Getting Monumental In Almaty

Of course Almaty has a nice collection of old, Soviet, Russian, Communist, propaganda, whatever you want to label them monuments. The regime liked statues and making statements in bronze. Comrade, enjoy history on a pedestal.

Behold, the mighty Memorial of Glory. The sculpture commemorates victory during the Great Patriotic War, otherwise known in the West as WWII. A clever design, posing he-man Soviet soldiers into the shape of a map of the USSR.

To the left of the Memorial of Glory is a bronze frieze called, "Oath." Something about a Red Army soldier leading his fallen comrades' horses. Looks a little knight-ish. Also in the same park, a little bronze shout out to military medics.

Girl power. Here's the Memorial of Aliya Moldagulova and Manshuk Mametova, two women warriors who fought in that Great Patriotic War.

Suave. A statue of Gani Muratbaev, helper of the poor, founder of the Youth Union of Kazakhstan in the 1920s. Zipping forward to 1986, a sad, moving memorial to workers who died while putting out the fires and cleaning up at Chernobyl.

Lenin appearance, now relegated to a minor park, bunched up with various communist cronies. Still golden.