KZBlog

Tag archive for ‘Holidays’

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  65 Year Old Acrobat

  Another shot of Astana Day. In the park, a group of Uzbeks set up a little circus which is my second favorite part of Astana Day. They’re usually there at other times over the summer too, so you may not have missed them. Pretty good for traveling carnival workers. They make their money by asking […]

  7/11/10 • (Comments Off on 65 Year Old Acrobat)

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  Riding Back Saddle

  Another shot from this year’s celebration of Astana Day. This trick riding looks impressive but is also an important set of skills in battle and hunting. From this position, the rider can avoid enemy arrows or swords and also lean back far enough to pick up a fallen colleague or lost weapon from the ground […]

  7/09/10 • (Comments Off on Riding Back Saddle)

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  Medvedev Twitter Makes Some Noise

  Some of you may have heard this by now, but President Medvedev of Russia wrote a Happy Birthday congratulations to Nazarbayev on his Twitter feed: Interesting that they provide an English-language translation of his feed, suggesting that either the feed is more for foreigners or that he wishes to appear hip and cool by speaking […]

  7/08/10 • (Comments Off on Medvedev Twitter Makes Some Noise)

• Nothing Happened

  So despite the rumors, another Astana Day/President’s Birthday passed and 1) Nazarbayev did not step down or announce his plans to do so, 2) Massimov, the Prime Minister, was not dismissed, 3) No ministers were fired or radical new reforms to the government announced. The two most exciting things to happen were the opening of […]

  7/08/10 • (Comments Off on Nothing Happened)

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  Movie Festival

  Beginning June 27th for Astana Day, Astana will be hosting an international action film festival. Timur Bekmambetov is one of the organizers and apparently Mike Tyson, Dolph Lundgren and Milla Jovovich are coming to Astana. They’re showing a lot of interesting films. In particular, I’m looking forward to seeing Shanghai, Tyson, Sukiyaki Western Django, The […]

  6/17/10 • (Comments Off on Movie Festival)

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  Happy Victory Day

  Today is the 65th anniversary of the surrender of Nazi Germany in World War II or the Great Patriotic War. Victory in Europe Day is celebrated on the 8th of May, but the former Soviet countries celebrate Victory Day on the 9th of May. Apparently Stalin insisted that because the Soviet Union had contributed more […]

  5/09/10 • (Comments Off on Happy Victory Day)

• April Fools

  My earlier post, Capital Moving, was an April Fool’s joke. If my dictionary is to be believed, the name of the MP I “quoted” means “No one”. I also tried to write his voice in bad Russlish translation. The gazeta.kz story id was 00000. And of course the last quote was completely out of tone with the rest of his speech and hopefully reminiscent of The Onion or some such satirical source.

  From the comment count, my fooling rate was 50/50 or one of each. So not too bad.

  4/02/10 • (4)

• You know it’s Nauryz in Astana

  …When it only snows twice in one day and the temperature gets all the way up to freezing! Everyone knows that Nauryz in Astana is always cold and rainy. For the past five years I’ve been here, it’s the same thing. This year, it was cold and snowy. Everyday this week it has snowed, and […]

  3/23/10 • (Comments Off on You know it’s Nauryz in Astana)

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  Nauryz! Nauryz!

  Happy Nauryz!! Nauryz meriam kuti bolsyn!

  3/21/10 • (Comments Off on Nauryz! Nauryz!)

• If You Make 70 Gifts for 70 Years, I’ll Fire You

  In another part of the President’s speech yesterday he noted that gift-giving is something that has to stop. Nursultan Nazarbayev noted that there is no budget item for gifts for fellow civil servants and threatened to report people who give too many gifts:
  Gazeta.kz quotes the President, “Accounts Committee, regularly reports to me about the most serious violations. People buy expensive cars, expensive electronic devices and begin to furnish their offices, buying expensive furniture. It’s a waste of everything.”

  3/13/10 • (1)

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