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Back in the corporate life, I had a customer in Kazakhstan.
Start-up airline – the type that most people wouldn’t touch with a bargepole but which our sales people used to sign up regularly

Sort of like the kids bringing in bedraggled kittens and saying “But it hasn’t got a home”

Except that the sales peoples’ bonus targets were based on turnover and the number of signed contracts.

And mine were mainly based on profit contribution.

But this airline – Air Astana – really took off and my guy who ran the account reckoned the boss should front up to lend some decorum to the proceedings

So there we were in Almaty.

Huge wide boulevards with classic Soviet architecture. Side streets like in Dodge City. Hyatt could be anywhere in the world. (If the lobby bar weren’t housed in a yurt)

Great little airline. Good people (CEO was ex-BA, his Kazakh CFO lectures at a UK university) and after we’d worked out a pricing model to reflect their growth rate, off we went as honoured guests to the annual Almaty Travel Convention.
Weirdest darn thing.
Truckloads of folk dancers dressed up in lurid fluffy polyester gear doing the honours and swaying rhythmically to the massed dombra orchestra, only to burst spontaneously into song when Elton John came over the PA.

Which is where I met Erkesh Shakeeb.

He was CEO of Air Kazakhstan which was the unspeakably tatty state airline (which later died and got swallowed by our lot) and we – the honoured foreign guests – got wheeled up for introductions.

And he gave me his newest CD – ВБГСОТА (which translates to Vbgsota). None the wiser. The back cover has a picture of Everest being threatened by blue lightning; the the insert has a picture of Erkesh and a mate celebrating their ascent of Tanzania’s highest peak.

As I said – Не спросите мне

Nice enough guy, though.

Here he is with Anma-Ata – track 1 of 16 indecipherable titles.

And here’s Oorzhak Khunashtaar-ool with some very nice Tuvan throatsinging

And some Bahraini pearl divers singing about Ifjirie. (They really hit their stride about halfway in – the rest must be tuning up)