May 24 2007

UK Searches For Kazakhstan

Category: Kazakhstan — ChrisM @ 6:28 am

In case you care, here are this months top 100 searches involving Kazakhstan, for people searching from Britain.

kazakhstan
flight to kazakhstan
holidays to kazakhstan
kazakhstan hotel
kazakhstan map
kazakhstan adoption
in internship kazakhstan
helicopter kazakhstan services
kazakhstan embassy
kazakhstan flag
borat kazakhstan – impressively far down the list 🙂
almaty kazakhstan
car hire kazakhstan
travel kazakhstan
kazakhstan visa
weather in kazakhstan
kazakhstan airline
kazakhstan national anthem
kazakhstan jobs
education in kazakhstan system
kazakhstan woman
cheap call to kazakhstan
kazakhstan embassy london
cheap flight for kazakhstan
kazakhstan girl
lonely planet kazakhstan
where is kazakhstan
capital of kazakhstan
in kazakhstan search
kazakhstan fact
food in kazakhstan
football kazakhstan
anthem borat kazakhstan national
astana kazakhstan
jobs in kazakhstan
kazakhstan legislation
air kazakhstan
anthem borat kazakhstan
bird kazakhstan
kazakhstan airport
anthem borat kazakhstan lyric national
british embassy in kazakhstan
british embassy kazakhstan
kazakhstan currency
flower delivery kazakhstan
kazakhstan news
kazakhstan tourism
bank of kazakhstan
capital city of kazakhstan
kazakhstan history
time in kazakhstan
kazakhstan oil
kazakhstan property
kazakhstan tour
aksai kazakhstan
america benefit cultural glorious kazakhstan learnings make nation
chef in job kazakhstan
kazakhstan embassy in london
embassy of uk in kazakhstan
flower to kazakhstan
kazakhstan rocher yves
kazakhstan tv
almaty flight kazakhstan
atyrau in inspection job kazakhstan
china iran kazakhstan oil
kazakhstan culture
kazakhstan and economy
kazakhstan embassy uk
kazakhstan exchange rate
kazakhstan oil export
fitter kazakhstan mechanical
holidays in kazakhstan
in kazakhstan living
kazakhstan religion
flight to atyrau kazakhstan
national bank of kazakhstan
environmental kazakhstan law
holiday hotel kazakhstan state united
kazakhstan petropavlovsk
2 borat kazakhstan
anthem kazakhstan
coal kazakhstan mine
construction in kazakhstan
alliance bank kazakhstan
duty excise kazakhstan oil
environmental kazakhstan legislation
property for sale in kazakhstan
information on kazakhstan
kazakhstan lyric o
kazakhstan serbia
aktau kazakhstan
amazon kazakhstan
bane bo kazakhstan
call from kazakhstan uk
call to kazakhstan
card kazakhstan phone
country kazakhstan
country kazakhstan muslim
development in kazakhstan
tengiz kazakhstan

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 23 2007

Want To Learn English?

Category: Kazakhstan,Personal — ChrisM @ 7:47 am

If you are based in or around Astana, Kazakhstan, and want to learn English, you should definitely pay visit to English Advantage‘s site and their blog.

English Advantage

You will also find their site & blog very useful if you wish to attend a university over in America, or simply wish to learn more about the academic system over there. I particularly found the post on Everyday Manners and Customs in America interesting, as it reminded me of just how different some things are, over here in Kazakhstan.

THIS POST IS NOT SPONSORED … I just know the guy that runs it, and wanted to help him out with a little link love.

Tags: , ,

May 23 2007

Summary of the Goings On In Kazakhstan

Category: In The Media,Kazakhstan — ChrisM @ 3:24 am

Last week, a batch of amendments were announced, and if you are at all interested at how the situation in this country will be changing, I’d recommend reading some of the posts over at KZBlog (see the links page for the, well, err… link 🙂 )
If you’d like to read a summary of the changes, rather than a little more details, this particular post is most relevant – New Amendments Clarified in English.
The BBC also published an article on it here, cheers to ChrisD for sending me the link.
Next time one of you feels like moaning about the political system back home in America or the UK, have a quick gander over the ‘improvements’ on the table for RK…

Tags: , , ,

May 16 2007

Scary Times For Kazakhstan

Category: Aware Or Conspiracy Nut...,In The Media,Kazakhstan — ChrisM @ 3:45 am

I thought I’d already linked to KZBlog’s article on the case of a business man who was abducted and beaten, allegedly by a well known figure in Kazakh politics, but I couldn’t find it a moment ago. Anyway, see here.

Then there is the current legal proceedings related to extraditing a man from Russia, to Kazakhstan, where questionable mistakes/errors of judgement appear to have been made. Not only do independently audited records allegedly display that no crime was committed, the charges he was extradited for appear to have been replaced with others, despite this breaking the due process, if reports are valid. Check here.

Now we have the case of a KTK (a Kazakh TV channel) employee who was kidnapped, beaten and held in a cell. His treatment was so shocking that he suffered a stroke. Click here for more info and a further link to a Russian language article on the incident.

On a slightly more light-hearted note, I’ve just come across a picture which look embarrassing enough, without any kind of background information…

Bush Idiot

Apparently his Supreme Stupidness G W Bush had almost inferred that Queen Elizabeth II was more than 200 years old, and so decided to recover his embarassment by giving a WINK to the Queen!

Tags: , , , , , ,

May 14 2007

Went To Chelsea Again

Category: Eating Out,Friends,Kazakhstan — ChrisM @ 12:31 am

On Saturday night. Unfortunately Walton and Assel had a previous engagement, but Ira and I still had a good time. I ventured beyond my normal potato skins for a started, and had a tomato soup. Over here in Kazakhstan, soup is not soup unless it looks like water, has a few real vegetables in it, and a fair dollop of meat. Unfortunately, my ideal soup is basically creamy flavoured water. Unless it is cream of tomato or cream of chicken, I’m not too interested basically. Anyway, previously, I’d always said no the the idea of having a $12 soup of tomatoes as a starter, but as we were celebrating my first month of income from web sites in a while, I decided to try it out. Combined with a chocolate milk shake and a Baileys.
Then I had something labelled as lasagne. It certainly had meat, tomato paste/sauce, pasta and cheese, but it wasn’t quite arranged the same way. Anyway, it was too big for me to finish, wasn’t what I was expecting, but could have been a lot worse. The fact that it was quite so filling meant I had to skip the anticipated apple pie and ice cream, so I drowned my ‘sorrows’ with a few more vodkas.
Anyway, we’ll hopefully continue our Saturday night out pattern with Walton & Assel next week.

Tags: , , ,

May 12 2007

Whether The Weather Will Settle Down

Category: Kazakhstan,Personal,Pictures,Weather — ChrisM @ 6:44 pm

OK, so as I previously mentioned the weather has been a little changeable recently, however this week saw even more contrasts. First we had weather where you could walk around in t-shirt and shorts again, almost time to start retrieving the sun-block from the back of the cupboard. Nice.
Then, it starts to snow again! Having had such (relatively) high temperatures just previously, the snow obviously didn’t settle. I’m just hoping the weather is just getting all the gunge out of its system before Alex arrives, towards the end of June. She has hopefully sent off the form to get her visa, so we’re all really looking forward to her visit 🙂
Just hoping we don’t have weather like this when she gets here…

Sun Snow

OK, I’ve just looked at the picture properly, and you can’t really tell it was snowing, but trust me, they were proper, big snowflakes!

May 09 2007

At The In-Laws…

Category: Kazakhstan,Personal — ChrisM @ 3:46 pm

today, so apologies if I miss anyone online.

It is Victory day today, so we have Babushka with us as well. Ira and I popped to a shop to grab some food & drink for this afternoon, and we are hoping Dr. Natalya & Balzhan (and of course their respective families) will be coming over in a little over an hour.

Spraznekum to any veterans out there reading this 🙂

Tags: , ,

May 08 2007

Karra The Screen Blocker

Category: Dasha&Kittens,Pictures — ChrisM @ 7:12 pm

If you check the older pictures of Karra & Muska, there was a time when Karra could monitor my work on the PC, without blocking the screen…
Not anymore, unless she has some room made for her, and is encouraged to lie down, my work suddenly comes to a halt 🙂

Karra Next To The Screen Karra Lying Down Next To The Screen

Tags: , , ,

May 06 2007

Zen in the Art of Writing

Category: Books,Kazakhstan,Personal — ChrisM @ 11:21 pm

Zen in the Art of Writing – Ray Douglas Bradbury

If you’ve read either of the two Bradbury books that I’ve mentioned, or you are considering becoming a writer yourself, this book may well interest you.
The subject of writing is analysed (as well as a fair amount of self-aggrandising) and covered quite well. He makes mention of quite a few of his previous books, and just how he managed to write them, dealing with the typical gamut of writers problem – mental blocks & lack of faith in one’s self.
If you’re not interested in writing or didn’t like his books, you can safely give this one a miss.

For any readers who’ve come across this blog recently, this is an entry reviewing one of the books that I’ve read since coming to Kazakhstan, if you’re interested, you can see a list of the recent ones here:

Tags: , ,

May 06 2007

Chelsea Hosts Another Meeting

Category: Eating Out,Friends,Kazakhstan,Personal — ChrisM @ 7:57 pm

of English language bloggers and their partners…

Ira, myself, Walton and Assel all went to the Chelsea ‘English Pub’ (well they have a few UK football club shirts on the wall, and it is closer to a pub than a bar…) again on Saturday evening. Had a nice time, and the two men decided to limit themselves to sharing a 500ml bottle of vodka, with absolutely no ‘assistance’ from their wiser&better halves Spitting Out Drink 2.
We had quite good food there; the Chelsea has normally had good food, but the potato skins were bigger, and the burger tasted of meat more last night. The apple pie and ice cream has even now replaced the chocolate dessert as my favourite at that place.
Having said all that, the prices appeared to have increased, so it is probably a good thing we don’t go there too often.
Anyway, a summary of the evening, I hope, is that a good time was had by all, so thanks to Ira, Assel and Walton for their company 🙂

Tags: , , , , ,

« Previous Page — Next Page »