When we moved into our apartment on the campus at Nazarbayev University 2.5 years ago, we were living in the middle of nowhere. The nearest stores were downtown, or at least four bus stops and a long walk. However, the plan was to build up around the university - and one of the main building projects is the expo plaza which is being built directly to the East of campus.
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| March 2015: nothing is out there except a bunch of cranes |
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| East of NU campus. Nothing is out there either! |
In addition to the expo, there is a great deal of other development going on - including large numbers of apartment buildings, and a new mall. The new Mall is a "Mega" a chain mall that has a number of locations in Kazakhstan. This mall is called the Mega Silkway and is the largest retail establishment in Central Asia. It is huge.
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| March 2016 - the skeleton of the new Mega Mall |
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| And a bunch of apartment buildings growing like mushrooms after rain. |
What is amazing, is that the entire building has been built since we arrived. In fact, the fencing was around the project when we arrived, but there was no visible construction until we returned from our first leave home in July 2015.
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| May 2016 - it is not just a skeleton anymore! |
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| And the apartment buildings look like they are almost ready! |
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| The ball in the center of the picture is the main Expo building. |
The outside of the building has been looking done since late fall (October or so) and we heard a number of rumors about when the mall would open. One rumor was that it would open in December, but that date came and went [1]. The last few weeks, activity has been even higher. We heard another rumor that it would open on 6 March, and Yulia looked it up online and found that it would have its technical opening on 6 March with a Grand opening around 23 March.
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| February 2017 - the first fence came down. |
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| And a week later the second fence came down. The funny thing is that they planted the trees upfront before they even leveled the ground! |
Monday I had a faculty meeting, and afterward, we walked across the street to see the mall. The food court was still mostly not open, but we bought some Asian food from a little place - one of three open fast food places. I called Yulia and she couldn't wait to see it, so we walked over with the twins and met Nika and Lina on their way home from guitar lessons. One of the features is a trampoline park that also has climbing walls and other activities. We signed the kids up to jump for half an hour. (it's about $6.00 for half an hour - so pricey here - but the kids had a great time and were exhausted. The owner and founder is an American kid (about 30 or so) who grew up in one of the cities in the West. His dad worked for an oil company there.
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| March 6 2017 - the Mall is opened to public! |
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| The kids had a blast at Kango. The guys in yellow are professional gymnasts and circus acrobats working on the Kango team. |
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| Lexa is trying the rings |
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| The guys from the team were showing to our kids how to do some tricks. |
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| Rock climbing area |
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| Food court: really bright and happy! |
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| Love these fountains. They change color every 20 seconds or so. |
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| Kids relaxing in "flower" chairs |
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| Assalting a poor lego man outside of their favorite store in town. |
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| At the end of the day they got pin wheels which is a Mega's logo. |
The best thing about the technical opening is that the grocery store - Ramstor, a Turkish chain - was opened. Now we have a grocery store (besides our little mini-market on campus) that is within walking distance, which is tremendous.
Wednesday was the 8th of March - International Women's Day - and so school was out. I worked in the morning and Yulia gave the kids a light day of school, and then we went back to the mall. We bought the kids tickets to see the movie "Sing!" and some slushies to each while they watched. Yulia and I ate lunch to celebrate the day and our anniversary (March 12th). We ate at the Korea House Restaurant. It is pricier than most places here, but the food we had was excellent and the atmosphere was amazing.
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| While the kids are at the movies, we are on a date at the Korean House |
We also bought tickets to the Expo for August when we are back from our vacation in Utah and my Mom and Yulia's mom will be here visiting.
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| The main Expo building, view from Mega Mall |
The mall is still not fully functional, but it is mostly functional, and a tremendous boost to our quality of life. We are no longer at the edge of nowhere. Soon we will be in the middle of everything.
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[1] There was a fun article in the local news in December that the Mall was "completely launched" in December. We laughed because they had put up vinyl signs for the main stores on the main sign for a few days and then they had disappeared. Basically they put together a photo op in December and called it "fully launched." It only took another 3 months to get it partially off the ground. By May all of the tenants should be online.
