6/23/2006- Selling our bikes.  Living in a Disco in Kazakhstan.

We had received many quotes for shipping our bikes back to the west coast.  We told all of the shipping companies that we wanted to ship the bikes from Almaty to the cheapest place possible on the west coast of North America.  Even using our newly found connections with the president of Global Link, (an Almaty based shipping company) all the quotes were too expense.  We knew we had to sell the bikes.  The worst part was that we only had 4 days to do it before our Kazak visas expired.  At 10:00 p.m. we went to a “banya” with our new friends, Sergae, Andrei and Alexi.  Banyas are popular places for relaxation and business in former USSR countries.  You drink and eat, sit in a sauna for a few minutes, then jump in a cold water pool.  This process is repeated several times, and people usually stay for 4 hours or more.  After hours of heat and Vodka you feel very relaxed.  In classic USSR style, we shook hands with Andrei over the sale of our motorcycles…naked in a banya.  Before this we were worried that we might loose the bikes all together.  This could have meant the end of the trip for money reasons.  Instead we ended up getting a fair price and sold all three bikes at once.  We cheers to health and new friends, then it was off to the disco.

The disco opens at midnight but people come and go all day long.  The outdoor dance area is covered with graffiti art.  A large tent canopy reads “Effes” (a popular Turkish beer) and covers a foosball table and chairs.  Inside, there is a disco-ball hanging from a high exposed wood ceiling.  The combined length of the indoor and outdoor bar could probably seat 100 people or more.  It stays open until 6:00 a.m. and when you live there, you don’t sleep until its closed.