About Air Astana

In support of the development of the national language, Air Astana, partnering with Otrar Travel agency and the national newspapers Nachnem s Penedelnika and Azamat.kz, held a literary competition of original Kazakh prose entitled “On the Wings of a Dream.”

The award ceremony announcing the winners of the literary contest for teenagers ages 12 to 18 years, took place on June 1, 2006; Child Protection Day. Grand Prize in the contest is a trip for three to Turkey which was won by a 16 year old resident of Uralsk, Zhazira Amankyzy. Besides this, the top three places were awarded prizes along with eight supplemental prizes. Ernur Zhamalov and Argulan Askaruly from Almaty received a television and DVD player from Air Astana for first and second place. For third place, Rasyl Berikuly from Aktau won a CD player.

The contest was publicized for the past four months in the newspapers Nachnem s Penedelnika and Azamat.kz, who were the coordinators and informational sponsors for the project. In all, 50 compositions were received from through out Kazakhstan and from which the 12 best were selected by members of the jury. The average age of participants was 15 years, many of whom came from the Almaty and North-Kazakhstan Oblasts.

Member of the Jury, Chief Editor of the Republic Youth Magazine Ak Zhelken, Nurgale Oraz: “In general, the participants of the contest were literarily talented children, among whom I observed children with the disposition of writers. Selected compositions will be published in our journal Ak Zhelken.”

Chief Editor of the newspaper Nachnem s Penedelnika and author of the “On the Wings of a Dream” project, Didar Amantay: “In observing the number of compositions received by our editors, I understood that many teenagers want to become to be writers. If other companies participated in the development of the national language, like Air Astana does, then we would know more of the talents they possess.”

Director of Public Relations at Air Astana, Zukhra Sultanova: “Air Astana represents a socially responsible company which understands the importance of the execution and support of significant social projects. Air Astana always supports such projects. In the present case, we became the initiator of the children’s competition “On the Wings of a Dream,” in as much as the existence of the indisputable value of bringing up a generation with a growing sense of patriotism, a love for the native language, and the development or self perfection of the artistic potential of our youth, after all – they are the future of Kazakhstan!”