Update: Tue 22:45

True to his word the man had my Kazakh visa ready today at 18:30. And for the other 50-odd people who had been queuing from well before I turned up at 18:05.

In other visa news the Uzbeks managed to be busy tomorrow so I'm booked in for 09:00 on Thursday which should be OK so long as they give me the visa there and then as it gives me time to head over to Almaty on the Thursday. I may well have to sit things out there for a while too depending on when parts turn up but at least it will be a different city!

Not much else to be said. I had been making some notes in the garden under a semi-translucent "car port" thing by the (dirty from feet dragging soil in) pool where I noticed it was a little hot. Sweat was dripping off me despite my total effort being to wave a biro about. I went back to the seemingly pleasantly cool room despite the thermometer claiming 27C and 50% humidity to find the the canopy thing was raising the temperature by at least 12C (and curiously dropping the humidity down to 27%). All this at 10am.

These car port things seem to be very popular with the new builds so maybe the idea of raising the temperature in the winter is a very good thing and it's only muppets who go and sit there in the summer.

On the subject of summer/winter as I trundle into town each day (the little girl saw me today and said hello, I presume, but carried on playing with her mates, best not encourage a line of the giggling little bleeders) straight down the end of the road there is a snow capped mountain. I tried to work out what it is today, due south of Bishkek, I presume it's part of the Tian Shan and here about 4500m. It looks very good as views down your road go! Not quite as good as being able to see Muztagh Ata from over 100km away on the road to Taxkorgan but that might be an exception, a straight valley and a 7700m mountain.

Oh well, tempus fugit!