How to survive winter in Astana 

Winters are tough when you’re living in Astana, one of the three coldest capitals in the world (the others are Ulanbataar and Ottawa). This is my experience of how to survive winter in Astana, when the temperatures can fall as low as -50C.

As November moves into December, the days and nights get steadily colder. Last year, I realised that the -25C I’d experienced at the end of November, when I froze at the bus stop was actually not that cold at all. 

When the winter comes, the weather forecast announcers didn’t bother to use a minus when announcing the temperatures so they talk of 28, 32, 35… by mid December most nights are around 37-38, and the days not much higher. 

Attacked by the cold

Going outdoors felt like a physical attack. I’d leave my centrally heated flat, walk down the stairs and find myself suddenly in a temperature almost 60C lower. 

The wind would batter my face, painfully. I would choke as my lungs inhaled the freezing air. After a few minutes, I’d have to keep blinking as a tiny film of ice formed on my eyeballs.

My exhalations would freeze on the scarf wrapped around my mouth and nose too, and anyone with a runny nose would end up with what we called ‘snosticles’ — frozen trails of snot. 

One day, I took a couple of empty five litre bottles out to the communal rubbish bins. The moment I stepped outside my building the plastic bottles collapsed in on themselves, as the warm air inside contracted dramatically. 

Snow on top of snow was trodden down onto the pavements, packing down into dense sheets of ice. If snow hadn’t fallen for a few days this blackened and became slippery underfoot. 

We adopted what we called the ‘Astana penguin shuffle’, waddling along with our feet turned out and our arms outstretched to try and keep our balance. Once I got off a bus at an exposed bus stop and a gust of wind sent me sailing over the ice to crash into a snowdrift. 

Diamond dust

On clear days, though, Astana was dazzlingly beautiful. One day the temperature was around -30C and for the first time I saw diamond dust, tiny ice crystals suspended in the air; close up each one glitters in the sun until they merge into a blinding white haze.

In the street, I passed a man pulling a sledge with a little toddler on it. Parents didn’t take small children out much in the extreme winter, but when they did they substituted sledges for pushchairs. 

We expats had mostly been shellshocked by the extremity of the winter. When it came to how to survive winter in Astana I wasn’t the only person to have retreated into the cocoon of my home during December, January and February. It wasn’t uncommon for a group of people to make plans to meet then all text each other to cancel at the last minute when the prospect of venturing out into a driving blizzard and temperatures below -35C was upon them. 

We all put on weight sitting at home watching DVDs, drinking wine and eating comfort food. I didn’t have to work between western Christmas and orthodox New Year, so I spent most of my time in the flat, reading, cooking (I was experimenting with soufflés), watching DVDs and pottering about on the internet.