Azerbaijan's part of the Caspian Sea to ensure it has plenty of friends in high places. English and American accents ring around the hotel lobby each morning, and I shared a lift with two Nigerians - more oil men.
I can see an oil rig from my hotel room. I'm nine floors up - it wasn't the ideal place to learn that a few days ago a 16-storey building under construction nearby collapsed, burying several workers underneath the rubble.
The oil has created a building boom but standards are somewhat lax - this was not the first building to crumble. Apparently the locals prefer to buy (if they can afford them) Soviet-built apartments - ugly but built to last.
This is a place of cultural and political collisions - the remnants of Persian conquest; the Soviets and more; the benign (for now) collision of Asia and Europe; and the on-going scars of conflict with neighbouring Armenia.
The two countries are not on speaking terms, relations with Russia and Iran are also strained. It is in more ways than one today - a hot spot.