Bishkek

Bishkek (??????, ??????) (population in 2005 approx. 900,000), founded in 1878 and from 1926-1991 known as Frunze (??????), after the Bolshevik military leader Mikhail Frunze, is the capital of the Kyrgyz Republic (Kyrgyzstan). In Kyrgyz, a Bishkek is a churn used to make fermented mare's milk (kumis), the Kyrgyz national drink.

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Bishkek is a city of wide boulevards and marble-faced public buildings combined with numerous Soviet-style apartment blocks surrounding interior courtyards and, especially outside the city center, thousands of smaller, often privately built houses. It is laid out on a grid pattern, with most streets flanked on both sides by narrow irrigation channels that water the innumerable trees which provide shade in the hot summers and give a generally beautifying effect to the city's otherwise rather drab appearance.

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Bishkek, at , is situated at about 800 m altitude just off the northern fringe of the Ala-Too range, an extension of the Tien Shan, which rises up to 4,800 m and provides a spectacular backdrop to the city. North of the city, a fertile and gently undulating steppe extends far north into neighboring Kazakhstan. The Chui river drains most of the area. Bishkek is connected to the Turkestan-Siberia Railway by a spur.

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1878: 1878 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar)....

1926: 1926 was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar)....

1991: 1991 is a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar....

Bishkek related Images and Photos (experimental)

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