ASTANA – A charity concert was recently held at the Radisson Hotel to help 25-year-old Miss Scuba Kazakhstan Kamilya Aukenovapay for expensive surgery in her fight against acute leukemia.
Son Pascal, the Kazakh-singing darling of Kazakhstan’s fans, was one of the concert’s headliners.
Dinara Satzhan and Ruslan Sultanov were the anchors of the concert and liaisons between the attendees and the mother of Kamilya, who was sending messages and made a video-call from the hospital during the concert. Kamilya was able to watch the programme live and see performances by famous and young Kazakhstan dancers and singers like Rustem Zhugunussov, Kulaim Kairbayeva, the TERRA dancing group, Son Pascal, Dilshat Akhmadiyev, Ivan Breussov and many others.’
Yedil Kussainov, a well-known player of Kazakhstan’s national instruments, gave a wonderful performance. And before he started playing, he performed a shamanistic ritual, asking God to help Kamilya get better.
“The event was absolutely great. I found an amazing group of friends united for our sister Kamilya. They were able to raise that much money in just one night and that’s a stunning fact. This is a demonstration that the youth of Kazakhstan has skills, power and style and that gives me bright hopes for the future of this country. I was invited by the Angels for Kamilya and I was happy to give my effort for a good cause. As a singer, I have the privilege to be the loudspeaker for the youth and using my voice was the minimum I could do. But these young guys did much more than me by organizing such an event with that number of guests and in great fashion,” said Son Pascal.
The attendees included people from various spheres, such as civil workers and students, as well as guests from the diplomatic corps. Ambassadors and representative of the embassies of Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, the United Kingdom, the Republic of South Africa, Afghanistan and others watched the concert and were sympathetic to Kamilya’s disease. This was really touching and was another confirmation that people in Kazakhstan are helping each other.
Money collected from the sale of tickets will be sent to Kamilya’s account for urgent bone marrow transplantation surgery. Over 1,000 tickets were sold, and, together with money donated in boxes installed in the hall, the total amount raised was more than 2 million tenge ($13,228).
The organizers of the event were close friends and relatives of Kamilya. They created an online group called Angels for Kamilya and used social networks Vkontakte and Facebook to gather many people for the concert. The group Angels for Kamilya was created for those who cannot remain indifferent to the suffering of others.
