Dispatches from Kazakhstan?? Kirby Liu, '09 (wrote on September 13, 2009) I am in the Republic of Kazakhstan for the next year and a half for a Fulbright grant. I just arrived last week and am still adjusting to the lifestyle here. It gets really cold here (much colder than Hanover) so I am having my mother send me my winter coat but since the government is so corrupt here, the postal service doesn't work because I've been told that mail theft is not only common, it is to be expected. Its strange -- for a nation that only has 15 million people and a vast amount of capital from the West for developing the country's energy sector and mineral sector, people live a very modest lifestyle at exorbitantly high prices. For example, I bought a little thing of black pepper for 12 dollars US! I live in a nice neighborhood but my apartment looks very run down and still the rent is fairly expensive. I asked my land lady why is it that Kazakhstan is such a wealthy nation in many respects but the living standards have not really risen to reflect that. She replied that the government is very corrupt here -- Nazarbayev (who is more or less a dictator) and his family pretty much own all of the country's capital resources. For example, his first daughter owns the ENTIRE media sector. His second daughter owns the rights to most of the petroleum reserves of the entire country. She said that the Soviet era was far superior to the current government if you compare the provision of public services like the post service, hospitals and police protection. Now, all the nation's wealth is monopolized by the Nazarbayev family and his cronies.
Kazakhstan is actually the 9th largest country in the world by land mass and extremely sparsely populated. Even still, I am surprised that there are pollution problems on the scale of China's -- the air quality and water quality is probably worse here than in China where I had been l living during the summer. I am not exactly sure what the deal is -- I have read that Kazakhstan just pays lip service to organizations like the WHO and different environmental regulation agencies and that really everything is more or less a free for all here.
All in all, I am very happy I am here for the next year and a half. I feel like I have learned so much already and I have only been here a week. Some of the experiences I have had here are overwhelmingly positive whereas others have really made me question whether or not I will be able to stick it out here for the full 16 months. That's probably pretty typical for culture shock.
I hope all is well in Hanover and that you have a great group of kids to work with. I really miss Dartmouth!
Oana Castu, '07, (wrote on July 21, 2009) I am currently working in finance in NY. I am an 3rd Year Analyst in the Credit Risk Management and Advisory Group at Goldman Sachs.
Michael Jennings, '72, (wrote in August of 2008) has taught at Princeton since 1981; his teaching and research focus on European culture in the twentieth century. In addition to literature, he teaches on topics in cultural theory and the visual arts, with special emphasis on photography.
Nancy Kricorian, '82 (wrote in July of 2008), is a writer and political activist. She has published two novels (ZABELLE and DREAMS OF BREAD AND FIRE) and is at work on her third. She is a member of the national staff and New York City coordinator for CODEPINK Women for Peace (www.codepinkalert.org). At Dartmouth, Nancy majored in Comparative Literature (French and Women's Studies) and did a Senior Fellowship in Creative Writing (Poetry). She has an MFA in Poetry from Columbia University's Writing Division.
