Kazakhstan is a wonderful country, with beautiful mountains and lakes, says Yevgeny Kuznetsov. Just don't try to find a decent bowling alley there.
"Maybe about 60 people bowl seriously in my country," he said.
Asia is the world's most populous continent, but it is by no means the richest. And when it comes to sports -- especially the less-known or more-expensive-to-play ones -- it isn't always easy to find a place to train.
PHOTO: AFP
Kuznetsov bowled his first game four years ago while vacationing with friends in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates. He's now on the Kazakhstan national team.
It's not just bowling.
As Doha hosts Asia's biggest sports event, the Asian Games, the difference between the haves and the have nots is clear. The big three sports nations in the region -- China, Japan and South Korea -- are also among the richest and the most willing to spend large amounts of money to support their athletes.
While Chinese swimmers can expect big bonuses for winning, some Palestinian athletes had to buy their own uniforms. Iraq's lone pair of women beach volleyball players had to train indoors -- not on sand -- for lack of a proper beach venue.
"We are present here just to show that Iraq exists," Liza Agasi, who paired up with her sister for the games, said after a drubbing by the Japanese in their opening match on Saturday.
With small budgets and limited interest, many countries in the Asian Games don't have the resources to put together teams for such events as sailing or softball, which has only five teams. Shooting, meanwhile, has a full field -- often with police officers or soldiers filling out the list of competitors.
Kazakhstan has possibly the saddest hard-luck story.
When the equestrian team from the former Soviet republic realized it couldn't afford to fly its team and horses from its base in Germany to Doha, it decided to drive nearly 7,000km to the Arabian Gulf for the competition.
The trip lasted 13 days -- five days longer than expected -- because of border problems in Turkey and Syria. The convoy went via Austria, Italy and by ferry to Greece. From there it continued to Turkey, Syria, Jordan and through Saudi Arabia to Qatar.
For sports like bowling that aren't on the Olympic roster, the gap is even more stark.
Poor countries such as Laos, Cambodia and North Korea didn't even send teams in bowling. Though Kazakhstan dispatched a full men's team to bowling, it could find only one woman worthy of the competition.
Neighboring Uzbekistan wasn't able to find even one.
"We don't have any women good enough to play here," said Agzam Tursunov, the head of the Uzbek bowling association. "Until about four years ago, our country didn't have any bowling alleys at all. There are only about 40 competition-level players in the country today."
"They get together on Saturdays," he added. "They all know each other."
Even oil-rich Qatar, which has announced it will bid to bring the Olympics to the Middle East for the first time in 2016, has only one competition-class bowling center, and that was just built recently for the Asian Games.
"This is the only place that you could call a real bowling center," said Frank Buffa, a Canadian who coaches the Qatar national bowling team.
Despite the lack of facilities, Qatar has produced some world-class bowlers, including Salem Busherbak, a torchbearer at the games' opening ceremonies.
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