Aral Sea: Advocacy is Louder Than Words

By Malika Gizzat, 2023 Future Blue Youth Council member

Featured Image: “Foul Sights” by Andrew Lee (Washington, USA)

“It’s louder than words, this thing that we do,” sang Pink Floyd advocating for the Aral Sea, once the fourth biggest lake in the world. The music video features locals’ connection to this unique water reservoir, and how impactfully admiration for nature unites generations. We see elders whose eyes light up when they share their valuable memories of this astonishing place with their grandchildren – they imbibe them with such passion, but also with fear. They question, “Is this the end?” “Are their grandparents the last people to contemplate the fascinating presence of the Aral Sea?”

“Dear Aral, I sing for you, I long for you and your water that once resembled our sky. Aral, come back again! Dear Aral!” wrote well-known Kazakh poet, Kadyr Myrza Ali, expressing the whole nation’s grief over the demise of a cultural timeless legacy and an incredible natural landmark. A grief of Aral’s environmental power and biodiversity, a grief of the hypnotizing sounds of spring birds, a grief of the unfulfilled socioeconomic potential of this place for the people residing in it. Similar motifs are observed in Seidolla Bayterekov’s song “Swans Without Their Nest,” where he wrote “all spring birds are looking for you (Aral Sea), the swans without a nest, fly away, away” to describe the significance of preserving the Aral Sea and once again, to spread awareness about this tragedy.

Evolution of the Aral Sea (1989-2014)

The Aral Sea, a disappearing drainless salt lake located on the border of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, speaks of Central Asia’s notorious Soviet colonial history. Since the beginning of the 60s, the water from the rivers flowing into the Aral Sea, Amu Darya and Syr Darya, was actively used by the authorities for irrigation purposes, causing Aral to dry up rapidly. Year by year it abates substantially, leaving behind an impenetrable desert of salty sand that was covered by the sea’s turquoise waters only a century ago…

All these poems and songs about the Aral Sea are performed by my whole nation, Kazakhstan – we sing together to pay tribute to our natural treasure. However, in times of sorrow, unwavering hope is born. Hope for life-altering and goading solutions such as innovative technologies to increase the flow of the rivers and implementation of appropriate water management on a national level. Hope to provide help and support to those suffering from environmental injustice near Aral. Hope for alleviation of Aral’s ecological catastrophe by those who are not willing to abide by the status quo. Hope for a successful perpetuation of our cultural heritage and an inspiring reclamation of our power. Hope for the future generations to be awestruck by the beauty of the Aral Sea, like past generations were.

We cannot let the Aral Sea turn into a legend, tale, or a memory to be soon forgotten. We need to transcend our barriers and put our efforts into solving the disappearance of the Aral Sea, so that songs and poems about the Aral can be written from its shores and not only from pictures.