Overview
The Ushtobe central market, on Tole Bi Street, runs daily until early afternoon. Koryo-saram vendors are present at the food section most mornings. The material culture of the community is readable here without framing it as a tourist display: morkovcha (julienned carrots fermented with garlic, chilli, and coriander seed — a Koryo-saram invention, not a traditional Korean dish, made when napa cabbage was unavailable in Central Asia) is sold by the kilogram alongside donjimi white radish pickle and several varieties of rice-based side dishes. Dried rice is sometimes available when harvest timing aligns. The market also carries mundane Ili-valley produce — melons, tomatoes, pickled watermelon — and locally manufactured goods from the nearby factory district. Ushtobe has a yurt-building factory that exports across Kazakhstan; its rail entrance and production buildings are visible from the eastern approach road. The third generation and fourth generation of Koryo-saram in Ushtobe speak primarily Russian and Kazakh; Korean is heard mainly from elders.
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Viewing visit notes for Ushtobe — Koryo-saram Memorial
Ushtobe Bazaar — Koryo-saram Material Culture
Step 7 · 2 km from previous · 5 min drive
The Ushtobe central market, on Tole Bi Street, runs daily until early afternoon. Koryo-saram vendors are present at the food section most mornings. The material culture of the community is readable here without framing it as a tourist display: morkovcha (julienned carrots fermented with garlic, chilli, and coriander seed — a Koryo-saram invention, not a traditional Korean dish, made when napa cabbage was unavailable in Central Asia) is sold by the kilogram alongside donjimi white radish pickle and several varieties of rice-based side dishes. Dried rice is sometimes available when harvest timing aligns. The market also carries mundane Ili-valley produce — melons, tomatoes, pickled watermelon — and locally manufactured goods from the nearby factory district. Ushtobe has a yurt-building factory that exports across Kazakhstan; its rail entrance and production buildings are visible from the eastern approach road. The third generation and fourth generation of Koryo-saram in Ushtobe speak primarily Russian and Kazakh; Korean is heard mainly from elders.