Archives for December 2009

Where quality goods are had.

Our second morning in Baku Molly headed to church while Frances, Evan, and I caught a bus to the local market.

First stop was breakfast at a hole in the wall. I always get a little nervous in new restaurants. Especially when the proprietors don’t speak English and you don’t really know how it all works. Thankfully we had Evan and his friend Kent to lead the way.

We ate an egg and tomato dish served with white cheese and cucumbers. An interesting combination, but super delicious. (I pretended the eggs weren’t eggs and just went for it).

Next, we wandered a bit about the market where you can buy basically anything ranging from fruits, meats, and dried goods to hardware and junk from people’s houses. Treasures abound.

Behold:

The way back from the market we bumped into these dapper gentlemen who were kind enough to pose for a picture. Too bad they wouldn’t smile with their mouthful of gold teeth.

A few more sights on the way back to Evan’s:

xo, jill

Everyone loves a death trap.

It’s simple. You pass a ferris wheel, you ride it. Doesn’t matter when it was built. Doesn’t matter that no one else dares. You just do it.

xo, jill

“Your mouth is foul. I kind of love it!”

After lunch, Evan took us out on a walking tour of the city. It was nice to be shown around by someone who is studying the Azeri people and knows his way about the town. I’d pass on that information to you but the memorable bits of the walk encompassed a different flavor of banter.

Not to mention, a lot of the sights in Baku fall under the category of, “Yeah, we don’t really know…” There’s still a lot of research to be done.

Take a look at Baku:

Scenes from the old bit of the city, down the road from Evan’s.

Nice hats.

The streets.

Caspian Sea.

Looking out.

Maiden’s Tower.

Uh, Evan?

Head made of people.

Eternal flame, view of the city and the tallest flagpole.

Left over bits from the Soviet days.

Our band. Uh, ignore the swastika, please.

Travelaters.

“AzerBAN-JAN!”

Turkish style mosque.

xo, jill

Ahead of the tourism curve.

Morning came with an invitation from Evan to play Ultimate Frisbee with a group of well established ex-pats in the city. We were picked up by a foul-mouthed Brit and whisked away to a university where the ex-pats play. Frances, having not played Ultimate since Wednesday, was game. Molly and I elected to take a photo walk around the Soviet era training grounds.

I think everyone was a bit amused over how excited we were to be able to see our breath… not to mention the yellow leaves! We didn’t think we’d see fall this year… but we found it in Baku.

Post game, we headed out to lunch with our lively new acquaintances, taking a quick side trip to a Soviet prison. Not pretty. I was advised to take a photo fast, then hide my camera.

The ex-pats, who work in oil, e-commerce, and education, were a bit puzzled as to why we would visit Baku… and how we met up with Evan. We all enjoyed a good laugh explaining the situation and an even harder laugh at the Brit’s suggestion that it sounded quite fitting for the basis of an adult movie. Ahem.

Apparently, Baku’s not a hot tourist destination. According to one of the ex-pats, in 2004 Azerbaijan issued only 27 tourist visas! Most people visit Azerbaijan on business… if at all.

Challenge accepted.

xo, jill

You’ll want me to book your vacations.

Knowing we had a 10 day holiday coming up, Molly, Frances, and I were seeking out cheap airfare to popular destinations in this general part of the world. Not finding much for less than $700, I threw out this little gem of a question: “Could I interest anyone in going to Baku for $250?”

Now if your geography is a little rusty, you might not know that Baku is the capital of Azerbaijan and sits heartily along the lip of the Caspian Sea, east of Turkey and north of Iran. It seemed like an interesting destination… especially considering our other option for the same price was Khartoum, Sudan. It didn’t take much convincing.

Departing from Dubai, our hunch that we had selected a unique travel destination began to solidify. One big clue? The 30 other people on our flight.

Regardless, we arrived quite giggly in the middle of the night to the Heyder Aliyev Airport ready to pay the atrocious tourist visa fee ($131). By the time our visas were processed (which was a matter of hand writing on a sticker), we were the only remaining travelers in the airport. Really.

Our hostel tipped us off to a reasonable rate for a taxi, 20 manats. So when the drivers tried to charge us 50 manats… Frances and Molly were ready to battle. As soon as Molly (inadvertently) sought a ride from a non-licensed driver, the proper taxis quickly dropped their prices yet continued their bursts of disdain in Azeri. Victory. Nice work, ladies.

We easily found our hostel located down a dark narrow alley. The office door wasn’t immediately clear to us. Not knowing what to do, we began knocking on the doors in the small courtyard. It being the middle of the night, we felt a little awkward. The first door to open revealed a Pakistani man, Mr. Haloumi, who didn’t seem to know about a hostel. Upstairs we saw a sign for a different hostel and inquired within. The travelers there also didn’t know about our hostel, but seemed to think it had closed down, and not very recently. Um…? As Frances negotiated with this hostel’s proprietor for couch space, Molly began talking to an American voice in the dark.

Enter Evan. According to Evan, the hostel we had booked is run by two brothers. One brother is the online presence and lives in England. The other brother is the physical presence, and lives in the hostel. Physical brother closed the hostel and rented out the rooms as apartments, without telling online brother. Online brother confirmed our reservations. Physical brother was no where to be found. It seems that so few people actually visit Baku, this was the first time their lack of communication had ever become a problem. It’s comical to think I originally followed our hostel booking with the gem of a sentence, “So that was easy.”

Evan, who was fetched by Mr. Haloumi, is a Fulbright Scholar living in one of the defunct hostel’s rooms (still decked out with bunk beds). He was kind enough to offer us sleep space.

Here begins a surprise tale of happy friendship and adventures based in the ever so slightly drab city of Baku.

xo, jill