The mountain that never ends....

So yesterday, myself, Anna, two other American girls, one Azeri girl, and a 55 year old Korean Professor (Oh Taw Dong, who was absolutely hilarious) left Baku around 6:30 in the morning (that meant a 5:15 wake up call for me) to head to Laza, a remote mountain village that was the beginning of what we believed to be a nice mountain hike though the Caucuses. Let me begin by stating that the hike was absolutely beautiful, hands-down the best scenery I have had during my time here (despite what my last post said) . I will put pictures up, but they dont come close to doing the place justice.

Well, so we started out, and it was great. Then, our guide decided we didnt have the correct permits to hike through what is apparently a National Park (no signs, no paths, no anything). So after two hours or so, we had to go straight, no paths, almost nothing flat, and no end in sight. Thus I named it.....

This is the mountain that never ends....Its goes on and on my friends....Some people started climbing it not knowing what to do, and they will keep on climbing it forever just because....This is the mountain that never ends....

Anyways, you get the idea. By the time we reached the top (definitely not the end) multiple (I stopped counting at two plus of walking straight up hills, no real switchbacks, paths, or anything) hours later, to say I was exhausted would be an understatement (like saying getting shot is merely a flesh wound....). My description of how I felt at the top went something like this..."Well, at first I felt great. Then, about 30 minutes later, my heart rate started rising. Sometime after that, my heart felt like it was going to jump out of my chest. Awhile after that, I could feel my heart pounding in my temples. An hour later, I felt my heart beating in my calves. Finally, upon reaching the top of our hike, I felt like someone had taken a fillet knife to my calves, taken them out of my legs, put them on a cutting board, and taken a meat hammer to them for about 15 minutes".

Ok so maybe that is a flair for the dramatic, but I had to try to entertain myself after enduring those last couple of hours. The Korean professor, who has run 7 marathons in his life, told me he felt about like he does on kilometer number 30 out of 36 upon reaching the top (and yes, that's him, smoking a cigarette). Anyways, it was difficult, but quite rewarding. Right before getting to the top, we were covered by clouds for about 20 minutes that limited our vision to maybe 100 yards, thus showing why the place is appropriately named Cloudcatcher Canyon.

Then we began out hike down to our village, which our guide tried to tell us would take around 2 hours. Well, it was steep, and as we found out later, he took a a pretty slow route so as to avoid to "military", which we never saw but that he was continuously afraid of. The going was slow, with three girls in sandals and one who was terrified to walk downhill on her own right. Well two hours turned into four, and then darkness began to set in. I was back helping the one girl who didnt like to hike on her own, and I came up to the guide, and the girl (who was Azeri) translated for me and told me he wanted to wait till it was dark to finish our hike (sounds like a great idea right) so as to avoid the military a little more.

Needless to say that hacked me off, so we trudged ahead, and ending up hiking in the dark (with two or three cell phones as lights) for around 2 hours. The girls were rightfully terrified, and at one point, our guide wanted to take the horse (with one of the girls on it) on his own path, thereby spiting the group up (in the darkness no less, which he slowed us down for). Again, I was pretty ticked, yelled at him (in English, but I think he got the point), took the reins from him, and started back down towards the village we could see light up in the distance. At this point I would have liked smack out "guide" (if you can call him that) with a billy club, but a) I didnt have one, and b) decided that might not be very culturally sensitive.

Anywho, we eventually made it safe and sound, spent the night in the village, and left at 5 am this morning to head back to Baku. This is a pretty bad description of the day, but I'm pretty tired at this point, but alas, we all made it safely and Ill be back in the States tomorrow.

More travels....

So this week has been highlighted by more travels about the country. Tuesday was spent exploring different areas around Baku, starting at the odd mud volcanoes. The volcanoes exist from natural gas that seeps up through the ground and pushes the mud up into a bubble on the surface. While these are mostly harmless volcanoes, they do, on a rare occasion, explode in a dangerous manner every couple of decades, but it would only be perilous if you were very close to them during the "eruption".

From there I went on to see some ancient rock carvings in Gobustan, which are dated between the 12th-8th century BC. They are hidden up in the hills, but quite a reward to work your way up there. Also nearby is an old Latin inscription, which happens to be the location furthest East in the entire world where a Latin stone inscription has been found.

From there, I took a trip to the beach nearby, where I had to take a dip in Caspian while I was all the way over in this part of the world. Only in Azerbaijan is your trip to the beach combined with a scenic view of an off-shore oil rig. I then finished my day with some scenes over the outskirts of Baku, producing some views of the cities continued dependence on Oil production to try to drive forward its economy.

The next morning, I awoke early and jumped on a bus to Lankaran, a town near both the sea and the Iranian border. Despite what you would think, the further south (and closer to Iran) you go, the more green and lush the countryside becomes. I was there to get some hand-made woven baskets, and after completing my responsibilities for work, I decided to take a side trip up into the mountains. I hired a taxi for the afternoon and had him take me to a fairly remote mountainous village, and after a short hike, I was rewarded with some of the best views I have found in all of Azerbaijan.

Finally, the last few days I have been searching around for a nice Azeri carpet to bring back to the States. The only exciting news on that front (besides finding a carpet I really like) is that in one shop I visited, I managed to really make the shop owner angry by telling him I thought his carpets were very expensive. When he got pretty angry, the only way I was able to calm him down was to explain that by expensive, I meant he had really high quality carpets in his shop, but then I politely excused myself a few minutes later.

Finally (really this time), I will be back in the States on Wednesday afternoon. I am going hiking all day tomorrow, but I will hopefully write a quick report on that and give a summary sometime in the near future.

Hilary visits....

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/05/world/05clinton.html?_r=1&ref=azerbaijan

Lahic

So yesterday I visited the village of Lahic, a small village in central Azerbaijan. Lahic is famous for its metalwork, and in particular for its coppersmiths. It is a quaint little village, and the main road that runs through town is an old cobblestoned street that is lined with old homes and various metal workshops.

While exploring a little, I ran across a group of men sitting in front of the local mosque, and despite not speaking (or reading I assume) hardly any English, they took quite an interest in my Azerbaijan guide book, and they loved looking at the maps, especially of their own village. Then, the ruling elder insisted that I take his picture as he proudly stood in front of the mosque.

Finally, who doesn't love pictures of a cute kid?

Georgia (the country)

So I just arrived back in Baku after a short excursion to Georgia to renew my visa for Azerbaijan. My time there was nice and refreshing, beginning with the two young Georgians I shared a cab with on the train from Baku to Tbilisi. They both spoke very good English, something I find to be quite a rarity in these parts. After getting to know one another, they learned that I did not have a place lined up to stay and no plans on Sunday (as the Embassy does not open till Monday), so they insisted they show me traditional Georgian hospitality. This consisted in taking me out to their family's home in a small village about 25 km outside of Tbilisi, where we enjoyed some Georgian cuisine. From there, my hosts took me to see a beautiful monastery tucked away in the hills outside of the village, where we walked around the 6th century complex surrounded by monks in long robes sporting thick black beards.

After another stop by their home, we headed back to Tbilisi where I spent the night at one of the guys apartment, while he had to go to work that night, as he worked as an air-traffic controller for the military. The next morning was spent doing visa work, with the rest of the day dedicated to exploring Tbilisi. I started with a climb up to some old caste ruins that offer great views over the entire city, as you can see the river running through town with churches and homes perched precariously close to the edge. Tbilisi is a town that feels like it has as many churches (at least per cpaita) as Rome does, but they all normally have quite a dark interior and are stocked to the brim with various icons, a normative part of their Eastern Orthodox worship.

After climbing up to the ruins, I took a walk though the old town, where home sit atop the old city walls, and then down the main avenue, and I must say I was extremely impressed with the city. It was quite beautiful and historic, and the people and culture had much more of a European feel than their neighbors over in Baku. While the city does not have some of the extravagant wealth of Baku, I had the impression that on the whole people lived a bit better. Some of this has to do with the recent crackdown on local corruption, which now does not come close to the levels here in Azerbaijan. The country has, however, suffered somewhat in recent wars with Russia, especially over the controversial region of South Ossetia.

The rest of my time there was spent exploring other parts of the city, and after my visa was approved, I jumped back on a train to Baku, where I tried to get a little sleep despite the fact that my cabin-mate on the train was sawing some serious logs last night. Sorry for being MIA for a bit, but I was out and about, and will probably be doing some more work related travelling at the end of this week.

Lezgi Village Visit

So this weekend was spent visiting a family in a small mountainous village inhabited by mostly Lezgi people. The Lezgi people are originally from Dagstan and speak their own langauge, and today there are over 170,00 Lezgi people living in Azerbaijan. We took a mini-bus to a nearby town, and after having some tea and sweets at a friends house, he arranged a ride for us up to his parents house about an hour away. The drive up was through a rain shower, the first during my time here. However, after being in the village for around an hour, the rain lifted to reveal beautiful and peaceful mountain scenery, reminding me of a crisp Colorado summer. With the ground still moist from the rain, we talked to a local home that produces hand-made carpets, where we were able to see the impressive process in which every step is completed by hand. The wife of the family we were staying with makes these carpets, and we were told it would take a team of two women, working full days six days a week, around two months to complete a two meter by four meter carpet, which would sell for 400-500 manat (480-600 USD). That may seem somewhat expensive for a carpet, but the quality and time put it, it seems like little compensation for two months work of labor. I have attached a short video of the ladies working on a carpet at the bottom of this post.

We then spent the afternoon with the man whose house we stayed at, and he took us on a walk around the village and in the surrounding countryside, proudly showing us his cows and a garden he had organizing and planted himself. Then suddenly seeing some fodder high up in a tree that would be good for the animal back at his house, he jumped up into a tree, climbed to the top, and starting ripping branches down. Now I think that was the first time I have ever seen a 63 year old man just jump up into a 30 ft. tall tree and act like George of the Jungle, but he did it without giving it a second thought. Overall man of the people seemed to be quite healthy, due to a diet of locally grown produce, little meat, fresh mountain air and water, and daily outdoor work. This was evidenced by a 92 year old man we met on the road, who was still sharp as a tack and wanting to share his stories about his travels during his time in the army.

We ate dinner and spent the night at the families house, and as guests we were very graciously treated, always being severed tea and some sweets, and that night were given the prime sleeping places. After breakfast the next morning, we headed off in a shared taxi back to the main town, where we were to jump in a mini-bus back to Baku. That was an interesting point of cultural learning, as it took about ten minutes for everyone to decide where everyone would sit. I probably got in and out of that mini-bus three or four times, but finally settled in for the ride to Baku. Riding on the buses here is in general a bit odd, as even in the big city buses people (esp. the elderly women) never seem quite content with where they are standing or sitting, so it is a constant game of chess meets bumper cars to jockey for position. I still have figured what the prize is, but I have been places with buses much more crowded but people don't seem quite so keen on moving around as they do here.

World Cup action

So just finished watching the US World Cup game, and man, how frustrating was that....They looked asleep in the first half, with Slovenia's first goal coming while it looked like keeper Tim Howard was in his own little world in the box, and the second appearing to my not so well trained soccer eyes (despite the years spent watching little league and high school girls' soccer) to be offsides on Slovenia.

Yet the US, resilient as always (or so I like to think) rebounded with great play in the second half, evening the score on a Michael Bradley goal. Then around the 84th minute they had a potential game winning goal wiped away on a very controversial offsides call. Better draw than lose, but I am still not pleased with the officiating. All of that being said, my neighbors at the store, with whom I watched the game, found it pretty funny to see my emotional responses to the game. They set up a TV outside of their shop, so it was a fun and convenient place to watch the match.