I went there (Aralsk, specifically) four years back, while en route to shymkent from aktobe. It's a sad, sad place. Photos don't do it justice - you drive for h

I went there (Aralsk, specifically) four years back, while en route to shymkent from aktobe. It's a sad, sad place. Photos don't do it justice - you drive for hours through barren desert, passing next to nothing, and then you reach Aralsk - a nothing harbour city in the middle of nothing, with a tide that went out to never return. Everything is dilapidated, dusty, everyone is old, the smell of diesel mixed with shit and mud is overpowering - the sea looks dry, but under a thin crust is meters of gloopy dumped oil and sewage. Learned that the hard way. It used to be a bustling place, full of greenery, and the desert around it was green - but the Soviets drained it from the Uzbek side, and whether it can ever be refilled more rapidly than it evaporates is anyone's guess. Central kaz could have been a place. Instead, it's nothing, and probably will remain such. Easy to go "oh it's just a lake", but it turns out humans need water.