Face of Kazakhstani vol.1

Because of the trouble with the unlicensed taxi, I put cons for Kazakhstan. But it doesn't mean I dislike the country, or rather was so interested in Kazakhstan to set it as the starting point of this travel.

27 years ago when I just started to live in NY, I met a guy who took a workshop class at the International Center of Photography.
I was interested in photos he took. So I asked him to show me the works. He accepted my request with pleasure. Although he was not a professional photographer, he often traveled abroad and photographed a people. "The latest one is about Kazakhstan" "Where is that?" That's the first time hearing the name to me. "In The Soviet Union. Central Asia" "Yeah? How was the Kazakhstani?" "Their facial features had remembrance to yours" "Really? It's in the Soviet Union, right?" It sounded a little bit strange to me Northeast Asian face people lived in the Soviet Union.

Meanwhile his work was excellent. He got close enough to the subject and got into the people's life. Apparently it's more than travel photos. I decided to attend to the ICP class by the experience.
As he described, Kazakhstani in the photos were not only Caucasian but also Asian. I found huge diversity in it.

Long time has past since then. Now, I actually visit the country. People's features in Almaty, the biggest city in Kazakhstan, is quite various. When I visited Kashgar in Xingjian region of China, I was surprised with people's facial features which was lookalike westerner. If I would go further West, how people's face change to. I built up a hypothesis the Asian face character must be weaken.
However look at the people's face here in Kazakhstan. It's drawn back to the Northeast Asian's one. The Kazakh people lives also in west end of Mongol and China too. Of course, there are Russians from the Soviet dominated era. The South part has strong effect of Uzbek people. The people in Kazakhstan are mixture of the people from different origins.
The fact I'm asked the direction by Russian tourist in a city is a proof of my old friend's words "Their facial features had resemblance to yours" Maybe I need a little correction. In exact "There are also faces looks like me (East Asian) in Kazakhstan"