Rockettes receive surprise invitation to Turkmenistan
The Helsinki Rockettes, 2011 World Champions in synchronized skating, will perform at the opening ceremony of a Turkmen ice stadium
By Riitta Koivuranta
One could be forgiven for not believing right away that the Rockettes in Helsinki and Turkmenistan in Central Asia have anything to do with each other in any way.
But it is true that the girls of the Rockettes have received an invitation from the far shores of the Caspian Sea, which the skating squad does not intend to reject.
In October, the Helsinki team, winners in April of their second successive World Synchronised Skating Championship gold medals, will set off on a trip to Ashgabat, the capital city of Turkmenistan, where the opening of the country’s first large ice stadium will be celebrated.
”This is a unique opportunity. As far as I have been able to discover, it is quite a fine place of its own kind, where one would not otherwise be going any time soon”, says Kaisa Nieminen, the coach of the Rockettes.
According to Nieminen, the Roxettes’ invitation to Ashgabat was sent by a Finnish company that built the ice stadium.
The same company has also built the Hartwall Arena in Helsinki, the Barona Arena in Espoo, and the HK Arena in Turku.
The Rockettes are to skate in the 10,000-seat indoor ice-skating rink on October 14th.
A decision on the exact date of their departure has not been made just yet, but the team plans to fly first on a scheduled flight from Finland to Istanbul.
If there are no connecting flights to Turkmenistan available on the same day, the organisers will send a plane to fetch the skaters from Turkey.
The Russian plane crash that killed the members of a Russian ice hockey team last week does not make Nieminen think twice.
”No, I am not scared. I rather feel that if we are invited as guests of honour to such a place, they will certainly wish to take good care of us. I fully count on it”, Nieminen notes.
According to Nieminen, the President of Turkmenistan has lately had several large sports arenas built in the country.
”I somehow feel that everything is done there on a rather large scale. This is not exactly a small event, and reflecting this is the fact that they want to fly in a team from Finland to perform on the ice over there”, Nieminen continues.
”The opening cermonies will be filmed and the local television will broadcast them to other cities’ sports arenas, where people can watch them on large screens. All shows and events will be transmitted to the people to serve as entertainment”, she says.
Nieminen and her team
are looking forward to the trip with great interest.
”We have gradually managed to gather some information, but there are still many things we do not know. Hence it is quite interesting to go there. Then we will have an opportunity to see what it is really like down there”, Nieminen notes.
The Rockettes will have a chance to showcase their new synchronized skating programmes to the Turkmen audience.
”At the same time, the trip will provide us with a kind of training camp. It is also good to train actual performances before the competition season begins”, Kaisa Nieminen says.
The competition season for the Rockettes will start in Turku in November.
”We are in a very good phase. The season has barely started, and we will be doing rather good and ambitious things. Our programmes are clearly faster and more difficult than before. I am very pleased with the way things are going”, Nieminen adds.
FACTFILE: Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan is one of the world’s most authoritarian dictatorships, with a population of approximately 4.9 million.
Most of the country is covered by desert (the Karakum Desert). The most significant export products are oil and natural gas. the country is located on the eastern shores of the Caspian Sea and its neighbours comprise Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and to the north-west a small part of Kazakhstan.
The Turkmen SSR was one of the Central Asian republics of the Soviet Union. After the collapse of the USSR, Turkmenistan declared independence on October 27th, 1991.
From 1999 to 2006, Saparmurat Niyazov was the President for Life of Turkmenistan. He was surrounded by strong cult of personality.
Since then, the cult of personality has been largely unravelled, and for example schoolchildren in comprehensive schools no longer need to take exams on Ruhnama (”The Book of the Soul”), a book allegedly written by Saparmurat Niyazov, combining spiritual/moral guidance, autobiography, and revisionist history, much of which is alleged to be of dubious or disputed factuality and accuracy.
The present President of Turkmenistan, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, also enjoys absolute power.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 12.9.2011
Links:
Rockettes website
The Rockettes (synchronized skating team) (Wikipedia)
ISU World Synchronized Skating Championships Helsinki 2011
Turkmenistan (Wikipedia)
Finnish teams take historic 1-2 at Synchronized Skating World Championships (11.4.2011)
RIITTA KOIVURANTA / Helsingin Sanomat
riitta.koivuranta@hs.fi
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| 13.9.2011 - THIS WEEK |
Rockettes receive surprise invitation to Turkmenistan
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