The actual number of Kyrgyzstan gambling halls is a fact in question. As data from this country, out in the very remote central part of Central Asia, often is hard to get, this might not be too astonishing. Whether there are two or 3 legal gambling dens is the element at issue, maybe not really the most earth-shaking article of information that we don’t have.
What certainly is true, as it is of the lion’s share of the ex-USSR states, and absolutely true of those in Asia, is that there will be a lot more not approved and alternative casinos. The switch to authorized wagering didn’t empower all the aforestated places to come from the illegal into the legal. So, the contention over the number of Kyrgyzstan’s gambling halls is a minor one at most: how many authorized ones is the item we are trying to reconcile here.
We are aware that in Bishkek, the capital municipality, there is the Casino Las Vegas (a spectacularly unique title, don’t you think?), which has both table games and one armed bandits. We can also find both the Casino Bishkek and the Xanadu Casino. The two of these offer 26 slots and 11 gaming tables, split amidst roulette, vingt-et-un, and poker. Given the amazing likeness in the sq.ft. and setup of these 2 Kyrgyzstan gambling dens, it may be even more surprising to see that the casinos are at the same address. This seems most astonishing, so we can perhaps conclude that the number of Kyrgyzstan’s gambling halls, at least the authorized ones, is limited to 2 members, 1 of them having altered their name recently.
The state, in common with most of the ex-Soviet Union, has experienced something of a accelerated adjustment to free-enterprise economy. The Wild East, you might say, to refer to the lawless conditions of the Wild West an aeon and a half back.
Kyrgyzstan’s casinos are almost certainly worth going to, therefore, as a piece of social analysis, to see chips being bet as a type of collective one-upmanship, the conspicuous consumption that Thorstein Veblen wrote about in 19th century America.