Leaving Azerbaijan

As sheep must outnumber people by a good margin, this seems a good shot to leave you with. This is on the road back from Lerik to Lankaran, in the South near the border with Iran. One of 4 trips around the region we made in the last two months trying to take advantage of Spring weather. I regret not getting to the blog more as the year wore on—and Marlys, as some of you know, defected to the joy of pure images on flicker. But I have decided my own hard drive was so full by mid-year, that things have just been overflowing—or at least so close to the top that it’s all I can do to keep from losing track of daily life. I have learned a great deal, met a million people—or at least a thousand—and started about six different research/writing projects. A few of which are actually in final editing stages.

We head back via Riga, Latvia in a few hours, where we will spend a day and a night. Then on to Norway for 9 nights, 3 in Bergen, 6 with family Marlys and I made friends with from Marlys’ school—one of her best friends this year (Marlys and another good friend had very sweet tearful goodbyes earlier this evening—that friend heads back to Pakistan in a couple days). Then on to England for 8 nights, 2 in Bath, 1 in York (where we have tickets to the Broadway version Pirates of Penzance), and 5 in London where we will wander around, eat curry, and enjoy (hopefully) cooler weather than the 80s we have here right now. We return transiting through Philadelphia to arrive in Seattle late the night of July 14th.

The 20 kilo limit on bags has hit us hard. Every kilo over 20 is 15 Euros now for EACH of three legs to London. That’s nearly 24 USD per kilo times 3=$72. London-Seattle we are grandfathered in with a bit bigger weight limits from having bought tickets last year for Europe/US portion. Needless to say it’s been tough trying to jettison precious papers and scraps with memories attached—I have airmailed 5 boxes to Seattle (you don’t want to think about how much that cost—but less than overweight charges on the flights), we have packed our heaviest things in our carry-ons, and we still may be about 5-8 kilos over. Hoping they let it go, but probably not since it’s such a great way to add bucks to the industry without appearing to raise prices. Fuel costs…yeah, yeah.

Sorry for prosaic quality of this post. It’s past three am and I’m just sitting here waiting to wake Marlys up for our very early flight…Poetry leaves when sleep is absent.We have tons more pics and stories to share, as I’m sure all of you do with us. Looking forward to return!

This is in Lankaran market where the produce was really in full swing of Summer and dry foods in this pic still beautiful.

Boarding House for War and Labor Invalids

Sounds scary right? not the best name in the world, but it wasn't that bad of a place. The government funds it, and war and labor victims with no one to turn to, and no relatives to help them, are allowed to come and live here. I did not take any photos of the actual persons housing there, yet I did get some of the actual buildings. The grounds were actually quite large, and you could see many elders strolling across the grass, or rather dirt, and walkways. Some sat in groups and discussed things which those over 70 speak of. Sharmeen, (one of my close friends), her mother, and I walked into the building while her driver unloaded lunch for the residents. We entered the dining room, and I immediately took out my camera and started snapping photos.
























While waiting for the cooks to assemble and prepare the meal, Sharmeen and I found an old piano in the corner of the room. After asking her mothers' permission we began pounding out memorized pieces, except they didn't sound the greatest. Of course, this was partially because neither of us has actually ever taken lessons. But, the piano was lacking as well. One of the keys would stay down after you pressed it, and to play the key a second time, you would need to lift it up back into proper position. It also hadn't received a visit from the tuner in recent.


Next, we explored a little. We found some parts of the main building which we were in to be under construction and had to avoid construction workers and brushing against the freshly panted walls; we found this out the hard way. After leaning against the white walls, Sharmeen's coat turned from black to dusty white. Luckily, this was easily brushed off, moments after noticed. There were some very elaborate, though somewhat depressing murals on the walls, and two shrines and memorials to the famous, or rather infamous, Heyder Aliyev.

















We also seemed to have discovered the storage room.



















Next, we poked our heads into the room of one of two of the boarders, and discovered and old couple. They had a small room, in comparison to a hotel, with a table, bed, tv, furniture, carpeting, and other decorations. They invited us to stay, but we declined, and headed outside instead.
































In this distance here, you may be able to, or you may not be able to see the elders sitting and wandering around the grounds.






Here, someone has hung up the days laundry to dry in the sun and wind.





Next, we returned to the indoors and wandered about the kitchen before serving the elders food. The staff were not very accepting to us, and seemed to want us just to butt out. But we insisted on helping, as we were wanting to experience the culture and atmosphere up close in the home. We even discovered a large pile of squash at the dead end of one whitewashed hallway.




























We took large trays piled with plates of food, and distributed them among tables. We gave two meals to some with a waiting Tupperware, who wanted extra food for later. We stood in the doorway to the kitchen getting plate after plate filled with steaming food set on our trays, and just as we tended to be ready to go and take them to the elders, one of the actual workers would come and take our piled plates, and put them on her tray. Then she would leave to distribute the food. We would again slowly take plates to our trays as the kitchen persons filled them with food, and then the same worker would come back again and steal them all away, to do the work herself. This repeated a number of times, and as Sharmeen's family Pakistani friend tried to insist that we wished to help, and was shunned (yet laughed, as it was all very funny), Sharmeen's mother finally stepped in and gave the worker a good scolding. And when the worker tried to sneak off with the tray she was carrying, she whisked the tray from her hands and handed it to us. We meekly accepted it, and went about the work. When her mother left however, the old practices resumed. We bid the time watching. When it was time to leave, we said thank you and collected the empty pots and pans; these we dumped in the trunk of the car. We gave our final thanks and drove away.

Popcorn

...is really good.

It's not really that I thought you all would enjoy an image you could get anywhere. I just needed something to catch your attention and alert you to the posting from NOVEMBER that I finally finished--because I started it back then, the blog program stuck it below the one you've likely already read. So skip down and read "Rear Window."

I need to buy more popcorn.

Slow Connection Blues

Well, it's been nearly 3 months--during which time we had the pleasure of 3 week-long visit from Grandma/Mommy Janet and nearly 10 weeks of Dad/Doug. With such great distraction, the blog fell by the wayside :(.

Well, we are now back to just the 2 of us and ready to blog, but we have moved to a much cheaper, much more "local" apartment and location where, we are told by our old ADSL company, the state run ADSL company has a stranglehold on new connections--and our company says that while we could try going with the state company, they have heard about very bad experiences of tacked on streaming traffic fees and that the state will just cut your phone line if you disagree and refuse to pay. Who knows, but we decided to stick with trusty dial-up, which suffices for email but sure pales when it come to uploading pics.

I tend to believe it's no coincidence that the market for ADSL appears competitive in areas where foreigners tend to live--and competition disappears when you move outside those phone numbers prefix areas.

Speaking of utilities--we've had multiple visits this past week from "utility bill collectors" in our new apt--this happened sometimes at the old place as well, with results that Doug may be documenting in his forthcoming newsletter on his time in Az. I saw our electric bill--there was no past due and this months bill was a mere $6--which we gave the landlady money for and she said they'd go pay for us--I believe her. We did the same by taking a gas meter reading and calling the gas company to get the amount to give them to pay for us. She says she pays water--nothing from us for that. She's a very cautious woman, in fairly constant terror that we'll forget to turn of the gas heater at night and not wake up in the morning (a legitimate fear when I think about how the embassy would surely become involved and cause all kinds of problems for her--though I doubt she's thinking that far ahead!).

The first few utility visitors we sent away by being linguistically stupid and saying we were just guests. When I told the landlady, she was so worried she came in person after work to inform the innocent Americans about how there are lots of bad people in Azerbaijan and never to open the door to anyone we don't know or risk being robbed and our throats cut. Because of her excited and many times repeated gestures, I would have had no trouble with her Azerbaijani even if I hadn't just learned the word for "cut" (I learned throat some months ago--handy word). So today I just peered out at the knocker and ignored subsequent knocks when I recognized the "electric" lady from a few days ago.

I think what happens is a lot less sinister than the landlady imagines--but still no fun. I think that there are folks who follow the billing cycles--maybe employed by the state utilities, maybe not, who come by wanting to "take care of your payment." Of course there would be something off the top--or on the top. I am continually amazed at the level of corruption that is built into the economy here--no one can really survive off the bribery grid as far as I can tell--but more on that in Doug's newsletter. (See this is really just a teaser post.)

Our apartment is really quite comfortable--cold in the kitchen/bath, but main room is warm with the feared gas heater (actually not a very scary device). The gas flash hot water heater only works with high water pressure when the city turns the pumps on for a few hours morn and night. Well, even then it has been an iffy appliance and I'm getting ready ask for it to be replaced if they can't make it more reliable. Hot showers are nice...Happy teenage daughters are even nicer.

I'll try a picture upload now--cross your fingers! It worked (took about 7 minutes). It's one of Doug's series on construction safety. I think those will make an appearance in the newsletter as well. I don't have any pics of our new place on my computer, but will hopefully add those next time. Please forgive less photos from here on out...I'll try and make them tiny kb. The second photo here shows a giant mothy thing that I thought was a tiny hummingbird at first--anyone want to ID it? It has a huge body for a bug and flies like a hummingbird.
--Alison