Fast forward past the point where Kazakh Tourism tried to sue Sacha Baron Cohen, and here we are at the time where they’ve taken on the famous catchphrase as a new tourism campaign.
After well and truly banning the ‘Borat’ satire, Kazakh Tourism has decided to turn bad to good, transforming “Very Good” into the new catchphrase for the country in a series of new, and slightly cringe-worthy – tourism ads.
Before the 2006 movie, ‘Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan’, many people had never even heard of Kazakhstan. But, post-Borat, more and more travellers started to visit, whether it be for comedy, out of curiosity or to get off the beaten track and experience something completely new.
Kazakhstan. Very Nice!
According to a report by The New York Times, the brains behind the campaign is Dennis Keen, who when learned about the Borat sequel, thought rather than ignoring Mr. Cohen, Kazakhstan should embrace the Borat character’s catchphrase and turn it into the country’s tourism slogan.
Cue, “Kazakhstan, Very Nice.” (Said in Sacha Baron Cohen’s ‘Borat’ voice, of course!)
The campaign video (above), was created by Mr. Keen and friend, Yermek Utemissov and features four fantastic (in a kind of funny way) scenes in which travellers embrace the countries unique experiences – such as hiking with a selfie stick, tasting fermented horse milk and hanging out with locals in traditional dress – and obviously, think they’re all “very nice”.
Totally still not sold on that fermented horse milk though. Especially as the tourist states it’s “actually very nice”. Hmm, okay.
Anyway, Mr. Keen told the New York Times that this idea the kind of idea you get when you own a tourism company and a pandemic has annihilated global tourism.
He confessed that he has “had a lot of free time,” and he wants his son to grow up proud of his country and not ashamed of Borat, which drove him to start the fun project and reclaim the catchphrase.
Go team Kazakh!
Would you like to visit, or have you ever visited Kazakhstan?
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