[ English ]

The complete number of Kyrgyzstan gambling dens is something in some dispute. As details from this nation, out in the very remote central part of Central Asia, can be hard to acquire, this may not be too bizarre. Whether there are 2 or 3 legal casinos is the element at issue, perhaps not in reality the most all-important article of info that we don’t have.

What no doubt will be credible, as it is of most of the ex-Russian states, and definitely correct of those located in Asia, is that there no doubt will be many more illegal and clandestine gambling halls. The switch to approved wagering did not drive all the illegal locations to come away from the dark into the light. So, the clash regarding the number of Kyrgyzstan’s gambling halls is a minor one at best: how many accredited ones is the element we are attempting to resolve here.

We are aware that in Bishkek, the capital municipality, there is the Casino Las Vegas (a stunningly original name, don’t you think?), which has both table games and video slots. We can additionally see both the Casino Bishkek and the Xanadu Casino. The pair of these have 26 video slots and 11 gaming tables, divided amongst roulette, blackjack, and poker. Given the amazing likeness in the sq.ft. and floor plan of these 2 Kyrgyzstan casinos, it might be even more bizarre to see that they share an location. This appears most confounding, so we can perhaps conclude that the number of Kyrgyzstan’s casinos, at least the legal ones, is limited to two members, 1 of them having altered their name a short while ago.

The nation, in common with almost all of the ex-USSR, has experienced something of a fast conversion to capitalism. The Wild East, you may say, to allude to the anarchical circumstances of the Wild West a century and a half back.

Kyrgyzstan’s casinos are actually worth going to, therefore, as a bit of anthropological analysis, to see money being gambled as a type of collective one-upmanship, the celebrated consumption that Thorstein Veblen wrote about in 19th century u.s..