Lost among the snowy mountains that separate Europe from Asia, Sheki is one of Azerbaijan's most iconic towns. Its largely silky history includes periods of great harshness. When we visited it, autumn pastels added color to a peculiar post-Soviet and Muslim life.
Set in the rugged, icy 2300 meters of the Great Caucasus, the Khinalig people are just one of several minorities in the region. It has remained isolated for millennia. Until, in 2006, a road made it accessible to the old Soviet Ladas.
In 1941, Hitler made Azerbaijan one of the targets of Operation Barbarossa. The reason was the same abundance of black gold and natural gas that had driven the opulence of the Azeri capital on the Caspian Sea. Baku became the great metropolis of the Caucasus. In a long fusion between Communism and Capitalism. Between East and West.