The world's tallest tent has opened to the public in the Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan. Designed by the British architects Foster and Partners, the Khan Shatyr Entertainment Centre in the capital Astana is 150m high（photo by Reuters）. Timed to coincide with President Nazarbayev's 70th birthday and the national Astana Day, the official opening took place on July 5, attended by the President and notable heads of state, with a performance by Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli.
全世界最高的帳篷，已在中亞哈薩克開幕。由英國霍朗明建築師事務所設計，位於首都阿斯塔納的「大汗帳篷」娛樂中心，高達150公尺（見圖／路透）。這個大帳篷為配合總統納札巴耶夫70大壽和阿斯塔納國家日，特別選在7月5日正式開幕，總統和其他國家重要元首出席，義大利男高音波伽利並現場演唱。
Standing on a 200m concrete base, Khan Shatyr is the city's highest structure and the world's tallest tent. Inside, visitors will find shops, restaurants and cinemas - even an artificial beach. The tent is large enough for 10,000 people and has a monorail, a running track that circles the upper layers, and the Cosmodrome amusement park with dodgems, human pinball, a log flume ride, and a death-defying 37m drop tower. The lower layers are a huge meandering sea of shops and boutiques. “The quality of light is quite incredible in there. It's like being outside,” David Nelson, the head of design at Foster said.
坐落在200公尺高的混凝土地基上，大汗帳篷是這個城市最高的建築，也是世上最高的帳篷。遊客在帳篷內可發現商店、餐館和電影院，甚至還有人造海灘。這個帳篷足以容納1萬人，上層有單軌軌道繞行，還有發射場遊樂園，裡面有碰碰車、人肉彈珠、激流滑水，和37公尺高的玩命高空彈跳。下層則是一片巨大如海洋的商店和精品店。「裡面的光線品質相當驚人，簡直像置身戶外。」霍朗明事務所設計組長尼爾森說。
The centre has a huge indoor leisure park, designed to be protected from the region's harsh climate. Astana experiences extreme changes in temperature, from 35℃ in the summer to -35℃ in the winter. The giant tent, which took four years to build, is designed to withstand harsh weather and maintain a comfortable temperature inside.
娛樂中心有個巨大的室內樂園，以保護遊客免受該區惡劣天候影響。阿斯塔納氣溫變化極大，夏天可以熱到35℃，冬天冷到-35℃。這個巨大的帳篷，歷時4年才完工，目的就是要避免惡劣的天氣和保持室內舒適的溫度。
Khan Shatyr is a US$260million, 13,000 sq m tour de force. It combines the ethylene tetrafluoroethylene plastic coating of the UK's Eden Project, the cable net structure of the Millennium Dome and a huge tripod frame. The tent is made from three layers of ETFE, a special see-through plastic that allows daylight to wash the interiors while sheltering them from weather extremes.
大汗帳篷是耗資2.6億美元、占地1.3萬平方公尺的力作，它結合了英國伊甸園計畫的乙烯／四氟乙烯共聚物塑料塗層、千禧年圓頂建築的索網結構，再加上一個巨大的三腳支架。這個大帳篷用3層乙烯／四氟乙烯共聚物鐵弗龍薄膜構成，一個透明超薄特殊塑料，讓日光灑遍室內，並遮擋住極端氣候的影響。
Aqua Zone is the most bizarre of the many entertainments in Khan Shatyr. From this week, Astana's 700,000-strong population will be able to use the beach, which surrounds a lagoon-shaped pool, frolic in the waves thrown up by a wave machine, whizz down waterslides, or sip a cappuccino on the sand in temperatures of up to 24°C throughout the year.
在大汗帳篷諸多娛樂設施中，戲水區最令人大開眼界。從這星期開始，阿斯塔納70多萬人將可以使用那個海灘，它環繞著一個狀似環礁湖的游泳池，一部波浪機可以製造海浪，供人在浪潮中戲水，也可呼嘯滑水，或在全年維持24°C的沙灘上喝杯卡布其諾。
It is the latest in an extraordinary building program that has transformed Astana since it became the Kazakh capital 13 years ago. The government of Kazakhstan decided to move the capital north to Astana from Almaty in the country's southeast corner because of Almaty's susceptibility to earthquakes and its proximity to the Chinese border.
自從阿斯塔納13年前成為哈薩克首都以來，這是最近一個改變阿斯塔納面貌的非凡建築計畫。哈薩克政府決定將首都從東南角的阿拉木圖北移到阿斯塔納，因為阿拉木圖經常發生地震，而且鄰近中國邊境。
From the start Astana was the subject of ridicule, the crackpot project of a strongman ruler. At the inauguration on June 6, 1998, international journalists noticed that many of the buildings were little more than facades. The first buildings, the Ak Orda presidential palace and the Baiterek tower, retained a heavy post-Soviet design element.
從一開始，阿斯塔納就飽受外界譏諷，指其為強人統治者瘋狂怪異的計畫。1998年6月6日總統就職典禮上，國際記者發現許多建築只有外牆。第一批建築中，阿克奧達總統府和貝特瑞高塔在設計上保留大量蘇聯解體後的元素。
A few years ago, however, things began to change. Frank Pannier, the chief executive of the steel giant Arcelormittal in Kazakhstan, lived in nearby Temirtau when Astana became the capital and returned a decade later. “Astana is a little bit like Dubai today, isn't it? It's a great place,” he said. “At that time it was a humble village.” The shift happened around 2006, when the city inauguarated its Pyrmaid of Peace and Reconciliation, also designed by Foster. Since then there has been a mania for hiring top architects such as Lord Foster.
然而幾年前轉機開始出現，當阿斯塔納成為哈薩克新都時，鋼鐵巨擘阿塞洛米塔爾集團執行長潘尼爾就住在附近的鐵米塔，他在10年後重回阿斯塔納。「阿斯塔納已經有點像今天的杜拜，不是嗎？這是個了不起的地方。」他說：「當時這裡只是個小村莊。」這種轉變始於2006年左右，當這個首善之區的和平和解金字塔落成之際，這個金字塔也是霍朗明設計的。從此以後，這個城市掀起一股狂熱，競相雇用像霍朗明勳爵這種全球首屈一指的建築師。
Aytekin Gultekin, the president of Turkish construction firm Sembol, which has built most of the city's landmarks, said: “If this continues, in 50 years' time Astana will be an open exhibition of all the good products of architecture. In Chicago, there was a similar situation and now architects who come to the US, they visit Chicago to see the masterpieces.”
土耳其森堡建築公司建造了這個城市大部分標誌性建築，該公司總裁古特金說：「長此以往，50年後阿斯塔納將成為所有優質建築的展示櫥窗。芝加哥過去也曾出現類似盛況，現在建築師到美國，還是會走訪芝加哥欣賞這些建築傑作。」
But given how rushed many of the buildings have been, with cracks often visible even before completion, they may not last long into posterity. Locals say the city has a long way to go. Daniar Duisemnov, a local bureaucrat, said, “We really need some public places to relax. There was more today than when he arrived three years ago. It's getting better, and the government is taking steps and building new places, but at the same time they could have done more for young people.”
但由於很多建築倉促興建，甚至在完工前已出現裂痕，它們可能無法維持很久，遑論留傳給子孫後代。當地人說，這個城市還有很長的路要走。當地官員杜伊森諾夫說：「我們確實需要公共休閒場所，比起3年前，今天已經多多了，情況應該會好起來，政府正在大興土木，但同時他們應可以為年輕人多做一點。」