Well a couple of observations -

- The fares do go up, and "bargain" origin points change from one year to the next. One must still get to the origin points so while IST may have been cheaper than, say, ARN for OWE issues, one can get to Sweden from various places more cheaply than Turkey.

- All it takes is for somebody who speaks Turkish and who has an Istanbul yellow pages to find a competent TA in Istanbul, someone like the Cairo or Bangkok agents who have profited by knowledge of this niche market. Ditto Damascus or wherever.

- Let's see what the bottom line is re surcharges and taxes after this year's fare increases. The "second sticker" has been growing faster than the base price.

- While €5999 sounds like a lot, think of it as 20 business class tickets at €300 each. Some flights (say, MCI-DFW) would be losers for that, but HKG-JFK or JNB-SYD for 300 Euros? Bring it on. May lead to more judicious use of segments.

- BA's RTW people in N. America and Bremen, it seems, don't know "booking" from "ticketing." So vat else iss new?