Baku
After seeing her off I got a lift from the airport in a really cool old car. They dropped me at the metro. Got off at the 28 May and walked back home through the boulevard while taking loads of pictures, some of which are quite OK, I think. Had aubergine "caviar" (just like in Russia) and bread for dinner followed by beer with Toby while watching films. Fell asleep and woke up this morning.
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| From Baku and Mud Volcanoes |
Walked more this morning after more caviar on bread for breakfast. Went to the top of the hill near the big flag (supposed to be the new biggest flag in the world) and almost died (joking) from the lack of air - god, am I unfit!
Jealous about the snow in England but not that much... really sunny today. Took the day to be stared at by walking topless in shorts (you'd have been invisible) while climbing the hill. Met Toby at O'malley's for a couple of drinks last night, chilled at his flat before going to bed and slept like a happy baby.
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| From Baku and Mud Volcanoes |
Early morning tomorrow. Toby's flying to Dubai and I'm heading south, hoping for a quick stop at the mud volcanoes.
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Up at 6:30, got a lift with a friend of Toby's but the way he took made us miss the Bond's oil field. Took another lift and walked a long way to the mud volcano, luckily, at the end (just before the road get really steep) another lift came out the blue. After a couple of pictures, the guys filled their big water bottles with mud (it must be good for something), they dropped me back on the road after a very cool chat on old maps and history. Two lifts later I arrived in Lakaran, had lunch and decided that there was nothing to do there so walked to the next road to take a shared taxi to Lerik. The road was beautiful! The south's still green and yellow and red and the mountains are beautiful.
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| From Baku and Mud Volcanoes |
The hotel's cheap but the room was a bit too damp and guess what? A horrible night's sleep - not even three puffs of my inhaler worked that well... Anyway... sleeping in a different room tonight. Had loads of bread and butter and late (but better than never) scrambled eggs and tea for breakfast and started to climb the mountains above town. Boy, was it difficult! I took me 2 hours to get to the top-ish, which would've taken me about half of that time in normal lung conditions. Halfway through I had to stop to strip off: vest, t-shirt and mac in the sun to dry (the mac smelled of fish thanks to the taxi ride - a bloke had two open baskets of wet fish in the boot, just by my backpack) and the bottom parts of my trousers. A lot better and easier that way. Decided to have a couple of big gulps of water and leave the small backpack hidden under a dry bush as well. Now were talking! Not a living soul about - apart from the cows - making it even more bucolic.
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| From Lankaran and Lerik, Azerbaijan |
Took some pictures and shot a video - not very inspiring to be honest although the scenery was gorgeous. Your camera and eyes would've made a great difference.
On my way back - easy, even managed a little trot – started feeling worried about my clothes, I was sure they would've been in sight for some time now. Walked around, found my backpack and the spot where the clothes were supposed to be: nothing. Yup, was pissed off! On the way down I saw two boys dressed in suits walking up, probably from school, and tried to ask them, I think they understood my body language but knew nothing of it. A hundred metres down a big dog came barking at me - bad for him I was in a terrible mood - and I grabbed a handful of stones and shouted back at him. Luckily - for him – some guys drinking tea down the road saw it and the presence of witnesses made me change mind on the “stoning the dog” matter. I walked away. They asked me about my clothes and I explained that they been nicked by mountain "pickbushes" and they shouted something to a kid and a lady from the above house. While my hopes grew, they invited me for tea. Five minutes later they brought a handful of shirts to give to me!!! None of mine but that generosity and hospitality made me feel better about losing some clothes. After more tea and sweets they made me come back into town in one of the guys taxi, even though I insisted that I wanted to walk.
Well, here I am, "new" checked beige shirt, at the internet klub. Gonna try to sort out more cs stuff and reply to some old emails.
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After not sleeping at all, apart from dozing off while listening to several chapters of the wheel of time and about 6 puffs of my inhaler (I thought I was growing resistant), I had breakfast in Lerik and took a taxi back to Lankaran (no traffic for a lift). From there it took me a couple of minutes to hitch to the border, and try to cash some extra dollars out, unsuccessfully. Got some Manat instead and got ripped off on the exchange rate and a stash of money worth more than 3 million rials!!!! (on banknotes worth 1 and 2 dollars) - my money belt is about to explode!!!
There was a massive "queue" to leave Azerbaijan - it looked more like a riot. After some time I decided to try my Brazilian charm (which made me feel a bit guilty, but no one complained that a foreigner was entering before all those people who'd been waiting for ages) and got through it very quickly, while being the attraction of the day.
On the Iranian side, same thing - super friendly and happy to see a Brazilian and shouting all the footballers' names they could recall, including Maradona!
Leaving the customs building I was surrounded by about 10 guys - all very friendly - trying to chat/exchange money/find me a taxi ride to the bus station. It was a bit overwhelming but they were friendly enough not to scare me out and after a couple of minutes I decided to walk away and find unbiased information about the "terminal".
My first impression of the Iranian Astara was of a trade city, very busy with lots of shops and taxis everywhere. My second was that they were all a bunch of lazy fellows - I asked for directions for the bus station (utubus? terminal? pointing at the direction opposite the border) and they told me to take a taxi. I asked for distance (kilometr?) and they said 'one km'. Which led to my third impression - they have no notion of distance! I asked the same question another 2 or 3 times with about 15 minutes between each time and the answer was the same!!! Take a taxi, 1 km! Luckily the last one was wrong and sooner, rather than later I got there, bought my ticket to Tabriz and had to wait for about 3 hours, while having bananas and mandarins to keep me going.
The bus ride was long and painful - 6 hours to cover 300km -, very cheap though - 3 dollars. I was really tired but didn't get much sleep. Listened to more Robert Jordan instead. At one of the stops for a pee and tea a guy came to me and asked if he could sit by my side and talk. I was really into the book but remembered myself telling you that we should be open to people and read when we have nothing else to do and decided to give the book a break (in a very exciting part!). Saman is a very nice guy with a slow talk that reminded me of Alexey (that Russian friend of mine that was DJing at a party we went to).
A few minutes into the conversation he asked where I was staying in Tabriz and insisted that I should stay with him and his wife Mahrud. I accepted the offer, had a much needed shower and sat down on the floor for a light dinner (which we call 'dinner'). It was really pleasant, the food was good and I fell really welcome and at home. Mahrud is painter and she has some amazing paintings, including some excellent pencil work. You'd love to see them.
In the shower I needed a puff from my inhaler but just had another one at about 4 in the morning - slept like a baby till 10!!!
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| From Astara and Tabriz, Iran |
I'm at an internet café (coffee net) by Saman's shoe shop. Gonna buy myself a sim card and then head into town (we're at a second centre now).
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Tehran
Might go up to the mountains tomorrow to see if snow boarding conditions are any good (our host, Reza, was told that there's enough snow already although it's bone dry down here).
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| From Tehran, Iran |
Took the overnight bus to Tehran and didn't get that much sleep. Took a tour on the metro system (really nice and clean stations, and trains. All very new) cus it was too early to go to his place. Got there and found out that it's also his work place (next door). I had a much needed shower and started planning Iran (since we have a deadline and the Indian visa to sort out) but tiredness got me before I was able to do much.
Woke up at 2pm and went for an explore but the metro didn't take me where I wanted (still finishing some new stations) so I walked a LOT! And still have to walk even more to get back to his place -good exercise though.
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