Tag Archives: blog The landscape around the Altai Mountains of far-western Bayan-Ölgii Province in Mongolia is as untamed as the people and animals who live there. The cold desert climate experiences dustings of snowfall – but little rain – and the measured temperatures – ranging from -22.6C (-8.68F) on a January night to 22.6° (72.7F) on a July afternoon – […]  “A fast horse and a soaring eagle are the wings of a nomad.” –Kazakh proverb The animals in Western Mongolia are as wild as the landscape: the horses are unruly and the hunting eagles are never fully tame. I suspect that the ethnic Kazakhs who live there prefer it that way. The Kazakhs are descendants of […]  Music makes everything better! The annual five-day Easter long-weekend musical feast that is Byron Bay Bluesfest always delivers up such a range and variety of wonderful talent that it is hard to know where to start. Rubbing shoulders with big names from around the world, lesser-known Australian performers proudly hold their own. I look forward to these […]  “Any fool can carry on, but a wise man knows how to shorten sail in time.” – Joseph Conrad I’m not a great sailor: my favourite part of sailing is making a safe landfall. This is especially true when the landfall is somewhere new and different, and when the sailing has been a bit fraught! […]  (Double click for: Elkesh Herself by Kugyershin Family’s Songs) It is said that if you want to see traditional Kazakh culture, you should go to Bayan-Ölgii province in Mongolia, rather than to Kazakhstan. In the 1800s, the expanding Russian Empire pushed the semi-nomadic Kazakh tribes into neighboring countries, including Mongolia – where members of the Middle Jüz Kazakhs […] |
|
