Results tagged “Azerbaijan”

I arrive in Zaqatala with 15 manat left. I find a share bed for 5 manat, leaving me with 10 manat to reach Georgia. Next to the hotel I stay is the local mosque, the following day is the holiday of Eid/Bayram. I want to go to the mosque during the holiday, so go out as soon as I find a bed for the night to see if it’s feasible.

Mosque in Zaqatala, Azerbaijan.

Attached to the mosque is an Islamic school where I meet a fellow by the name of Mohammed (what are the odds?) and we get into a long discussion about the existence of god and the purpose of faith. I tell him about how little manat I have left, he tells me that it’s no problem, the following day is Eid and Allah will take care of me. He invites me into his house for the night and tells me he’ll feed me and give me any money that I lack to get to Georgia.  I’ve already prepaid my accommodation so I agree to meet him the following day at the mosque.

Strolling around in the evening after Mohammed and I part ways, I’m drawn to the WWII memorial.

Next to the run-down memorial is a run-down looking cafe. The sun has almost set, it’s dark and a couple of rough-looking guys invite me to join them. One of them, covered in tattoos and with the appearance of someone who’s done time and been in a lot of fights introduces himself as Raphik. Our discussions gets to the story of how the guard on my train tried to plant heroin on me to have me busted by Kazakh soldiers for drug trafficking.

From there Raphik tells me other tricks that they could have pulled (concealing heroin in their hand, reaching into my pocket and pulling it out or distracting me and planting it in my bag) and I become a little apprehensive trying to figure out who I’ve gotten myself involved with. He goes on to tell me about some of the things that went on in Russia during the bandit times (after the fall of the USSR) and mentions that he was in Moscow for quite some time in that period. I don’t ask whether or not he participated in the stories he tells.

I tell him about my encounter with Mohammed and how he said Allah will take care of everything at which point Raphik’s expression turns completely serious.

Raphik: This person you just met told you Allah will get you to Georgia without any problems. Do you really trust someone you just met when they tell you things like this?

Me: Yes, I can see that he believes in it so much that I believe in it also.

Raphik: Follow me.

It’s late in the evening, the streets in Zaqatala are unlit. Raphik is covered in tattoos and has a few scars from street fights. He’s told me a few stories of fights he’s been in. I don’t even hesitate when I get up and follow him into the dark streets. As we walk, Raphik ignores all the “normal looking” characters and gives a greeting to the “rough looking” ones. He quickens his pace and I follow. We stop at a house, he looks up and down the street, opens the gate and says I should go inside. Would you have followed him?

I go inside the house to meet Raphik’s family, his wife and son, older brother with wife and son and also his parents. They’re in the the middle of dinner when we arrive. Raphik retells the story of how we met, of my travels and of what Mohammed had told me. Raphik’s father tells me that he would never follow someone like Raphik if they asked him to follow them, which is why he could never travel like I have.

We eat dinner for the next hour and in the process, I realise just how little money the family has. Raphik long ago stopped his life of crime to raise a son with his wife. His outward appearance still puts people off meeting him. His generosity is unimaginable back home, but completely typical in Azerbaijan. After we finish eating, I offer the last of my money to Raphik for his generosity, he tells me to put the money away before I upset him, that Mohammed was right, Allah will look after me and that I should go to mosque the following morning.

The following morning, given the lack of shower in the share room, I cleanse myself in the sink of the bathroom, put on the last change of clean clothes I have and head to mosque. Mohammed is nowhere to be found, I walk around for a bit, come back and find the mosque is now open, I go inside to find what I estimate to be several hundred men listening to the imam. I do likewise, praying as the people around me do.

After the final prayer as I’m walking away from the mosque to my room to grab my bag, one of the men outside the mosque who saw me the previous day talking to Mohammed tells me that I’m not leaving without sharing breakfast with them and points me in the direction of the cafeteria.

During breakfast, I find Mohammed, serving tea and breakfast to everyone present, when he sees me, he smiles and tells me that he knew that we’d meet here. Allah is looking after you Ivan, I still remember those words.

During breakfast, I meet some of the other students of the school who let me know that since Mohammed’s father died, both he and his mother have to spend every spare minute working in order to put food on the table, a fact that I’d been oblivious to. How can one man be so poor and yet offer everything he has to a complete stranger he’d met the day before? I have such an amazing respect for my friend.

I parted ways eventually with my humble friend and made it to the border of Azerbaijan for a grand total of two manat, leaving me with another eight. I show my Russian passport on the Azeri side of the border, this border guard, rather than try and extract a bribe quizzes me extensively about life in Australia and whether it’s possible to get work there. His colleague joins me and I give them advice on how to apply for a working visa to Australia, they wish me well in Georgia and I wish them happy festivities.

At the Georgian border, I show my Australian passport, laugh at the fact that their passport scanning machine has a sticker saying Department of Homeland Security and give a solid thankyou when they say “Gamar Joba, Welcome to Georgia!”.

Just as Mohammed said, Allah got me to Georgia…

I rock up to Sheki without much of a plan of what to do. I start chatting with one of the attendants at the avtovokzal and mention that I'm looking for a place to stay. He makes a phone call and ten minutes later I'm greeted by a man who takes me to stay at his place (his name escapes me for now, if you have the Lonely Planet Caucuses edition please comment). He mentions that he's in the Lonely Planet under Sheki places to stay, I tell him I believe him (I've given up on looking for guidebooks while travelling).

I stay with him and his family for a night, and realise the problem faced by a lot of people in this region with working in the tourist industry. Their culture mandates that the guest is treated with the utmost respect and should be wined, dined and left well rested which raises a dilemma when it comes to accepting money for such services.

The family that takes me in, brother and sister on the right, neighbour's kid (who has a crush on the sister) on the left.

The town is fairly small so I manage to see all of it within a day.

Old church converted to Museum.

The store that sells the best Sheki Halva in all of Sheki, directions courtesy of wikitravel.

Courtyard of the Caravanserai hotel which still functions as a hotel, even if you aren't staying there, have a look.

Sheki Khansarai, it's worth it to do the free tour and hear the stories about the place. Also if you get a chance, have a look at the video about Sheki.

After seeing the sights of Sheki, I take a bus to the village of Kish where I look at the ancient Albanian church (complete with human remains in the open grave).

I remembered reading somewhere that there was an old fort within two hours walk of Kish and a small percentage of the locals seemed to know what I was talking about, so I set off following their directions.

The village of Kish.

I stop for nutrients along the walk.

The view from the walk. Not long after I took this photo, I came across two Azeri soldiers standing in the field. They took my passport details, radioed to their higher ups and said that unfortunately I was not allowed to cross into the dangerous region. To this day, I have no idea what they were guarding.

After I returned to Sheki and said my goodbyes, the family urged me to stay one more night so that I could join in the Bayram (Ramadan) festivities with them. In retrospect, I should have stayed.

After leaving Johnny, I head to Ganja where the first hotel I walked into was incredibly expensive. The receptionist realises that there’s no way that I can afford to stay there (maybe my smell gave it away), she tells me about  the cheap hotel in Ganja (Hotel Kapaz) – Next to the statue of Nizami.

Unfortunately for the staff at the hotel, I meet a local Sabuhi, who invites me to stay with him (forewarning me that he lives like a poor student).

Poor guy, I help him devour some of his pomegranates and grapes.

In the evening, we proceed to make shashlyk and feast like kings. Left to right, Myself, Sabuhi and his room-mate Cesaret.

During the day, we take in most the sights of Ganja:

The puppet theatre – Sabuhi tells the performers who are rehearsing a new show that I’m a tourist and that I’m leaving before their next show. They let me watch the rehearsal and meet some of the stars of the show.

Senor Rooster at the Ganja Puppet Theatre.

The bottle house of Ganja, a sight that many locals don’t know. The owners said that the house was built as tribute to the son lost in WWII. Rocks and bottles were imported from various regions of the USSR. This place is seriously cool, I tried to get the owners keen on the idea of hosting Couch Surfers, they were more interested in smoking.

Look, it’s a flamingo chilling, I can watch these for hours.

The absolute must see sight of Ganja, Azerbaijan is the Mausoleum of famous Persian poet Nizami Ganjavi.

The story goes that they built the tomb on the sight of his father’s home town. They wanted to move the mausoleum into the centre of town (making it more accessible to tourists and others wanting to pay their respects). A series of misfortunate accidents occurred while setting up the mausoleum closer to the centre, so they left the mausoleum where it is now.

I also visited the museum in Ganja, where there is an exhibit dedicated to the Khojaly Massacre. Cesaret, Sabuhi’s room mate was from the region where the massacre occurred, and it was deeply saddening to see his reaction as he walked through the exhibit.

Addendum: After visiting the museum, I subsequently visited Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. While on a tour of the museum of Nagorno-Karabakh in Stepanakert, I asked the tour guide (a young 21yo girl) about the massacre and what her thoughts on it were. She adamantly stated that there was no massacre, that the civilians were shot by Azeri soldiers and that she couldn’t care less about what happened, a saddening truth highlighting how neither government is doing anything to prevent the youth feeling anger and wanting to gain “justice” for the war – I’d met plenty of Azeris and Armenians who had nothing but pure hatred for the other side and wished they would all be wiped out. Young and old had stories about how the other side persecuted them, justifying their hatred.

On the Aktau/Baku ferry, one of the passengers (Johnny) invited me to stay with him at his home in Masalli. Johnny is ethnically a Talysh, there are close to a million of them, they speak their own language, more related to Farsi than to Turkish like the Azeri language.

Along the way (Johnny gives me a lift, with his friend Sayid) we pass a speed trap consisting of two policemen hiding under a tree with a radar gun. Johnny stops and they exchange a few words. Later he tells me that they'd caught him speeding two days earlier and asked him for a 20 manat (30AUD) bribe to not take his license for speeding. He replied that he had two licenses with him, if they could catch him, they could have one of them.

At one point, Johnny turns to me:

Johnny: You want to take a bath? I know a great place where the girls give the best blowjobs, my treat.

Me: Maybe later.

Johnny: Or how about we go shoot some guns, have you ever shot a gun before?

Me: No.

Johnny: Good, if we find some time, we'll go shoot some guns. I have pistols and a rifle, if you want, an AK47.

Me: Tempting.

Johnny: How about to go to Iran, the border is thirty kilometres from my home.

Me: I don't have a Visa.

Johnny: No problems, I know people here to take care of it for you, pay a small amount of money and you can get one to go over there.

Me: Bribing my way to Iranian visa, tempting.

As we're approaching his town, we pull over and Johnny points out two car wrecks that were involved in a head-on. The driver of one of them died, Johnny was the first to arrive on the scene to watch the driver die. The driver was his twenty-two year old nephew, he'd shown me a photo of the car crash earlier on the ferry.

Next up, we take a photo with one of his towns cops.

Johnny: Lets take a photo with the pig Ivan.

Cop: *laughs nervously*

Johnny: Don't worry, it's only going on the internet.

Cop: No, please not on the internet.

Johnny: Shut up and smile, I'm joking.

*take the photo*

Johnny: I lied, it's going on the internet.

Drinking tea in his local chai-hana (tea house). The man on the left of Johnny is the uncle of Hadji, another of the passengers on the boat who walked/hitchhiked his way from Baku to Mecca. The man to my left is Sayid, who came with us from Baku and who took me around the sights of the area.

The following day after sightseeing in and around Linkoran, we're having lunch and copious amounts of vodka follow. Out of the four of us drinking, I'm the only one not driving. We approach a couple of cops on the side of the road and Johnny offers one of the cops a 5 manat bribe. The cop replies, you know we don't need your money Johnny. After some insistence the cop takes the money.

Me: What was the point of that bribe?

Johnny: We were out drinking. The cops would never think about hassling me for drinking, but now if they pull over the other two drivers, there won't be any problems for them.

Me: Why would they never think about pulling you over here?

Johnny: I'm well respected here, everyone knows me. I used to have an army and fight against the Azeri government. I was against our current president and in support of another man, because of this, we fought wars with the president. I've spent six years in prison because of this, but I've quit all that, I have a family now, a wife and children, they don't want me to die.

It's amazing to see how much the neighbourhood and his friends respect him. Irrespective of whether it's fear or admiration, his favourite restaurant always has a table ready for him, vodka food, everything.

It shows most in his five year old son's attitude. Not being used to not getting what he wants, he throws tantrums over anything that doesn't go his way. Hi bites, he spits and soon he messes with me. He spits on me once and I slap him across his face, hard enough to bring him to tears. When the kid inevitably runs to daddy, Johnny asks me what happened. I told him the kid had been spitting, I hit him so that next time he got the urge to spit, he'd remember the pain, I'd expect the same sort of discipline for my children. Johnny thanks me and tells me he's never had anyone have the courage to do that.

Waking up on the park bench outside the Aras hotel at 8am, we start looking for the Thousand Camels hostel. When I eventually arrive in the old town, after a detour of breakfast, I’m twenty metres from the hostel when a guy (Ali) on the street asks me if I’m going to the hostel and says I can stay with him for cheaper.

After agreeing on a price, he invites me into his cafe and pours me some tea, taking me back to his place and offering me breakfast. The view from his balcony is amazing, it overlooks the maiden tower.

Maiden tower in Baku Old Town.

Do I look delicious to you?

Om nom nom.

Mosque located near the monument dedicated to the Turkish assistance in the war with Armenia.

Azerbaijan is experiencing some serious growth thanks to the oil money they’re making. With GDP growth at close to 30%, there are construction projects going on everywhere in Baku (and nowhere else in Azerbaijan).

New Museum in Baku, not quite open when I visited. I was kicked out by security after wandering in and looking around.

Another almost finished, not quite yet unveiled building in Baku.

The cargo ship arrives at 2am. Going through immigration/customs at 3am is not the best idea in the world. The entire time I’m in the queue with the other passengers, I’m thinking “don’t mention that you’re going to Armenia, don’t mention that you’re going to Armenia”.

When I’m second in line, the guy in front of me starts making idle chit-chat and eventually asks me where I’m going. Baku, I reply, around Azerbaijan, then Georgia Armenia and Russia. F*ck, I realise I’ve said it just as the words roll off my tongue. The border guard was within earshot.

It comes to my turn to go through the “interview”.

Officer: Where are you going and where did you come from?

Me: From Aktau to Baku.

Officer: And then?

Me: Georgia and flight to Moscow.

At this point the guard from outside comes in and pipes in “and Armenia!”

Officer: Is this true?

Me: Maybe.

Officer: Hmm, this passport looks like a forgery, we’re going to have to take it to forensics. It’ll take a few days to get it back from the lab, we can’t let you into the country until it’s done. Of course, we could help you, if you’d “help” us. Will you “give thanks”?

Me: If you can help me, I can give thanks.

Officer: *as other officer stamps my passport* You should give him a little something for letting you into the country.

Me: *taking passport* Thanks, from the bottom of my heart.

Next interview, I’m in a room with two officers, one a very cute girl, the other her superior.

Female officer: Where are you going?

Me: Baku, then flying home.

Female officer: Do you have any Tenge?

Me: No, I spent it all.

Female officer: Manat?

Me: No, I will get some from the ATM.

Female officer: American dollars?

Me: I have some.

Female officer: Show me.

Me: *take out some money from pocket, holding it in hand, show it to her, ignoring her outstretched hand*

Female officer: *realising she won’t get the chance to take some of my money* Those are not American dollars *laughing* they are Azeri dollars, we have them everywhere. Off you go.

Charlie and I walk away from the immigration point and head into the city centre looking for the Aras Hotel, supposedly the cheapest in town to sleep until 8am. We come upon some restaurant and after some troubles communicating (they only speak Azeri), we think they let us sleep a few hours on one of the couches. We get setup, only to have them come in and tell us an incredibly high price. We leave.

We arrive at 4am and after some extensive banging on the door, the guy sleeping on the couch finally wakes up comes outside and tells us its 20AZN (Azeri New Manat) for the night, each. We ask if we can have it for 5 each since it’s only a few hours of sleep. He says wait a second, goes back inside, locks the door and climbs back into bed.