#79 Travelogue Kazakhstan: The Kazakh Dubai?
🇰🇿Kazakhstan is a nation blessed (or cursed?) with natural resources, and nowhere is this more evident than in Aktau, the Kazakh boomtown by the Caspian Sea. I can’t help feeling reminded of Dubai:
What’s the same?
The city is surrounded by desert and has a coastline. There’s a huge construction boom going on. People drive ridiculously good cars. The roads are wide and without a car you’re nothing. The buildings are huge and without air-condition you cannot survive.
What’s different?
The city feels quite empty. Apart from a few ‘mini markets’ you can’t find anywhere to shop and there’s basically no gastronomy, not even by the rocky beach. The palm trees are made of plastic and the areas between freshly built apartment blocks are still pieces of untouched desert. There are also close to no foreign workers or tourists.
No matter the luxury dump that Aktau is now, I’m sure we will hear more about it in the years to come.
👉@afandi_english👈 #travel #kazakhstan
🇰🇿Kazakhstan is a nation blessed (or cursed?) with natural resources, and nowhere is this more evident than in Aktau, the Kazakh boomtown by the Caspian Sea. I can’t help feeling reminded of Dubai:
What’s the same?
The city is surrounded by desert and has a coastline. There’s a huge construction boom going on. People drive ridiculously good cars. The roads are wide and without a car you’re nothing. The buildings are huge and without air-condition you cannot survive.
What’s different?
The city feels quite empty. Apart from a few ‘mini markets’ you can’t find anywhere to shop and there’s basically no gastronomy, not even by the rocky beach. The palm trees are made of plastic and the areas between freshly built apartment blocks are still pieces of untouched desert. There are also close to no foreign workers or tourists.
No matter the luxury dump that Aktau is now, I’m sure we will hear more about it in the years to come.
👉@afandi_english👈 #travel #kazakhstan