Karaganda Region

Map of Kazakhstan showing Qaraghandy province.

Qaraghandy is a province of Kazakhstan. Its capital is Karaganda, (also known as Qaraghandy). The population of the province is 1,287,000; that of the city is 437,000.

History

The province was the site of intense coal mining during the days of the Soviet Union, and is also said to be the site of several forced-labor camps. Following the Second World War, Josef Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, had many ethnic Germans deported to the area.

Geography

With an area of 428,000 square miles, Qaraghandy Province is the larger than any of the other provinces by more than 100,000 square miles. Although it doesn't touch the borders of the country, it does touch nine other Kazakh provinces. They are: Aqtöbe Province, to the West; Qostanay Province, to the Northwest; Aqmola Province, to the North; Pavlodar Province, to the Northeast; East Kazakhstan Province (Shyghys Qazaqstan), to the East; Almaty Province, to the Southeast; Zhambyl Province, to the South; South Kazakhstan Province (Ongtüstik Qazaqstan), also to the South; and Qyzylorda Province, to the Southwest. The Ishim (Esil) River, a tributary of the Irtysh River, beigns in Qaraghandy Province.

Trivia

Karaganda is often used as the punchline in a popular joke in the former Soviet Union. The city is fairly isolated in a vast area of uninhabited steppe, and is thought by many to be "the middle of nowhere". When used in the locative case, the final syllable rhymes with the Russian word for "where", as well as with a Russian obscenity used to answer to an unwanted question "Where?". Thus the exchange: "Where is it?" "In Karaganda!" — has a rhyming and silly sound, and its nuance could be approximated in American English as: "Where are you going?" "To Kalamazoo!" or "Timbuktu!"