My sister's husband wants to move to Kazhakstan.

He's in the uranium business. I hope my sis doesn't want to go. It is a completely different world over there, and I doubt she could adjust very well at all. She has personal health issues that affect her social abilities. (She is over 50, talks constantly, poor sensibilities, etc, like she is manic or something.)

I'm hoping that they either divorce or come to an agreement about him living over there while she stays in the US.

Anyone have any experience with Kazhakstan?

I'm an awful person.

:blush:

I'm terrible!

That show....was strangely funny, I still don't know how I feel about it.

They're in some anti-west fit right now...no physical just legal and social. Not a good idea.

Kind of "assbackwards and sliding further downhill socially/economically." as the one put it.

Borat wasn't too far off...

yikes. Met a guy yesterday who just joined the Peace Corps. He's leaving in the next few weeks. Red headed as could be.

Kazakhstan fries a lot of food in oil, not people. :shrug:

I spent a year in the former Yugoslavia, and I can tell you horror stories.

I've spent two and a half years in Bulgaria. I'm still kicking.

The former Yugoslavia is generally what I'd like to consider the asshole of Europe.

Slovenia and Croatia aren't that bad (now). Macedonia is still pretty backward. I haven't been to Serbia and Bosnia since college (late 80s). I really liked Sarajevo, Belgrade not so much.

The Ural Mountains are traditionally considered to be the eastern border of Europe. If you look on a map, you'll notice that a big chunk of Kazakhstan lies west of the Urals, making it a country that straddles both Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

The Ural Mountains one is an old one.

Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe#Definition

Politically (not part of the EU or Council of Europe) and for the most part geographically (that big chunks is still only a small part of a larger country) Kazakhstan is not part of Europe. It's techincally "both" in some cases.

Ethnically, I highly doubt they consider themselves European.

I never said that it was part of the EU, but the EU is a recent thing and I clearly said the "traditional" definition of Europe. You're talking politics, and I'm talking subcontinents.

My understanding is that Kazakhstan is a very diverse country, with some parts feeling almost like Russia (e.g., eastern Europe), others like Asia and even the middle east. I suspect that, if you asked the people in the Russian parts of the country whether they're Central Asian or European, they'd say European.

It's a hard country to pidgeonhole simply because it's so large. Looking at that wiki entry, it's the largest landlocked country in the world (I'll store that bit of trivia in case I ever get to meet Alex Trebeck).

would be miserable! I was in Turkey about 13 years ago and got very sick. The people were really great and, back then, Americans were still well-liked, but the Turks weren't "family". I have relatives in Poland, a friend in the Czech Republic, and contacts in Finland, so I would be more inclined to move to one of those places, if I needed to bail-out of this country, (say, in the event that the worst happens and McCain gets elected), but I would need to "have people" already there, where ever "there" is!

...Kazakhstan's (fake) national anthem, continued:

Kazakhstan number one exporter of potassium.
Other countries have inferior potassium.

Kazakhstan home of Tinshein swimming pool.
It’s length thirty meter and width six meter.
Filtration system a marvel to behold.
It remove 80 percent of human solid waste.

Kazakhstan, Kazakhstan you very nice place.
From Plains of Tarashek to Northern fence of Jewtown.
Kazakhstan friend of all except Uzbekistan.
They very nosey people with bone in their brain.

Kazakhstan industry best in world.
We invented toffee and trouser belt.
Kazakhstan’s prostitutes cleanest in the region.
Except of course for Turkmenistan’s.

Kazakhstan, Kazakhstan you very nice place.
From Plains of Tarashek to Norther fence of Jewtown.

Come grasp the mighty penis of our leader.
From junction with the testes to tip of its face!

First, understand that Kazakhstan is HUGE, and that there are few commonalities througout the country. Kazakhstan is the same size as all of western Europe. The northern part tends to be heavily Russian influenced and has a feel similar to most of Russia and Eastern Europe. Southern Kazakhstan has a more middle eastern feel, and Islamic cultural values underpin much of the lifestyle and way people behave. They aren't "all women must be veiled" conservative, but they did get upset when his wife started arguing with him in public. Apparently it was considered inappropriate for a woman to act that way, and several total strangers made comments to him and his wife about it. Other than that, the people were generally friendly throughout the country.

Second, understand that Kazakhstan is a fairly corrupt and decidedly unfree country. They're technically a democracy, but the leadership likes to arrest people who oppose them, so they conveniently get re-elected every time. Speaking against the government can get foreigners arrested and ejected from the country without trial. His group was warned before entering the country to NEVER discuss politics with the locals, and to avoid even discussing American politics. Bribery is everywhere, and there are lots of people who will smile at you and discuss what's wrong with their country, and then run to the police and report you as a foreign troublemaker in the hopes of getting a payoff. It's not a good situation.

The corruption problem also means that you should keep small amounts of cash on you when visiting the country...to bribe police and others who might harass you. He described, for example, one situation where his tourbus (travelling between hiking sites) was stopped at a bridge behind about 10 others for a security check. The driver of the truck in front of his bus told them that he'd been there over four hours. The people in front of him even longer than that. His bus driver turned around and instructed all of the passengers to place about $10 US in their passports when the police officers came onboard to check them. When the police boarded 10 minutes later, the took the passports and returned them without the cash. The bus was allowed to leave a couple of minutes later.

Not a place I'd like to live. Kyrgyzstan, on the other hand, was described as a stunningly beautiful and friendly country that would be a world class tourist destination if it weren't so hard to get to.

After Mining Deal, Financier Donated to Clinton

By JO BECKER and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
Published: January 31, 2008
Late on Sept. 6, 2005, a private plane carrying the Canadian mining financier Frank Giustra touched down in Almaty, a ruggedly picturesque city in southeast Kazakhstan. Several hundred miles to the west a fortune awaited: highly coveted deposits of uranium that could fuel nuclear reactors around the world. And Mr. Giustra was in hot pursuit of an exclusive deal to tap them.

Unlike more established competitors, Mr. Giustra was a newcomer to uranium mining in Kazakhstan, a former Soviet republic. But what his fledgling company lacked in experience, it made up for in connections. Accompanying Mr. Giustra on his luxuriously appointed MD-87 jet that day was a former president of the United States, Bill Clinton.

-snip

snip

"Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, whose 19-year stranglehold on the country has all but quashed political dissent."

"Mr. Nazarbayev walked away from the table with a propaganda coup, after Mr. Clinton expressed enthusiastic support for the Kazakh leader’s bid to head an international organization that monitors elections and supports democracy."

-snip

Just months after the Kazakh pact was finalized, Mr. Clinton’s charitable foundation received its own windfall: a $31.3 million donation from Mr. Giustra that had remained a secret until he acknowledged it last month. The gift, combined with Mr. Giustra’s more recent and public pledge to give the William J. Clinton Foundation an additional $100 million, secured Mr. Giustra a place in Mr. Clinton’s inner circle, an exclusive club of wealthy entrepreneurs in which friendship with the former president has its privileges.

LINK:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/31/us/politics/31donor.html