To Atyraulians from Aktau - with love (video)

By Zulfiya Bainekeeva

The surprising gift was made to the residents of Atyrau by these guys from Aktau - 3-minute video about our hometown. Video is called “I love Atyrau”.

“Expedition +362” is a group of young people from Mangistau, has already been travelling for two years, taking photos and making videos about the native land. At the beginning they made short trips in Mangistau region.

- We travelled on week-ends and simply spent time in an active way, - says one of the founders of a this movement of patriots Olzhas Murzagaliyev. – We travelled to the border with Turkmenistan and in the winter spent nights in the dunes of Senek - some kind of mini-desert of Mangistau, travelled to Saura lake, explored Ustyurt plateau … The an idea came to show all this to our fellow countrymen, especially the young people, that in the vicinities of our native Aktau there are places as beautiful as Grand Canyon or the Valley of Monuments.

This is how the “Expedition +362" was created. They started to publish the photos taken during their trips in social networks, and people started to get interested in the native land. When they invited other people to join their trips there were about 10 people at the beginning, but the second trip gathered already 50 people. It turned into a kind of hobby. As a rule, twice a month they travelled to the country-side and uploaded videos and pictures in a network. They formulated their mission as follows: “We live in a wonderful land. Let people see and appreciate the amazing region -  the dedal earth of Mangistau!”.

As a gift to their hometown the group that consists of oil engineers, businessmen, professional photographers and the artist, made the video “I love Aktau”. This video collected about 25 thousand views in YouTube and became the visual card of the city. And then the idea came to expand the borders of their travel and to explore all Western Kazakhstan region. Atyrau became the first city on their route. They travel on 3 SUVs and on October 2 they arrived in our city. They put up a tent on the river bank in Almaly village, took out fishing rods and went fishing.

- We caught three big ‘sazans’ (carp fish)!! One of them weighed 8 kilograms!

They showed me the video of fishing: I became envious, let me tell you. This is called rest and relaxation. They plan to make videos of two more cites after Atyrau: Uralsk and Aktobe. They have 2 weeks only and the budget of approximately 150 thousand tenge for each city. They don't pursue comfort: spend nights in sleeping bags right on the ground instead of warm and comfortable beds. They cook their meals on fire and with fish that they catch.

- This is all part of our adventure, the drive that we are seeking in our travels, says Olzhas.

In Atyrau the team shot the video from bird’s view using multicopter. They said they hope that the residents of Atyrau will like their video about our city. The authors of the video are:

Yerlan and Yerzhan Dzhumaevs, Kuanysh Karzhaubaev, Kuanysh Zhumagulov, Olzhas Murzagaliev, Saut Kussainov, Artur Sharygin, Anvar Mukashev.

- And why is it “362”?

- This is a special number for Mangistau, we can even call it a sacred number, because in Mangistau 362 ‘aulie’ or saint people have been buried. That is why the car number plates or telephone numbers with this figure are very popular.

You can look at the photos and videos of the “Expedition +362” in social network – Vkontakte:  https://vk.com/plus362, in Instagram: http://instagram.com/plus362kz and on website: www.plus362.kz