of landmass (with a pop 16mill) and spans the northern expanse of all the other 'Stans we'll be visiting. The people of the region are all of Turkic origin (with the possible exception of the Tajiks) and speak similar Turkic languages. The other Turkic people are the Tuvans (now part of Russia) and the Huighurs (of China). Heard about the devastating environments and ecological disasters that have befallen Kazakhstan including years of above-ground nuclear testing in the NE/Seven-Rivers part of the country by the Soviets (ended in 1989) and soil depletion from cotton growth (again dictated by the Soviet Union). I hadn't known that Kazakhstan was a major center of Soviet gulags during the 1950s; both Solzynytzen (sp?) and Dostoyevsky were imprisoned here. Apparently the Gulag Archipelago was based on Solzynytzen's experience here.
In the galleries we saw magnificent gold items - jewelry, daggers, horse harnesses - all excavated from archaeological sites in the country. We saw a representation of the famous "Golden Man" dug up from a grave site here. He is believed to be the figure of 20 year old man whose leather clothing was completely adorned with gold decorations including indigenous snow leopards. One room had lovely examples of nomadic textiles, jewelry, a yurt and items that would have been used inside the yurt including rugs.
Typical of what I think we'll experience throughout the 'Stans were exhibition cases with either poor lighting or no lighting at all. We suspect (based on comments made by our guide) that entry fees paid are pocketed by employees or officials and not used for the upkeep of the museum. We tried to stop in the museum gift shop but couldn't get the women who worked in the museum to open it. It wasn't lunchtime. There was no reason it couldn't or shouldn't be open. I guess these are examples of the lingering effects of years of Soviet domination.
In the afternoon we visited various Soviet monuments (well, not really Soviet, because those have supposedly all been done away with since K became an independent country) but they look just like Soviet monuments.
My favorite stop in the afternoon was at a wooden church, the Zenkov Cathedral (1904) which during Soviet years was used as the site for the Central State Museum. After Independence it was returned to use as a church and completely redecorated. Not only was it lovely inside, but it was interesting seeing women coming in to light candles and pray.
The Kazakh people are ethnically Mongol. The rest are either of European descent or Russian. The Mongol face is angular with extremely high cheekbones. Almaty is the business capital of Kazakhstan and is presumably the most sophisticated and urbane of all cities here. Women's fashions would certainly suggest that - just about everyone wears tight slim-leg jeans, high heels, tight t-shirts - in a word clothes that westerns would wear. I think I'd expected to see muslim women in conservative dress and hear scarves and I have seen a few, but the overwhelming majority of women I've seen so far wear modern clothing.
If this is the most cosmopolitan city of the Stans look forward to future posts. Avoid areas marked as radioactive. Can you bribe people to open stores? Notice a lack of discussion of food and drink. If there was anything you want to buy do they accept American Express?
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