“It's not like in the Borat movie. They banned that movie there.”
The country the movie got wrong
Ask Mike Boisvert what to understand about Kazakhstan first and he starts with what it is not. Borat was shot in Romania, the actor is British, and the film was banned in Kazakhstan, which is why the joke lands badly with anyone who actually lives there. What is here instead is a Central Asian country with Russian roots that reads as European and Asian at the same time, developed enough that skateboarding has real infrastructure. “I didn't know this country was so developed. It feels like Europe.” In Central Asia, nothing else is close: this is the biggest scene in the region.
A shop, a team, a full length every year
Wall Ride, the core skate shop in Almaty, has a team and puts out a full-length video every year, which is a level of organisation most of the region does not have. Mike missed the whole crew: they were on tour in China the week he was in town. The shop also supplies the neighbours, since skaters in Kyrgyzstan order their boards across the border from it. Add a working economy and Mike's forecast is short: “They have everything they need, so it's going to grow.”
Where to skate
Gorilla Golden Square sits in the middle of Almaty, built by the energy drink, and it is the main spot in the city: outdoor, free and busy from morning until night. “Full, full, full. Really hard to skate there sometimes.” Astana Skatepark is the other pole, about twenty hours north by bus, and the capital has the indoor option that Almaty lacks. Then there are the streets of Almaty themselves, plaza after plaza of ex-Soviet marble.
One practical warning for anyone planning a trip: locals navigate on Yandex rather than Google Maps, so a search in English will show you a fraction of what exists. The other thing that will date this article fast is RareSpot, a Kazakh company now pouring parks around the country, with two new ones in Almaty since Mike's visit alone. “They're building really, really good parks. For this part of the world, man.”
Three skaters to know
Vika (@_vi_skas_) founded Skateboarding Girls Club in Almaty in 2019, gives free lessons and rips in her own right; when Mike was there, twenty to thirty women were skating in that one city, which is unheard of across most of the region. Adil Zhunusov (@teqadil) is his pick for the best skater in the country: the contest rider, relentlessly consistent, with a style Mike describes as a ninja, and a temperament to match. “He never gets angry. We filmed, it wasn't going well that day, and he never got angry.” Alymzhan (@samur.eye) skates and films, which in a scene this size makes him twice as important. One more from Almaty: Nurbek Akbayev (@nurbekakbayev), whom Mike filmed there.
Sushi for tricks
The story Mike keeps telling from Almaty is a restaurant. On a date at Manga Sushi, his food came out an hour before his date's, so he did the thing you are not supposed to do and left the place every bad review he could type. The owner messaged him, apologised, closed the restaurant for the two of them the next night, and then sent 200 pieces of sushi to the skatepark. Mike handed them out for tricks. “That was the most random thing ever. And actually, it was a really good restaurant.”
If you go
Almaty sits under the mountains, so the day trips are the reason to build in extra days. Charyn Canyon is out toward the Chinese border and is the one Mike still talks about; Kolsai Lakes is further into the same range. Rent a car and it turns into lakes, small villages, horses and nomad camps. “The nature there reminds me a bit of Canada.” Eat plov, the rice dish every country here claims to have invented. English goes further than you would expect. And give it more than a week: this is the largest landlocked country on Earth, and a week inside it shows you about as much as a week inside Canada.
The one thing Mike wants on the record, twice: “It's not like in Borat. Really not.”
Mike Boisvert: “I always wanted to go to Kazakhstan. It was my dream to go there.”
Watch the full Kazakhstan series
Photos and video: Mike Boisvert / The Skate Nomad. Part of the JACKALOPE Skate Atlas, one country at a time, with the skaters who live there. See every country on the map.
