Poor Baku just can’t get a break. It’s like the Houston of the Caucasus. Forbes magazine recently listed it as the dirtiest city in the world, which is quite a blow to their long shot aspirations of hosting the 2016 summer Olympics:

Unless you’re in the oil business, there’s little reason to brave the choking pollution of Baku, Azerbaijan. Fetid water, oil ponds and life-threatening levels of air pollution emitted from drilling and shipping land the former Soviet manufacturing center at the bottom of this year’s list as the world’s dirtiest city.

On the contrary, I found Baku an interesting city to visit. It’s not all leaking pipelines and fetid pools of oil (but yes, there is plenty of that to see).

This is a view of Old Town Baku from the top of the Maiden Tower. Besides a large population of carpet salesmen, the Old Town consists of the aforementioned Maiden Tower (12th century), the Palace of the Shirvanshahs (15th century), and beautiful, narrow streets that would rival those in Dubrovnik. In 2000, the Walled City of Baku, the Maiden Tower, and the Palace of the Shirvanshahs were deemed a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

If this doesn’t quite win you over, you could always visit the gigantic Dubai like “Death Star” hotel they are building on the shores of the Caspian Sea. The beach, as shown in the artistic rendering of the hotel (complete with tiki torches and beachside dining), sure does look tempting.

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

Related posts:

1. The South Caucasus: Old Town Baku, the polluted Caspian, and conversations with an Azeri carpet salesman Don’t you love how my “New Baku post will be up in a few days” turned into a few weeks? Anyways…When I last left you, Laura and I had just arrived in Baku, the lovely capital city of Azerbaijan, situated on the Western shore of the Caspian Sea. We...
2. The South Caucasus: From Tbilisi to Baku For breakfast I had a chocolate croissant and a Coke float. Not quite the healthiest meal, but when you’re on vacation you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want, right? We were at a quaint little coffee shop/bookstore that specialized in English language books. Liz and Taline...
3. Coolio goes to Azerbaijan Coolio, the illustrious rapper that we listened to in middle school, is apparently on tour in the former USSR. I was surprised to find an article about Coolio’s Baku concert in the latest EurasiaNet newsletter, as most of their articles are about terrorism, oil, dictatorships, human rights violations…eh, you...
4. “Don’t get shot” I’ve had two people tell me this in the past week…and these are friends of mine who studied the region at LSE. Comrades, be reasonable! I’m not looking to grab an AK-47 and hop into one of the various post-Soviet conflicts plaguing the region, I just want some homemade...
5. North Korea: The Itinerary Theoretically, if all goes according to plan and the North Korean government has approved my visa, this is my trip’s itinerary. I’m especially looking forward to the bowling. Tues 8th Sep AM: Bus from office to airport. PM: Flight JS152 from Beijing to Pyongyang, 13:00 departure, arrive Pyongyang 16:25,...