A main event of the next year is to be the 7th Asian games Astana and Almaty will be hosting – an important achievement to our country. In his interview to our newspaper the vice-minister of tourism and sport Talgat Yermegyaev shares on the cultural constituent of the winter Olympics.

-How will the Asiada-2011 influence tourism development in Kazakhstan?

It is already known that 5 thousand participants and guests are coming to the games, and to our country the Asian Olympics is an image-building project, a good chance to present our country on the international level, to draw a lot of tourists and promote our culture, national traditions and history. As President Nursultan Nazarbayev says it will also scale up the winter sports infrastructure. We will show to the world our main wealth – a friendly, peaceful and united nation.

Mention should be made too that recently a memorandum has been signed with the tourism association. An auto-caravan from Guangzhou (the capital of summer Asian Olympics) is soon heading for Astana, passing the territory of 7 CA states and promoting the ideas of Asiada and the Olympic movement.

In spite of the crisis around 4,5mn tourists have visited our country in the recent years, and over 10 thousand guests are due for the Olympics. The winter games is an important event for tourism, they bring foreign tourist to our country.

Apart from athletic the Asiada is also a political and cultural event for the continent, many guests are arriving. How many hotels and vehicles are going to be tapped for it?

We have certainly taken care of transport and accommodation for the guests. All the facilities are to be ready 20 days before the Asiada opening for the 4 categories of visitors : 247 of them are members of OCA, VIPs and officials, 1 524 are the athletes, officials, coaches, the teams’ service staff, 525 – international and national judges, 1 300 are foreign media, host broadcasters and grantees – 4 thousand participants in all.

As for the hotels’ level they will be up to the international standards, not lower than 3-star category. The foreign tourists can book a hotel room in advance, in Internet too.

Culture and sport are inseparable, you know. In the V Olympics an art exhibition was first organized, then years later the tradition of joining art and sport transformed into “Cultural Olympics” in the hosting country. Kazakhstan will surely have it too, a first experience on the Asian Olympics record.

Indeed these games are going to be ground-breaking not only by two hosting towns, but also in new kinds of sport offered by Kazakhstan – winter sport orienteering and field hockey, Asiada Olympic torch relay and the “Cultural Asiada” .

The route of the torch relay will run through all Kazakhstan regions, which is also a novelty. Our games are designed to be as not only a purely athletic event, but cultural too, giving a glimpse into our historical and cultural heritage.

Almaty has so many sights, picturesque mountains, you know. Apart from stadiums what other festive venues are there on the plan?

These are the projects: “Snow leopard park”, a festival and fair “The Great silk route”, an Asian culture festival “Almaty- Kazakhstan’s cultural capital.

Are there going to be festivals in the capital too, or only a spectacular show for the games’ opening?

The capital will certainly host varied cultural events. First of all its sights alone are real masterpieces. There’s going to be a festival of ice sculptures, music and dance festival Voice of Astana, a festival of circus art, of fine art, a photo exhibition, a competition in drawings and essay and others.

Kazakhstan – a heart of Eurasia will show the main feature of Kazakhstan people – their hospitality.

Interviewed by Abzal Kambar