Behind the Facade, Baku Airport

When you arrive to Baku, the first thing you see on the road form airport is façade, that is thoroughly built along the main roads in Baku but literally prolong itself to any aspects of public appearance. Making the step behind, the curious traveler finds that façade is build of thin alabaster and montaged to the old half-reclining buildings, that were not bothered to be reconstructed.

Oil is making politics of Caspian though the ambitious plans of countries leaders have no benefit for ordinary people. Promise of oil wealth resulted into nothing. At least half of the people of these Caspian states live below the poverty line. The areas outside the capitals suffer from decaying infrastructure and absence of work. In Baku, in the midst of plenty, around half of million internally displaced people continue, since last 18 years, to live in abandoned factories, hospitals, train cars and other improvised housing. They managed to build a new home in cardboard houses and to keep hope and humanity while existing in inhuman conditions.

The new ventures may bring increased prosperity, but they also put pressure on traditional rural communities and the environment. The poverty gap is widening, with much of the population increasingly excluded from services and wealth. The prospects for rapid oil wealth contrast with fast spreading poverty following the collapse of the Soviet economy. Although massive investment has suddenly been channelled into the area, its effect is still both geographically and socially very limited, with little widespread impact on society.