Kazakhstan Travel

Kazakh land is located in the centre of Eurasia, with the bright influence of nomadic, Soviet and modern times. The beginning of the world's largest endless pasture steppe, marked by waves of mountains, wildflowers and quiet towns. Travel cross-country on the modern-day Orient Express, crossing fields where freedom-loving tribes once tamed the wild horse.

On either side of this vast expanse stretching from the Caspian Sea to China are cities lined with remnants of the past and bold displays of innovative architecture, while country-sized national parks are lined with a myriad of natural colours that reflect every season.

The determined people of Kazakhstan, who are eager for their country and national values to be known by the world, welcome the visitors with open-heartedness and traditional hospitality.

History

Kazakhstan has been inhabited since the Paleolithic era. It developed in the Neolithic period, as the climate and terrain of the region were most suitable for a nomadic lifestyle.

Cossack lands were an important component of the Eurasian commercial Steppe Road, the ancestor of the terrestrial Silk Roads. Archaeologists believe that humans first domesticated the horse (ponies) in the region's vast steppes. In 329 BC, Alexander the Great and his Macedonian army fought along the Jaxartes River against the Scythians in the Battle of Jaxartes, now known as Syr Darya along the southern border of modern Kazakhstan.

Real political consolidation only began with the Mongol rule of the early 13th century. Administrative regions were established during the Mongol Empire, the largest in world history. These eventually came under the rule of the emerging Kazakh Khanate.

During this period, a traditional nomadic life and an economy based on livestock continued to dominate the steppe. In the 15th century, a separate Kazakh identity began to emerge among the Turkish tribes. This was followed by the Kazakh War of Independence, in which the khanate won its sovereignty from the Shaybanids. The process was reinforced by the emergence of the Kazakh language, culture and economy in the mid-16th century.

At its peak, the Khanate would rule parts of Central Asia and control Kumanya. In the early 17th century, the Kazakh Khanate was struggling with the influence of tribal rivalries. Political division, tribal rivalries, and the decline of the importance of land trade routes between east and west weakened the Kazakh Khanate. Khiva Khanate used this opportunity to annex the Mangishlak Peninsula. Uzbek domination there lasted for two centuries until the arrival of the Russians.

The Cossacks suffered from frequent raids of the Volga Kalmyks against them. After the Dzungar and Kalmyk raids, the Kokand Khanate exploited the weakness of the Kazakhs and conquered current Southeast Kazakhstan. In addition, the Emirate of Bukhara ruled Shymkent before the Russians gained dominance.

Beginning in the 1890s, an increasing number of settlers from the Russian Empire began to colonize the territory of present-day Kazakhstan. In the 19th century, about 400,000 Russians immigrated to Kazakhstan, and in the first third of the 20th century, about a million Slavs, Germans, Jews, and others immigrated to the region.

The competition for land and water between the Cossacks and the newcomers caused great resentment against the colonial administration in the last years of the Russian Empire.

On December 5, 1936, the Kazakh Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (whose territory until then corresponded to the territory of modern Kazakhstan) broke away from the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and formed the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic.

Kazakhstan declared its independence on December 16, 1991, thus becoming the last Soviet republic to declare its independence.

Abai Qunanbaiuly

Abai was born in 1845 as Ibrahim Qunanbaiuly in the family of a Kazakh head (Bij) in what is now East Kazakhstan in the Chingiz Mountains. Because of his intellectual abilities, he was nicknamed Abai - "the clever, the insightful", by which he later became known.

During childhood, Abai studied in the madrasah of Ahmed-Riza and at the same time in a Russian regional school. He started writing poetry at the age of 13. He was passionate about reading and learning about the works of Europe's great poets and writers. Alexander Pushkin, Michail Lermontow, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Lord Byron exerted a particularly strong influence on the young poet. The influence was so strong that he was the first to translate some of the works of the aforementioned poets into Kazakh.

Abai had to devote his youth to administrative work in his tribe, which he detested. In the early 1880s, he met some important Russian intellectuals who had been exiled to Kazakhstan for their liberal views. In the conversations with them and the uninterrupted self-study, Abai's views were finally formed.

In his early 40s, he started writing in earnest. His poems, aphorisms and philosophical writings also received great attention among Russians. Already during his lifetime, he was venerated among Kazakhs and the neighbouring peoples. People from all parts of the great steppe came to him for advice or to discuss things.

However, his frequent attacks on the patriarchal, conservative, semi-feudal social structures of the Kazakhs created many enemies among the upper class for him. The poet was the victim of denunciations, slander and even attacks.

The importance of Abai for Kazakh literature, culture and even the cultural development of the people is generally considered very high. In his poems, stories and pieces of music he used many genres and forms that were previously unknown in Kazakh literature and music. As a highly educated person who spoke many languages, he translated numerous classics of world literature into Kazakh and saw to it that new schools were opened in order to make this legacy of world culture accessible to broad sections of the population.

Abai also made the rejection of violence ("Iskander") an issue in his works and covertly criticized the autocracy. He dealt a lot with the Islamic philosophy of the middle Ages.

In modern Kazakhstan, Abai has become a national symbol. His writings have been translated into more than 60 languages. The city of Abai in the Karagandy area is named after him, and the Kazakh National Pedagogical University and the Abai Opera House in Almaty bear his name. The two-volume biography of the poet - The Way of Abai ("Abai shol") by Mukhtar Auezov is considered one of the best books in modern Kazakh literature.

In his hometown of Semei there is the Abai Qunanbaiuly Literature Museum in honour of the poet.

Kazakhs - first domesticated horses

An excavation in Kazakhstan in 2009 found evidence that horses were domesticated in the region about 5,500 years ago. The discoveries suggested that horses were ridden and milked by people living in the area around 1,000 years before it was believed that humans began using horses. Radiocarbon dating has revealed these remains to be around 5,500 years old - a much older period than the Ancient Egyptian Kingdom or ancient Sumerian Mesopotamian culture or even the Mohenjo-Daro civilization of modern Pakistan.

Equine sports and food products, the cradle of the once nomadic, horse-loving Kazakh national identity, are common. Kökpar, another version of the game of polo, is popular in the countryside. Kumys, fermented mare's milk, remains the favourite drink of spring, and no Kazakh feast would be complete without the thick slices of kazy (horsemeat sausage) that liberally adorned the table.

Strong evidence indicates that it was the Botai civilization that first domesticated the horse. Research and analysis of excavated pottery and other artefacts combined the idea that ancient inhabitants of present-day Kazakhstan used horses to assist them in their daily lives.

The horse, its symbolism and history are woven into the fabric of Kazakh culture and present-day Kazakhstan while the Great Steppe people domesticated horses thousands of years ago. The world cultural community recognizes the unique and special role that horses play in Kazakh culture. UNESCO has included Kazakh horse breeders' traditional Spring Festival Rites on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity (ICH).

New hippodromes and racetracks were opened in Almaty, the country's largest city, and in Nur-Sultan, the new capital of Kazakhstan. Equestrian centres have sprung up, and equestrian hiking in the country's national parks and mountains is among the popular pastimes.

Kazakhstan emerged from the mists of history as both the most modern and the oldest nation along the legendary Silk Road. Moreover, the long valued equestrian culture has been important to the advancement of humanity.

Kazakh traditional clothes

Kazakh clothing worn by Kazakh people is usually made of materials suitable for the extreme climate of the region and the nomadic lifestyle of the people. It is often adorned with elaborate ornaments made from bird beaks, animal horns, hooves, and feet. While contemporary Kazakhs generally wear Western clothing, Turkic people wear clothing that is more traditional on holidays and special occasions.

Traditional materials used in sweater clothing include fabric, leather, felt and fur. Embroidery, fur, jewellery and trim can also be used for decoration. Imported materials such as silk, brocade and velvet can also be used for clothing, but are more expensive than traditional materials. Traditional materials such as horse hair, fox fur, sheep wool and rabbit skin are used in the production of clothing.

Kazakhs usually use white wool and value the wool on the neck of the sheep. The feathers of the Bactrian camel are also used for more clothing that is luxurious. Imported cotton, silk and woollen fabrics were used by Kazakh nomads. Feudal nobles used imported fabrics to make their clothes; less affluent Kazakhs wore more readily available materials such as fur, leather, and homemade wool.

Kazakh traditional dress for girls and young women, locally called koilek. Kunikey koilek is made of light, fluffy material densely gathered at the waist. Usually unmarried girls wear it. The main type of outerwear was shapan. Kaptal is another model with warm lining. Another type is the fur-trimmed shabu. Zhargak shapan is for occasions and is appropriately decorated with ornamental patterns. The type of shoes common among Kazakhs were lightweight, tight-fitting boots without heels, called ichigi or masi. Leather kebis, which had to be postponed at the entrance of the house, were worn on them.

Wearing hats and caps is indispensable for Kazakh traditional clothing. By the type of headdress a person wore, they could tell which class they belonged to. Kalpak is stylish, useful and protects from heat in summer and cold in winter. Another traditional men's headdress is borik - a round warm headdress decorated with the fur of astrakhan otter, marten or raccoon. In the harsh winter cold, men wear the tymak, a three-bladed fur hat with a pair for the ears and a longer and wider cap towards the back for the rear head. One of the common male headdress models since ancient times is the kulapara, a type of headgear worn by hunters, berkutci and shepherds. The girls wore two types of hats: a skullcap (Takiya) and a warm hat (Borik) decorated with otter, fox or beaver fur. The Kazakh women's national bridal hat Saukele, which is a high (70 cm) conical hat, is especially important.

The National State Museum of Kazakhstan is a treasure house where you can find many wonderful examples of Kazakh traditional clothing. Here, clothes belonging to important figures of Kazakh history, batyrs, raiders and artists, especially the stage costumes of famous singers are exhibited.

Territory & Nature

Since Kazakhstan stretches on both sides of the Ural River, which is considered the line that separates the European continent, it is one of the two landlocked countries in the world that have lands on two continents (the other is Azerbaijan).

With an area of 2,700,000 square kilometres (1,000,000 sq mi) - the equivalent size of Western Europe - Kazakhstan is the world's ninth largest country and largest landlocked country.

The terrain of Kazakhstan stretches from the Caspian Sea to the Altai Mountains from west to east, and from the plains of West Siberia to the oases and deserts of Central Asia from north to south. With an area of approximately 804,500 square kilometres, the Kazakh Steppe covers one-third of the country and is the largest dry steppe region in the world. Large areas of grassland and sandy areas characterize the steppe. Major seas, lakes and rivers include Lake Balkhash, Lake Zaysan, the Charyn River and its strait, the Ili, Irtysh, Ishim, Ural and Syr Darya rivers, and the Aral Sea, until it largely dried up in one of the world's worst environmental disasters.

Kazakhstan has an "extreme" continental climate with hot summers and very cold winters. Indeed, Nursultan is the second coldest capital city in the world after Ulaanbaatar. Precipitation varies between arid and semi-arid conditions, with winters particularly dry.

Kazakhstan has ten nature reserves and ten national parks that provide safe havens for many rare and endangered plants and animals. Common plants include Astragalus, Gagea, Allium, Carex and Oxytropis; endangered plant species include native wild apple (Malus sieversii), wild grape (Vitis vinifera) and several wild tulip species (eg Tulipa greigii) and rare onion species Allium karataviense, as well as Iris willmottiana and Tulipa kaufmanniana. Kazakhstan's 2019 Forest Landscape Integrity Index average score was 8.23/10, ranking 26th out of 172 countries worldwide.

Common mammals include the wolf, red fox, corsac fox, deer, argali (the largest species of sheep), Eurasian lynx, Pallas cat, and snow leopard, some of which are protected. Kazakhstan's Red Book of Protected Species lists 125 vertebrates, including many birds and mammals, and 404 plants, including fungi, algae and lichens.