Citizens of Kazakhstan have been concerned that comedian Sacha Baron-Cohen’s portrayal of an outrageous TV reporter in the film Borat would have a negative impact, but obviously they don’t understand the first rule of marketing. All publicity is NIIIIICE.

Located in Central Asia, Kazakhstan is the world’s ninth largest country, but until recently, tourism hasn’t exactly been one of their more popular resources. Now, thanks to Borat, tourism is booming and in a new poll, thousands of travelers have picked Kazakhstan as their #1 must-see destination for 2007. Although I believe the poll was conducted by a Kazakh company.

Things must be picking up, because Radison has just opened a new luxury hotel in the northern city of Astana and the national airline, Air Astana, has added a third weekly flight from the UK. Frequent flyers will be happy to hear that passengers are no longer allowed to bring goats and chickens on board in their carry-on luggage.

Tourists will find the countryside to be quite spectacular with beautiful mountains and lakes, but they probably won’t find the cuisine so pleasant. At traditional Kazakh dinner parties the special guest is served a sheep’s head and the least important guest is served one of the animal’s vertebrae. I hear the eyeballs are especially tasty though.

Source: The Sun

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