Kazakhstan: Monuments, Economics, Gender and Media · Global Voices
Adil Nurmakov

The blogosphere of Kazakhstan was not too keen to discuss perturbations in the official government. The traditional May holidays have become a naturally most popular theme, however many other issues were also traced by the bloggers.
Thus, pycm posts a photo of the Eternal Fire monument in Atyrau, a city also called as the Kazakhstan’s oil capital. The Eternal Fire memorials were erected in all major cities of the Soviet Union in commemoration of the victims and soldiers of the WWII. Quite often, and especially in 1990s (years of economic hardships) the flame was not actually burning in the center of the five-point star. But the fresh picture from Atyrau shows that it’s not there again:
“The fire is not burning. The oil capital of Kazakhstan lacks natural gas, memory and conscience”, pycm says [ru].
The monument issue is supported by pr-odin, who tells about the plan to erect a monument of charity in the capital city of Astana. The monument is expected to be dedicated to the city’s tenth anniversary this summer, and the initiators are currently gathering money contributions:
“Does it have anything to do with charity?… By the most conservative estimate, it will cost 1-2 hundred thousands dollars… Can you imagine how many really good deeds could have been done with such budget, which will be used for the Monument of Hypocrisy” [ru].
Another strange monument is a sculpture of Charlie Chaplin in Kustanai (Northern Kazakhstan). Nurgeldy notes the strangeness of the very fact of its appearance in the city, where the only one movie theatre (which reportedly had the largest screen in the country) was demolished last year.
Many bloggers keep on worrying – and they really have sound reasons to do so – about economic situation and endemic rise in prices. Eev asks why food gets more expensive:
“I can understand the rise in prices for clothes and cosmetics”, she says. “It’s because euro’s rate has jumped up, so the European goods have become a profusion. But what happened to bread, sugar, milk and cereals?” [ru].
The question aroused a lively discussion, in which renovated proposed an original answer:
“It’s all very simple – those who sell bread, sugar, milk and cereals also want to buy expensive stuff and European cosmetics” [ru]
Small-horsy shares her observations concerning the influence of crisis developments on an entity – similar symptoms are experienced by many businesses that used to serve the chilled market:
“Customers don’t have money to pay for the projects, and they offer barter… The scope of work has sharply reduced, many employees were to go to the vacations, including non-paid ones” [ru].
Meanwhile, megakhuimyak warns that May is not only the month of holidays, but also a month when the financial year ends:
“Banks and other financial institutions sum up their accounting. As of now, six principal banks acknowledged failed credits to the sum of  $1,179 billion. Let’s see what the other will say. The most sexy stuff will come up in the end of year” [ru].
Aslili supports the female MP, who came out against the polygamy amendment, proposed by a group of parliamentarians [ru]. The very fact of such discussions taking place in the single-party Legislature against the background of serious socio-economic problems causes at least sorrow. Meanwhile, m-kaa continues the gender thematique, opining on the perspectives of marriage contract in Kazakhstan. He emotionally argues that the level of family and marriage relations in Kazakhstan is higher than in the Western countries [ru].
The sphere of media and Internet is traditionally covered in blogs. The LiveJournal community journalistkz discusses migration of the print and web-based media, which faced obstacles in reaching their readership, into the blogosphere [ru]. Blogs – a free and unmediated tool to reach out to the audience – is really becoming a simple solution for them. Hackuna reports that the Kazakh state ICT agency intends to involve Yandex JSC – a leading Internet company in Russia – into development of the Kazakh sector of the worldwide web [ru]. And epolet reproaches the Kazakhstani TV channel Caspionet, which makes a broadcasting abroad:
“The weather forecast should be edited. Montenegro has to be displayed as a separate state, not as united Serbia and Montenegro, in order to avoid shame for our television” [ru].
Also posted on neweurasia