Ashgabat is the name of the city I live and it is the capital of Turkmenistan. It is the city with around 1 million population and it is not very old but it has its history. I will talk about the railway station and the biggest hypermarket closed recently.
The railway station is probably one of the oldest building in the city because there are even rumours that says the whole city is built around that. According to some sayings Russians came to Ashgabat first but there was no city, they used that place as a station on their way to east and that is how life started around the railway station It is very obvious that it is an old building. Turkmenistan was under USSR for long time but the railway station was built before that. It is in the residential area and because of that the buildings near it are also old but if you walk little bit you can see the difference. Huge and white marbled buildings, University campuses, amusement parks and theatres are all around it now. And the railway station divides the city into two important parts. One side is the modern part with only apartments and skyscrapers and other part is mostly residential detached houses. Unluckily the building is renovated now but it still has it 19th century vibe.
One of the other important building is a hypermarket which is called YIMPAŞ. It is a market chain in Turkey which is not very famous in Turkey but it was most famous in Ashgabat Turkmenistan. Even though it is little old it has a beautiful modern structure which will never get old. I used to love the restaurants in it and I also remember going there as a kid, it used to have a huge playground for children. It was located in the centre of the city which makes it better. YIMPAŞ was also famous with its foreign regular customers. Almost every foreigners who has been in Ashgabat for couple of years will do their shopping from there. It is closed recently but the building is still there and when I pass by it sometimes it reminds me the old days.
The whole city changed a lot after I left the country in 2016 it’s been through long modernization period which is good in a way but it slowly destroys the old Ashgabat and builds new one.
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MCT-B 2017 