What happened to the rest of Asia?

[mbarrick]

OK, so it was a month ago, but I was just thinking about the Asian Excellence Awards and wondering what happened to eastern Russia and all the "-stan" countries, the Indian sub-continent (although one posthumous award was given to an Indian), and the middle east? Last time I looked there were a just a few people of Jewish descent in the American entertainment industry. Is Israel not in Asia anymore? There are also quite a few popular Arabian-descended people like Paula Abdul, Shakira, Jamie Farr, Paul Anka, and Salma Hayek to name a few. When did Asia become just China and Japan?

Comments

[sovietnimrod.livejournal.com]

I know in sporting competitions (especially soccer), Russia, Israel and Kazakhstan are usually considered part of Europe

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

Since the dividing line between Europe and Asia is the spine of the Ural mountain range from the Arctic Ocean to the Caspian Sea and the spine of the Caucasus mountian range between the Black Sea and the Casipan Sea, Russia and Kazakhstan are both partially in Europe. Georgia and Azerbaijan also straddle Europe and Asia. Israel is unambigiously in Asia geographically, but the European connection is obviously a cultural one. Armenia and Cyprus are both also unambigiously in Asia, but are considered politically part of Europe.

Egypt also has a smally portion of it's territory in Asia (the tiny bit east of the Suez Canal). And on the other side, Indonesia straddles the geographic boundries of Asia and Oceania.

Kazakhstan

[sovietnimrod.livejournal.com]

I think Kazakhstan has fallen into association with Europe due to the huge Russian influence. There also used to be a large German population which left in the early 1990s. During Soviet rule, Kazakhs were a minority in large parts of the republic. Mind you, these Central Asian 'stans' were not designed to be viable nations but just propoganda countries for the USSR. No one ever expected them to actually become independent

Interestingly enough, an ethnic Kazakh citizen of Kazakhstan is called a Kazakh but a non-Kazakh citizen is a Kazakhstani

Some guy named Stan.

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

The same formation is true of all the "stan" countries. The suffix means "home of", so Kazakhs live in Kazakhstan, Afghanis live in Afghanistan, Pakis live in Pakistan, etc. and the "stani" ending means anyone living in the land of the people in question.