Folded up in a too small van with locals who couldn’t afford a plane ticket

Arriving in Almaty, Kazakhstan I received a similar treat: Angry looking customs officers, a long queue and even longer waiting times and an enormous supply potential of taxi drivers, willing to drive you from the airport to the city centre, asking height prices. In former USSR days, Almaty was the Kazakh capitol. Since ten years it is followed up by Astana; however Almaty still remains the commercial, cultural and financial centre of Kazakhstan. Therefore Almaty would be the best Kazakh hub for the coming period, especially because the city is located in the South East, near the Chinese and Kirgizstan border.



After a meeting and diner with my colleague and supervisor René Meeuws, where project progress was discussed, I could start to plan the further purpose of my stay. But off course also time had to be spend on touristic sightseeing, therefore I visited a museum with old Soviet musical instrument, a World War II monument and the Kök töbe cable car carrying passengers uphill presenting them a nice city panorama.

On Friday evening, 10pm, the night bus would transport me in a 15 hour trip, thousand kilometres southward to Karaganda, an industrial coal town located in the middle of the country. Karaganda would be my one-day-stopover on my route to Astana. During the trip I was able to get some insight in the road conditions, the insensitivity of road transport on this trajectory and state of on-route facilities. Part of my field research aims on visualizing the current infrastructural conditions and external influences on international trade in this region e.g. border cross situation and governmental policy. Travelling parts of the corridors’ trajectories is the simplest way to do so. Consequently I found myself folded up in too small vans with locals that were not able to afford a plane ticket.