{"id":733,"date":"2025-06-14T23:19:33","date_gmt":"2025-06-14T23:19:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/?p=733"},"modified":"2025-06-14T23:19:34","modified_gmt":"2025-06-14T23:19:34","slug":"inside-14000000000-city-of-the-d-ad-home-to-1-million-people-thats-now-completely-empty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/?p=733","title":{"rendered":"Inside $14,000,000,000 \u2018city of the d.ad\u2019 home to 1 million people that\u2019s now \u2018completely empty\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Turkmenistan\u2019s capital, Ashgabat, has become a hotspot for dark tourism, drawing visitors intrigued by its surreal, authoritarian atmosphere. Built with $14 billion of white marble under dictator Saparmurat Niyazov\u2019s orders, the city features bizarre landmarks like a rotating gold statue of Niyazov and the world\u2019s largest indoor Ferris wheel. Despite its opulence, Ashgabat feels hollow\u2014its vast plazas sit empty, and its underused $5 billion Olympic complex serves just 100,000 annual passengers despite a 14-million capacity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Strict rules govern the city: black cars are banned as \u201cbad luck,\u201d photography near government buildings is prohibited, and guides restrict tourists\u2019 movements. Documentarian David Farrier, who visited for Netflix\u2019s *Dark Tourist*, described it as a carefully controlled facade. Nicknamed the \u201ccity of the dead,\u201d Ashgabat\u2019s gleaming marble veneer hides an unsettling reality, making it a magnet for travelers seeking offbeat, authoritarian-era curiosities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Turkmenistan\u2019s capital, Ashgabat, has become a hotspot for dark tourism, drawing visitors intrigued by its surreal, authoritarian atmosphere. Built with $14 billion of white marble under dictator Saparmurat Niyazov\u2019s orders, the city features bizarre landmarks like a rotating gold statue of Niyazov and the world\u2019s largest indoor Ferris wheel. Despite its opulence, Ashgabat feels hollow\u2014its&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":734,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=733"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":735,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733\/revisions\/735"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}