In the process of reading a very interesting book, On the Trail of Genghis Khan: An Epic Journey Through the Land of the Nomads by Tim Cope. I am about half way through this at the moment. I am finding it both and educational and entertaining read. Part personal travelogue, part contemporary cultural study, and part history lesson as the author recounts his his 2004-2007 journey from the birth place of Genghis Khan in Mongolia to the Danube River in Hungry entirely by horseback following the path the Mongol armies would have taken in the 13th Century.

I have just completed the chapters covering his journey through Kazakhstan. This was particularly interesting as it provided a glimpse of the new challenges facing the people of Kazakhstan in the post-Soviet era. Having previously read The Silent Steppe: The Story of a Kazakh Nomad Under Stalin by Mukhamet Shayakhmetov in which the author recounted the destruction of the traditional nomadic way of life by forced collectivization under Stalin in the 1920s and 1930s. The breakup of the Soviet Union has forced the Kazakhs to once more redefine there lives economically and culturally.