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| Page Views: 7,682 Last Visit to Astana: September, 2007 | AKMOLA -> TSELINOGRAD -> ASTANA by Pablos_new - last update: Mar 17, 2008 |
New Capital of Kazakhstan Akmola
TselinoGrad
Astana
Akmola, which could be translated from ancient Turk as "white grave" was a small willage in endless Kazakh steppe. In 1950-s Khruschev made a call: Everyone should go for uprising of virgin lands. And millions of peasants, mainly from Russia and Ukraine, moved with families into this wild and deserted country. For many of young people this was real chalenge and there were really very many volunteers and enthusiasts came here to build new life. Administrative center of the new region could not have such an unpleasant name and new town was named: Tselinograd. "Tselina" in Russian and Ukranian means "Virgin lands" (Virginia ;-))). |
| Headoffice of the local Oil and Gaz monopoly |
|  | After fall of the Soviet Union there was a wave of renaming of all Russian names (not only Soviet ones) in Northen Kazakhstan (even ancient Russian town Guriev was renamed). Name Akmola was returned, but not for too long time. To prevent splitting Kazakhstan into to parts (Russian-speaking and Kazakh-speaking), president Nazarbaev desided to move capital from Almaty (Alma-Ata) to the north. Name Akmola again apeared to be rather unpleasnat for that. And new giant and modern megapolis appeared on the world map - Astana.
I Kazakh this means just "a capital". |
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Comments for Pablos_new about Astana | | | | |
fabrice Mon Mar 17, 2008 08:52 UTC fascinating country , we have to visit , because we never hear about it | GyuriFT Mon Sep 4, 2006 11:13 UTC I also remember the "khruschevka" buildings being called... "khruschobina" - describes them also pretty well :-/ | victorwkf Fri Jun 30, 2006 09:35 UTC Good insight into the new capital of kazakhstan :) | yumyum Wed Feb 16, 2005 14:22 UTC I'm not sure whether I want to go there. Thanks for the info. |
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"Mukammal" 4* hotel in the center of Astana Internet, safe box, minibar
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