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Published: April 26th 2015
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Yes, I spent 36 hours in the train! It was a comfortable train with berths to sleep on, including their linen, blankets and pillows. The people I met in the train, from my own compartment and also from neighbouring compartments, were very friendly and of course many of them took pictures with me. These people shared their food and drinks with me, even though it was not easy to communicate with most of them. A truly great experience with warm, friendly and hospitable Kazakh people.
After 36 hours I arrived in Aralsk and it was around 8am. My guide, Zhasulan, was already waiting at the station and he took me to my home-stay where I took a shower and had a nap on a proper bed. I was treated very well by the family and my stay included all the meals. I arranged everything via “Aral Tenizi”, an NGO dedicated to the revival of the North Aral Sea by supporting sustainable fishery and to improve the social, economic and ecological well-being of the fishermen and their families. The whole experience wasn’t really cheap but neither ridiculously expensive. I really wanted to do this, so I didn’t bother to pay the
money.
Aralsk has about 40.000 people and was once a thriving fishing town, until the Aral Sea started to dry out. In the 1960’s the Soviet Union decided to start irrigation projects on both rivers feeding the Aral Sea: “The Syr Darya in Kazakhstan and the Amu Darya in Uzbekistan”. Many canals were dug to divert the water towards plantation fields. Therefore, less and less water was flowing towards the Aral Sea and its water level started to shrink. Aral Sea had roughly the size of Netherlands and Belgium together but today only about 10%!o(MISSING)f the original size remains. Kazakhstan built a dam to separate North-and South Aral Sea and it improved the irrigation channels to prevent water loss and to increase the flow towards the sea. This helped the North Aral Sea to grow! A lot of fish returned to the sea and the amount of fishermen is on the rise. Hopefully Aralsk will be on the shore of the Aral Sea again soon. So yes, there is hope for the people living around the Aral Sea, which is good news! In the afternoon Zhasulan drove me a little bit around town. Aralsk looks a bit
like a depressing and forgotten place, most things look old or lacking maintenance....I don’t how to explain better. The town looks really "weird" hahah. Zhasulan took me to a museum, located where Aralsk’s harbour used to be. It’s a small building with a ship next to it. From here I was able to see the rest of the “harbour” with abandoned cranes, wharfs and warehouses. They are all witnesses of the glory days in Aralsk, when the harbour had water. It was a cold day in Aralsk when I arrived: -5°C during the day (and it was a sunny day!) and -8°C in the night. The next day was much better though. If I was getting attention in Almaty because of my skin colour, just imagine how it was in a place like Aralsk. Again many people took pictures with me and I definitely was the most popular guy in town for those two days! I’m very sure that most people in Aralsk, especially those who never left the area, have never seen a black person before.
The disappearance of the Aral Sea is considered one of the worst environmental disasters ever. Indeed, how stupid can people be?
It was obvious since the beginning that the irrigation projects would have serious consequences for the Aral Sea, yet they continued with the plan. This irrigation projects and its canals (of which the majority of the water is leaking, especially in Uzbekistan) were mainly meant for cotton plantations and Uzbekistan became one of the major cotton exporters in the world. Well, that’s good for them but really bad for the thousands of people who lost their jobs and source of income with the disappearance of the Aral Sea. At least Kazakhstan is trying to recover the northern part of the sea but Uzbekistan is not interested at all to recover the southern part. They actually prefer to do some oil-and gas exploration instead.
Aralsk is not a place for real tourism, if you understand what I mean. There is nothing special to see and do in Aralsk and tourist infrastructure is virtually non-existent. There is only one hotel in town, right at the station. Because I’m a Geography teacher I really wanted to see this area with my own eyes. The next day I drove with Zhasulan towards the Aral Sea area. The whole area is a desert,
here and there you can spot some camels. There was some snow too which made the scenery really beautiful. It’s just one vast emptiness you’ll be driving through. First we went to the village of Tastubek. Wow, what a bumpy ride that was. Seriously, it was really bad since there isn’t an actual road. From the village of Jambul, where we drove through first, it took an hour to get to Tastubek. The village lies close the current shore of the North Aral Sea. First we had lunch with a family, which consisted of “plov”. They put one huge plate on the table with many forks and everyone ate from the same plate. This is a very common way of eating in Kazakhstan. After lunch we went near the shore of the North Aral Sea, which was frozen and all the fishermen boats were turned upside down waiting to be used again after the water melts. I think most people know the expression “s***hole”, well Tastubek is the perfect description for that, I tell you. It’s so isolated, so difficult to get to (if it’s muddy or there is a lot of snow, it’s really hard to reach) and after
Tastubek there is nothing else!!! There are maybe 20 houses in the village (not much more) and I was really wondering WHAT people do there. There is absolutely nothing going on, seriously! It was nice to go there but I don’t know I ever want to go there again....I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. The village of Jambul is much less of a “hole” since it’s easier to reach and they have a school etc. From Jambul we drove to Zhalanash shipyard. A couple of years ago there were still several abandoned ships sitting on the ground, which used to be the bottom of the Aral Sea. Unfortunately, most of the ships have been sold for scrap metal and I was only able to see the remnants of three ships. It looked so strange, surreal, interesting, bizarre and sad at the same time. I was standing there, where the crew on these ships used to fish in a big sea that dried out! Will the sea ever reach its original size? NO, I don’t think so! Only the northern part in Kazakhstan would grow and hopefully reach the harbour of Aralsk one day.
I took a
train in the evening back to Almaty, but it took 33 hours this time. But the journey seemed longer because I was tired and had some headache. Once in Almaty, I stayed one more night at Bek’s place and I flew out the next day. Up to another “Stan” in the next blog!
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Ake Och Emma
Ake Dahllof and Emma Holmbro
Oh so cool!
Yep, must go there! So cool to see boats miles away fron the sea/Ake