Leigh in Azerbaijan

Two weeks back a new bar opened up downstairs, three floors below me.  The music starts around 7pm at a restaurant level which is acceptable.  At 9:30 however, a Turkish singer (who looks like a Turkish movie star) starts up.  He has a sequencer with bass and drums and that’s where the problem begins.

The bass is so loud that it’s hard to think about much at all except the annoying repeated bass playing a pattern about 120 times per song.  The next song starts with a new pattern that repeats for 120 times.  Heather, three floors higher up, uses sleeping tablets but I’ve taken to evacuating to get sleep rather than lie in bed getting angry. I’m now sleeping somewhere else 5 nights each week, seeing as though it’s loud from Wed through Sunday evening.

It’s hard to know what regulations there are here.  Even if there are regulations about something, money and power seem to find a way around.  The Director has been sympathetic and says the school will move me as soon as possible, which probably means December.  The situation is not so bad for expats who can be moved but I wonder about the owner/residents in these buildings who have no choice but to stay or sell at a reduced price due to the disturbance most nights.  Looks like the black mafia grows stronger.

A friend’s father worked for a tobacco company here which was nationalised two years ago.  There was nothing that could be done about it.  My guess is that it’s now owned by a powerful Azeri family with a siginficant income.  He also described how a local company counterfeited Kent cigarettes with low quality tobacco for a few months to reduce its market share.   It seems that these things happen with no consequences.