People and Buildings: Xinaliq

The men above were more than happy to let Marlys photograph them. They even asked if she had a telephoto lens and suggested a different angle. I bet they are among the most photographed men in Azerbaijan (besides the president). Their suggestion for composition is below--I like Marlys' initial take with the layers of terraced rock walls, but theirs showcases the village more. You decide.
Here is the garden of the house we stayed in.


The whitewashed doorway and little window below the white jeep are where the wash house/toilet are.














There used to be a house right there--and indeed houses used to crowd side by side all along this level--but as you can see from the next photo, many houses have fallen into disrepair.


It doesn't take more than a winter or two with houses made of earth and rock. If you don't keep the roofs well plastered and pitched properly, and shovel the snow off regularly, then they begin to leak. With so many families choosing to move into larger towns for the winter these days (the shepherds take their flocks much lower for the winter months anyway) up to half of the homes are no longer permanently occupied and many have just fallen apart.




That's not to say people aren't still building and maintaining homes here. In the following photo you can see a number of well-kept homes, including the one we stayed in at the far center of the photograph--a large stuccoed house with a metal roof and little enclosed front stoop. But it is very expensive to bring in materials, so for everything besides the earth and stone, you need cash--and that's not easy to come by.















Here's a kid who was shy about having his picture taken, but stood very carefully still for Marlys anyway.
And in case you didn't quite catch the T-shirt--plus he's smiling a bit now:


I'm starting to run outta steam here--it's nearly midnight and using multiple photos on this blogger program is a layout nightmare--it's really designed for one or two photos per post. It's nearly impossible to get things placed right. But here are several more photos below of buildings and people. There's a great one of a stack of the dung and straw fuel they use for heating in the winter.


For 40 years they had very cheap electricity and heated their homes that way, but with independence and rising energy costs, they now have gone back to the old methods. Our host said that each house must keep a couple cows just for this purpose--which can be a lot of work, especially for the older folks whose kids have moved out.

You can also see the hay piles for the winter to feed the cows and few sheep and goats not gone to lower pasture.



Kids on the roof in the hay picture just were hanging out, but we also saw the usual football (soccer) play--often kicking the ball from roof to roof--even when there was flat area for easier play below. I personally think the game could be much more fun if played on a terraced field!

In a couple of the next photos notice the water line snaking up the street. It brings water to the town from a source higher up (wise, given the way toilets drain into the mountainside and animals wander about in the streams at town level especially).



It runs continuously via taps into a trough at the center of town where everyone has to go to get water. Well, not everyone. This was clearly a job for women and children--mostly girl children. Strong women.

The young woman in red is carrying a tub of wet laundry.




The water has to run continuously so that it doesn't freeze in the subzero winter months. This is also why no house to house plumbing exists--the pipes would just freeze unless you left the taps open all the time. Of course, everyone in town knows the term"global warming" and adults talk about how when they were kids there was snow by this time of year (October) and snow year round on the nearby peaks—which are, after all, 3710-44466 meters (12,000-14,600 feet) high--the highest mountain in Europe is in the Caucasus. Al Gore's Nobel Prize had just been awarded and folks saw it on the news. (They also were watching the US vote on labeling Armenian genocide--but that's another blog post.) We saw just a dusting of snow on two of the peaks--so little it can't really be made out in the photos we took.


What we don't have photos of--the two weddings we attended (low-budget, night-time, largely outdoors under tarps, dancing bundled against the wind), the inside of the house where we stayed (very comfortable--slept great), the outdoor set up for washing hands and face (very clever low-tech water holder/dispenser contraption), the food we ate (they made us vegetarian food!). You know, the everyday things that one takes for granted. And we were having low battery issues with the camera--we could buy more in the little store, but they only lasted a short time.

Marlys took a hundred more lovely photos (most of our photos are by her). I'll try and get her to post a few of the 4WD trek we did up the rocky river valley, as well as some Fall pics coming back down through Quba. Oh Yeah--and some great pics from the new village museum.



Last words on Xinaliq from me for now--this is a village that's changing quickly. A new road was put in just this last year that more than halved the time it takes to drive there from the nearest large town and made the place accessible in winter. There are now two small shops in town where there were none 5 years ago. A new school has been built that allows children of shepherds to board while their parents are off with the sheep. And because of significant mention in the only good tour guide to Azerbaijan, they now get tourists, including Azeris from Baku, all summer. It's clearly an amazing base for hiking the Caucasus. Finally, with the dedication of the new road and school, the president came for a visit and of course the ubiquitous giant billboard of he and his father (the previous president) has been planted in full view next to the road through town (well the road kind of stops at the town, but it trails off slow). The attempt to make the populace love the son through images of the father is everywhere--I think they must have a plan for a billboard every few minutes, no matter where you go. Somehow I forgot to get a picture of it in Xinaliq.

The Otherworld of Azerbaijan

THE DRIVE: from Quba (pronounced~ goo-buh) (about 2 hours from Baku) to Xinaliq (pronounced "henna-look"--which is actually what it means because the mountains are henna-colored in the sun) a small town in the mountains of Azerbaijan, 25 kilometers from the Russian border, in the Caucasus Mountains.













ABOVE Left: Treehouse perched amongst a tree's autumn leaves. Unlike Baku, Quba was fully being hit with fall. Trees of Quba, few pines and furs, were orange red yellow, and some still green.

ABOVE: Hills of area surrounding Quba.

Our driver was a great tour-ish guide too. He knew all the great tourist photo-op places. As we drove to Xinaliq, he stopped the car a number of places, to show us waterfalls, rivers, and beautiful rolling hills.
Here, he stopped to lead us up some stairs, by the road. Some rocky steps of this hill, and some slices of wood nailed as steps up to this lookout. These steps led to a quite precarious climb, as some of them were broken and unstable. Heres our tour guide in a picture below.

















More beautiful scenery!!!!!!!
















Sorry about the dust on the lens in this pic. of mom, here, folks. Did I say it was windy? Cuz it was windy, not so much down in Quba, but very windy in Xinaliq. I think some dust got blown onto the camera lens, so the pictures a little funky monkey. Also below, you'll catch a glimpse of "yo", this photo taken by "mi madre". Hey, I'm learning a bit of Spanish, anyway. Again, pic is a little blurry.























Posing at a picnic party palace. Nice alliteration, eh?


















OH NOOOO! She's gunna fall over the edgeeee!!! (While I sit here and watch...)



















CANYONSS!!! Getting close to Xiniliq....












(Ok--so Marlys' first picture of the village was the next one, but I felt the narrative went better if you could see the town first. But it is more exciting in her version, I guess.--Alison)


OUR TIME IN XINILIQ: They cook and kill their own meat in this small village town built on a hill....look what we almost tripped over! :0


















Grazing in the hills of Xiniliq...



















Okay, here's mi madre now, she's gunna share a few memories with y'all.


Hi, Alison here now.
Here's Zaur, our guide, with his 15 cows in the background. He's a super skinny guy--but the wind is blowing up his clothes like balloons! You can't really see, but Zaur climbed with us in casual dress loafers. It was amazing--we were often going straight up and transversing shale hillsides. We hiked with him for several hours, past sacred waterfalls (wish I'd thought to take a picture of the discarded and rusty crutch that was left near the falls--a clear indication of its healing powers). Folks tie prayer flags on a bit of fencing near the entrance to the caves/falls, but as with any location in the country that sees many number of visitors, there was also trash...Not much trash up higher though, where mainly shepherds are the only human inhabitants.














Here's Marlys and Zaur with Russia off somewhere in the distance there. Just outside of the village we stayed in was a station/boarding house for border soldiers--I wasn't sure if it was for the Russian soldiers or the Azeri soldiers though.







Marlys and Zaur.















More scenery. The wind was whipping up the dust and the clouds were moving through at the same time. Hazy effects.







Below is Xinaliq from above on our hike. As you can see, it's quite defensively built on a spur of the mountainside. Since the inhabitants of this village speak a language no one else speaks (and which has not been definitively connected to any others), one local man speculates that maybe communication with nearby villages was only through hostilities. The other two small nearby villages (both lower altitude) speak a language no one else speaks also. These are still living languages, but because the villages have been subject to the familiar phenomenon of migration to larger towns for jobs, and the permanent resident population has been halved in the last quarter century, I do wonder how long the language will remain strong and dynamic. Children are beginning to be brought up elsewhere. The man who arranged our visit said his second son, who has lived for three years in larger Quba and plays with Azeri speaking kids, speaks the Xinaliq language with a strange accent.
Marlys chose all these pics and I have some others I want to talk about so I'll close out this post and start another. We got some really spectacular photos I want to share. More next post...Alison

Helping Those in Need

As a school field trip, about two weeks ago, all of the M4s went to A "UNHCR", refugee center for women and children. Our teacher put us into groups of 3, that including one Azeri speaker, so we could communicate with the people in the center. Originally we were told that it was a refugee camp we were going to be visiting, however it turned out to be a refugee center. This meaning, that the refugees don't actually live there. Our assignment given by our teacher, was to come up with 5 questions to interview the refugees there. Some of their stories were amazing. Almost all came form Afghanistan, and had learned to speak Azeri, Nara (the Azeri speaker in our group) was easily able to communicate with them.
There was a girl our age from Afghanistan still in the 7th grade. I'm sure her schooling was slowed because of the war. She spoke a bit of English, and told us she was all alone here in Azerbaijan. She is not here with her family.
Another mother said that a man brought them here. They thought they were going to the US, but instead they ended up here. Pretty different, huh?
One family even came here by car.
Everyone said they were happier here than they had been in Afghanistan, though. They said it was much too dangerous to live their presently. Some said they would go back, if the war ceased and it became safe to live there once more, while others said they would not, and that they were happy here.
















One of the M4 teachers also came up with the idea of bringing goody bags for the children filled with candy. Some other kids and I helped to pass these out to the children. There were little twisty ties holding the bag closed, and some of the children just stood there with there goody bags, not quite sure what to do and how to open the bags. So I went around, and mimicked to the kids how to untie it, and pointed to myself, to see if they would like help. This little girl pictured above, just stared at me, and held out her bag for me to help. It was very cute, she was such a solemn little girl. She didn't even act excited at all when we passed out the candy. But obviously, she enjoyed it. :)

There was also a child's play room equipped with toys, like a dollhouse, building blocks...and a room full of children! TISA students passed some free time, after the interviews, playing ping-pong with the children.

Checkers was a hit!

This happy child was extremely enthusiastic with his pen and paper. I believe he enjoyed showing off his artist skills with such a large audience.

















The girl in all red was posing for pictures all over the place! She would point at the camera to get my attention, then strike a pose and wait for the flash. Then she would urgently point again to see the picture. It was the most exciting thing for her to see her photograph!! Most likely, she has never encountered a digital camera in her life. She has probably seen them, but never actually had an experience with one before.

Hey fellow with the chair! Take it easy, let's not throw a tantrum just yet, wait till I'm out of the way! No, this kid was just playing. =)


























Hey mommy! WE MATCH!!!!























NAP-TIME!! zzzzzzzzzz....snore....zzz



















Quitterie and the kiddies in the dangerous play structure...The play structure had no ladder. Children were just hauling themselves up by pure arm strength. Hey, well at least it's a good way to get those macho-super-fine arms.

I'm very grateful that I got a chance to visit this refugee center. I know this sounds corny, but I really do think that it impacted my life. Hearing all of those sad stories for real, not just on TV, made me realize how fortunate I am. I can't imagine being in one of these people's position. Especially the 14 year old girl. Imagine being in a strange country all alone....

I'm glad to say that most everyone seemed happy. All of us from TISA certainly enjoyed our time spent there as much as the young children seemed to. However, the refugees did say they were lacking in some basic necessities such as clothes and food. The center said they were also in need of books and more modern computers. M4 has made it our community service project to make enough money to help these people. In groups, we came up with ideas that we're going to put into action. As a whole, we've decided to hold a car wash, as well as holding bake sales. My group came up with some ideas as well. One small idea was to fill a jar with different types of candy, and have kids pay to guess how many pieces are in the jar. Then, which ever kids guess was the closest gets the whole jar to take home! I know it. My ideas are the best. :)

Well, till later my readers!

-Marlys

CAMP TIME!!!!!!

OKEY dokey, so I had some fun last week at camp, and absolutely NO sleep!!!! OH YEH! M4s and a few M5s who couldn't go to Tanzania got to go to Quba. (pronounced: Goo-buh.) It's much more beautiful up there in the "mountains" and the air actually smells, well, clean. It was so much fun! Of course, the teachers had us do boring "educational activities," like creating plant keys and learning about carpet designs (ok, this was all right, but you know what I mean), but they also had us do cool stuff. Like, we got to visit a "lost city" called Shabran. It's all hecka old right, and just AWESOME! This is probably one of the only times in life I'll ever have gotten a chance to walk around in an undisturbed old, old ruin. It was sooo cool!!!!! If archaeologists got a good look around, they'd find tons of stuff! It's truly a piece of history. Unfortunately, no one can seem to come up with enough money to do a dig. Our class got to see the place firsthand, though. There were all these bones lying around, and teeth still in skulls, and all of this pottery, some of it with bright, pretty colored glazing. This was all still scattered across the ground. I couldn't imagine what people would find if they actually held a "dig." Here are some pics from Shabran.






Carpet weavers! Quba is known for their carpets, and our class went to a carpet museum, although we were in and out of there in like 6 minutes. It was kinda weird.....but the carpet weaving was cool. =)
















We also had some fun just hanging around the hotel. Oh yeh, I forgot to say, it was camp...but we didn't actually stay in cabins. We got two nights a fancy hotel!!! Us girls has some fun just playing around in our hotel room. Here's my friend Andrine straightening my friend Quitterie's hair...lol...(Andrine is from Norway, just like Aase.)



















PICTURE POSING!!! Here are Sharmeen and Kim, hopefully if you read my last blog you know who Sharmeen is. Kim is from Australia...I THINK so anyway... =) These peeps are hanging out on the bridge over a river that ran right next to the hotel. It was really quite beautiful.





Aase, (left) Amy and I outside the hotel.




Shadow fun!













Stairwell pics!






























Lunch break!! After a morning of being bussed around from place to place, we finally got to stop and eat...wuddya know? A sandwich, an apple, and juice...same thing they always feed us. =) We stopped at a lovely rapids river. Though water was not deep. It was GORGEOUS! And the weather was just right, not too hot, not too cold. Perfecto! The only annoying things were the bees, but it's kinda impossible to get away from them.















In all, camp was pretty fun, other than the walk/run thing we had to do every morning at 7:15, in the freezing cold temperature of the mountains. Okay, I don't know whose idea that was, but it was crazy. Everyone pretty much ended up walking. The first morning, the gym teacher was like, "okay, who's gonna run?", and practically everyone raised their hands, including me. The second morning...yeah, not so much enthusiasm. People had found out the day before that it's pretty hard to run on a rocky trail, way too early in the morning when its freezing outside.






Camp included some really fun teamwork activities, as well. We got to participate in an "egg drop" ( yay, our groups' egg didn't break!), build this humongo tower thing with plastic toy pieces, and even do a drama skit. Trust me, our drama play was pretty weird. It involved a cow getting stolen, a knife-stabbing hobo going to court, and a cow turning up in the middle of a court session. It was pretty durn weird.

Okay well, bye for now! It was nice telling you all about camp, hope you enjoyed. :) -Marlys :D