Life in Urkadurkastan...

The answer is or what but you will not find out till the end…

When my wife and I first arrived in Urkadurka land it was summer, temps to 45C, kids running everywhere, I got that thirsty onetime I was tempted to buy cold fermented horses milk available on every street corner …I actually wanted the somewhat more palatable sweet barley water but things got confused in the translation…Anyway as newbie’s do we headed off to for a wander around a popular market called the Dordoi bazaar.

We walked down one lane at the bazaar and did a double take…We are not the kinkiest of couples but we know French Maids outfits when we see them...and here they were, rows and rows of them all different vendors all different sizes form the most petite to the not so petite…I think my wife's hand went to her mouth to suppress a giggle…we did an about face before we stumbled across other……paraphernalia. (I did say we are not really the kinky types)

We carried on exploring the rest of the Bazaar…I can see where the word bizarre originates. This place is huge, we did not see more than 10%, it must be near 30 acres in size, all shipping containers staked 2 high, side by side, openings facing the walkway with both sides of the 4m wide walk way lined with containers, then a roof over the walkway…cannot let rain stop commerce, not that it rains here of any consequence.

There were sunflower seeds to Russian sable hats, Chinese appliances to Turkish carpets, Wasabi to water melon… you can buy anything and every thing here ……as we had already found out!.

A few days later I started work up at the mine site for a nine day stint well away from civilization. About a week later my wife said to me I was in for a surprise when I come home…What could that be? Good, interesting….kinky? She would not elaborate.

The trip home was still at the interesting stage….two years later it is well past interesting….1 hour of steep windy gravel then 4 hours of the roughest sealed roads in the world. After about ¼ hour on the seal we arrive at the first village/small town Kaja Say. Kids are back at school, and school was just finished for the day so they were walking all over the place. Pedestrians often share the road with cars and trucks with assumed equal rights, travelling in random directions…school kids were no different. The girls all had neat and tidy hair in pigs tails high on the back of their heads with white ribbons contrasting against glossy black hair, the shiniest black shoes and white socks, white blouses and black pinafores which, had I seen hanging up, I would have sworn were kinky French maids out fits….