Introducing Mystery Class #2 Petropavlovsk, Kazakhstan 54.900 N, 69.100 E Welcome to Petropavlovsk!! (Or Petropavl) Click on image to enlarge We are a class of 9th graders who live in the country of Kazakhstan, which is in Central Asia, between Russia and China. Our country was a part of the Soviet Union until 1991. Kazakhstan is the 9th largest country in the world, but there are only 15 million people living here, so there's a lot of extra space! Most of our country is "steppe", huge flat prairies without much water. In the south of our country there are very beautiful mountains, but around our city it's very flat. Petropavlovsk is the most northern city in Kazakhstan, near the Russian border. We actually live on the southern edge of Siberia, so winters here are very long and cold, with the temperature often reaching -30 or even -40 C! The native people of our country are Kazakh, but there are still many Russian people here, especially in the north. Most of us speak Russian in our daily lives, but we also learn the Kazakh language in school. Our school is called "Gymnasium BEST", and specializes in linguistics, so besides Russian and some Kazakh, we all know English very well and either German or French. Come to Class Monday-Saturday Click on image to enlarge Our school has 1st through 11th graders together in the same building, with 2 shifts of classes each day (we study in the first shift, usually from 8:15 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. each day). There are 1,050 students in our school. We go to school 6 days a week, Monday through Saturday. We enjoy participating in some extra-curricular activities at school, like Parliament, basketball, literary club, Odyssey of the Mind and debate team. We also take part in something called K.V.N., which is popular throughout the former Soviet Union. It's a humor, acting, singing and dancing competition. Our city, Petropavlovsk, has 250,000 people living in it. It's on the steppe, but there are lots of small forests here, mostly of birch trees. There is a pretty river called the Ishim in our town, which flows north to the Arctic Ocean. No Cars, Please One of the best parts of Petropavlovsk is our main street, Constitution Street (it used to be called Lenina). It's only for pedestrians and has lots of shops and ice cream carts along it, and had a pretty park too. We all like to walk on this street with our friends after our classes. Our city is in the north, so in the summer the days are very long. In June it doesn't get dark until after midnight! The teacher who connected us with the Mystery Classrooms program is Rob Mocarsky. He is an American Peace Corps Volunteer who teaches Environmental Protection classes at our school. We wrote all of our clues and this description in his class. We hope you enjoyed learning about us! Goodbye for now. We'd love to hear from you! Rob Mocarsky's Class Petropavlovsk, Kazakhstan You can e-mail us at: cranberryrob@hotmail.com Back to Today's Report Copyright 2000 Journey North. All Rights Reserved. Please send all questions, comments, and suggestions to our feedback form