WaterWired

The Armenia Report 4: Parev, Zvartnots, and Hajogh, Armenia!

Okay - what that is supposed to say is 'Hello, Zvartnots, and Goodbye, Armenia' (apologies to any native Armenians). 

Zvartnots is the name of the international airport in Yerevan. It means 'celestial angels' in Armenian. To me, that is like naming an airport in an Arab-Muslim country 'Inshallah' (If Allah wills) - it doesn't exactly infuse me with confidence. Zvartnots had a pretty bad reputation. I guess I will find out soon (see below).

I'm writing this at 9 PM on 25 May in Yerevan. I have a 5:40 AM plane to catch to Vienna on 26 May so I really should be getting some sleep but it's too early. I get home late on 26 May - arrive in Portland at 8:50 PM. The routing is Yerevan-Vienna-Washington Dulles-Portland.

Just thought I would share few more pictures with you. The following three shots are from my 8th floor hotel room, looking northeast. You can see the Soviet-style architecture of the apartment buildings. The tall metal stack on the left side of the second picture is an incinerator.

 

The statue on the ridge in the back is "Mother Armenia". She's huge, and she's got a sword, so don't mess with her!

Finally, here is a beautiful little church just across the street from my hotel. Armen told me that the Soviets wanted to tear this down, but somehow it was spared. I'm not sure why the red metal roof was attached to it.

 

Hope to return one day.

4:00 AM 26 May, at Zvartnots International Airport. I arrived in plenty of time for my 5:40 AM flight. The terminal, true to descriptions, looks like the space station from Deep Space 9. The check-in area was not very expansive, but what struck me was the number of people (mostly men) who looked like they would shank you for a hundred drams (about 35 cents). I mean, really tough-looking characters, and I'm talking employees, too. I have heard stories about the 'Armenian mafia' in the LA area, but I didn't think they were all in Yerevan this week.

But once Austrian Airlines checked me in. everything was fine (great to see the supervisors in those red pantsuits). Security was quick, athough a little sloppy, and the passport inspector, who reminded me of one of my former students (Melanie - do you have a twin sister here?) said nothing about my Azerbaijan visa. Interesting though - at both the ticket counter and the gate, the airline did a fingerprint scan of both index fingers.

The gate area is gorgeous - brand new, well-lighted, air-conditioned, and clean (restrooms, too). Apparently a wealthy Argentinian-Armenian expat took control of the airport a few years ago and whipped it into shape. And the wireless internet is free!

And amazingly, in all my wandering around Yerevan, I did not see one American fast-food place.

"One hand won't clap.' -- Armenian proverb

South Caucasus River Monitoring Project: Water for Peace in a Volatile and Strategic Region

So after all these travel posts, you're perhaps wondering what bearing they have on water and why I'm posting them on WaterWired.

My reason for traveling to Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia is the South Caucasus River Monitoring project, which is funded by NATO (Science for Peace sub-Programme, part of the Science for Peace and Security Programme) and OSCE. The NATO program is specifically aimed at scientists in former Soviet republics and Eastern-bloc countries, to engage them in peaceful activities. 

Our project deals with the Kura-Araks basin, outlined in blue below. From the SCRM WWW site above, you can access the project's official WWW site (hosted by Azerbaijan) with the water quality and quantity data collected by teams from each of the three countires. Monthly sampling at about 10 surface-water sites in each country (12 in Azerbaijan) is performed for a variety of constituents: major and minor ions, selected heavy metals, POPs (persistent organic pollutants - e.g., pesticides), and radionuclides.

There are no water agreements (use, allocation, quality) in the Kura-Araks basin among the three South Caucasus countries. During the Soviet period, all decisions came from Moscow.  

Much of the project funding has gone for state-of-the-art analytical equipment for each country. Along with standard sampling and analytical protocols, this will ensure that each country can "trust" the work of the other ones.

This trust is important in an area that has been, and still is, rife with disagreements, conflict, and mistrust. With mutual trust, cooperation is enhanced and the prospect of conflict is reduced.

We hope that this cooperation (excellent, by the way) at the technical level can then "diffuse upward" into the political arena. We're essentially using water as an agent of peace in a volatile, strategic, region.

We are particularly proud of the SCRM project, because it was the first one funded by NATO that dealt specifically with the environment. We are in our sixth and final year.

At the SCRM WWW site you can also download a couple of Master's reports prepared by two former students of mine, Amy Ewing and Berrin Basak Vener. Below you can also download a paper by Berrin and me that I presented at 'The Last Drop' conference in The Hague in December 2006. It's a summary of her Master's report with some additional information.

Download venercampana_last_drop_paper.pdf

Water does not necessarily have to be a source of conflict. Indeed, it can bring people together.

And bring on that 'Great Game'!

“Handguns are acceptable; semi-automatic weapons must be checked at reception.” – sign on the door of the Metechi Palace Hotel in Tbilisi, Georgia (the sign was removed when the hotel became a Sheraton)

      

The Armenia Report 3: Lake Sevan, Churches, and Casinos

Here are Armen and I at Lake Sevan, which is about 60 km (36 miles) northeast of Yerevan at an elevation of about 1900 meters (6000 feet). It covers an area of about 950 square kilometers (370 square miles) with a maximum depth of about 90 meters (295 feet). Armen says it is a eutrophic lake (lots of primary producton - too many nutrients).

During the Soviet period, the lake level dropped about 20 meters (65 feet). The outflow stream was diverted for irrigation and hydroelectricity. The point on which we are standing is now a peninsula instead of an island. The level has come back about 2.5 meters (8 feet) in the past few years. The government is mulling over whether to raise it all the way back, but that would now cause a lot of infrastructure inundation.

Here is another shot of Lake Sevan, looking north towards an old Soviet installation. To the left of the installation, there is a low pass in the mountains, through which the road to Tbilisi runs.

Below is one the churches on the Lake Sevan peninsula. It was constructed in the 12th century A.D. On the other side, there are mobs of teenagers and some of their parents in all their finery. Armen explained that it is the last day of school, so those who are finishing get all dressed up and go somewhere. In this case, they went to a church. Others will stay in town, making a ruckus.

Okay, now we're back near Yerevan, this time just about 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of downtown. This church is the cathedral of the entire Armenian Christian Church; it's their St. Peter's Basilica, replete with a "pope" (Catholicos). There is also a school/seminary associated with the cathedral.

You can see some of the schoolchildren and their parents here at this church as well. The picture does not do justice to the hordes of people who were here. Most of them were mobbed inside where a priest was saying Mass. What was amazing were the people sticking cameras in his face as he said prayers.

Here's the last church we visited, which dates from the 4th century A.D. Three nuns were stoned to death by a mob on this spot, and the church commemorates their martyrdom. The hexagonal cupola (the big one) on top is characteristic of Armenian Christian churches.

So that's it for the church and Lake Sevan tour.

We also visited a huge market in downtown Yerevan where you can buy almost anything you want - crafts, books, CDs and DVDs, woodwork, metalwork, art, knives, antique guns, junk, even old Russian chemical reagents! Armen said that when they are desperate for chemicals and can't get them here fast enough, they visit the market.

We also saw Armenian casinos. They are banned within Yerevan city limits, so when you immediately exit the city on a major road, you encounter a downscaled version of the "Las Vegas Strip". None would never be mistaken for Las Vegas, as the casinos are really just big slot parlors. Didn't see any billboards for Wayne Newton or Paul Anka.  

Pretty amazing day!

"If not for your tongue, the crows would have gouged out your eyes." -- Armenian proverb 

The Armenia Report 2: Welcome to Yerevan and the Noosphere!

My colleague Dr. Armen K. Saghatelyan, a mineralogist-economic geologist, directs the Center for Ecological-Noosphere Studies of the Armenian National Academy of Sciences. What's the noosphere? I won't try to explain - check this site to see.

Armen is a fascinating man - he's seen so much and been through even more. You've met the type: one of those guys who lives life to the hilt. It was from him that I learned of Armenia's misery following the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

My first night here we had a discussion about Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenia's role in the region and the world, oil, Iraq, etc. Like our Azerbaijan colleague Bahruz Suleymanov, Armen sees the hand of Russia (and to a lesser extent, that of the USA) in keeping the Nagorno-Karabakh issue alive.  In many ways, what with Russia's ascendancy, the Cold War is being refought in Armenia and the rest of the South Caucasus. He notes that Armenia is just a small country in a "sea of Islam". I detected no prejudice in his voice; he was just stating a fact.

Shown below is Republic Square. The National Art Gallery and National Historical Museum are in the building at the top of the square. The Foreign Ministry is located counterclockwise from it, and across the street, in the lower left, is the Marriott.

On Thursday, Hans, a Dutch biologist who's teaching a short course at Armen's center, and I were invited to Armen's home to celebrate his wife Tanya's birthday. Tanya is a piano teacher. Their two grown sons, Armen and Vasgen, were also there and handled the grilling of the meat (kebobs). Both were delightful and spoke excellent English. Armen (the older son) is a TV producer for the army, and Vasgen works for the tourism ministry.  

Armen lives in the northern part of the city, above the downtown. His veranda has a spectacular view of Mt. Ararat. He bought the house a few years ago and said it had been trashed by the squatters living in it. He's put a lot of elbow grease into it, and it shows.

About 25 people showed up, and as usual, a table so full of food and drink it bent under the weight greeted us. This part of the world has a great meal-time tradition: the "man of the house" designates someone to be the toastmaster or tamada (pronounced ta-ma-DA). The tamada then delegates toasting authority. You must ask the tamada for permission to make a toast. So we drank, ate, talked, danced, toasted, and laughed for about three hours. It was great. Hans and I were treated as family, albeit ones who could not speak the language.

Armen's mother Emma was at the party. She is a world-famous mineralogist who still works at the university after a career spanning almost 50 years (she is 78). She was a real pioneering woman in the earth sciences during the Soviet period. She is amazing.

Hans told us that as a child he had spent about three years in a Japanese concentration camp during World War II. His father worked for the Dutch government and the entire family was in the Dutch East Indies. They had been "assigned" to a camp for much of the war. He did not seem to think that his experience had been such a big deal.

Armenia is closer to Russia than either Georgia or Azerbaijan; Russian troops still guard the Turkish border. In fact, there is a NATO base in the shadows of Mt. Ararat. But Armenia also has a good relationship with the USA. In some ways Armenia is isolated; it has poor relationships with Azerbaijan and Turkey and reasonably good ones with Iran and Georgia. There are still some issues with Georgia, dealing with the region of Javakheti and previous transgressions. In some ways the South Caucasus and its environs remind me of the Balkans - there is a lot of "your ancestor did this to mine, so you are my enemy for life" stuff. It is nowhere nearly as bad as in the Balkans, where they are still fighting the Battle of Kosovo after over 600 years (1389), and probably will be 600 years from now.

Yerevan is a city of about 1.1M people. The city traces its origins to the 8th century BCE, so it is no newcomer to the scene. The main part, where the museums and universities are, is very compact, and great for walking, as long as you watch for vehicles - crosswalk or no, pedestrians are fair game. This picture shows the view south towards Mt. Ararat. 

Armen says I came at a good time. The climate in Yerevan has a strong continental influence, even though there are two large bodies of water, the Black Sea and Caspian Sea, fairly close by. In another week or so, the temperatures will climb as high as 40 C (104 F). The highs have been in the low-mid 80s since I've been here. Armen said it got down to -30 C (-22 F) in the winter. Sounds like Fargo.

There are still many Soviet-era buildings here but they do not seem as dilapidated as the ones in Tbilisi. There is a fair amount of new construction ongoing.

There are many upscale shops here. Armen says he doesn't know who buys all the stuff they sell, but it's obvious someones does. There are not quite as many luxury cars here as in Baku, but there are enough. The young women tend to wear flashier clothes than their counterparts in Tbilisi or Baku. There are some wild outfits on the streets. The men - well, what can you say about guys.    

On Saturday Armen will take Hans and me to some various historical sites in the Yerevan area, and Lake Sevan. Till later.

"Thunder clouds do not always give rain." -- Armenian proverb

     

The Armenia Report 1: South Caucasus Legacy Tour '08 Rolls On

On the morning of 21 May 2008 I departed Tbilisi for Yerevan, Armenia, on a Ford minibus (marshrutka), a common mode of travel in this region. The roads are pretty decent, and the trip of about 330 km took about 4.5 hours, including a brief stop at the border. I had been advised that sometimes the Armenian border crossing could be lengthy, but not this time. My Azerbaijan visa aroused some interest; the inspector asked me why I was going to both Armenia and Azerbaijan, and which hotel I was staying in. I explained, that satisfied him, and off we went. No hay problema!

The drive was pretty. A lot of it went through the beautiful canyon of the Debed River, peppered with small cities, towns, or ageing industrial complex. We went over a low pass and then entered a large valley with 13,000 foot Mt. Aragats to our west, and Yerevan spread out before us. South of Yerevan, dominating the landscape, was 16,000+ foot Mt. Ararat, the extinct volcano reputed to be the site where Noah's Ark came to rest after the Biblical Flood.  

Mt. Ararat is actually just across the border in Turkey. The border is closed, as is the border with Azerbaijan. The dominance of Mt. Ararat reminds me of Mt. Rainier outside of Seattle, but it is a bit more impressive.

My colleague Armen Saghatelyan once told me a funny story about Mt. Ararat that occurred 'during Soviet period'. The Armenian coat-of-arms features an image of the mountain. When a Turkish diplomat complained about having a Turkish landmark on the Armenian coat-of-arms, a Soviet minister replied that the Turkish flag had the moon and a star, yet they are not in Turkey. That took care of the issue for good.  

Armenia is the oldest country to have adopted Christianity as the official state religion, in 301 A.D. (Georgia adopted Christianity in the same century). Armen related how the Armenian Christian Church is one of two (the Coptic Church is the other one) Apostolic churches - founded directly by one or more of the Apostles. Its patron saint, the Apostle Bartholomew, arrived here shortly after the death of Christ - around 40 A.D. The Apostle Thaddeus was also instrumental in establishing Christianity. Armenia is making an effort to market itself to people interested in its religious history; as in Georgia, there are many beautiful old churches and monasteries. I've run into several USA-based tours so far, primarily OWGs and OWWs (Old White Women) "doing churches and monasteries".

Armenia is a small country wth barely over 3M people. There is a huge expatriate community of around 10M, and these expats are fiercely loyal and supportive of the homeland. The Los Angeles area has a particularly large community. Famous Armenian-Americans are: mogul Kerkor "Kirk" Kerkorian, journalist Nick Kristof, basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, football coach Ara Parseghian, former California Gov. George Deukmejian, ageless Botox doyenne Cher, and Diane Nork, a former grad student of mine. The late writer William Saroyan and Chipmunks creator Ross Bagdasarian (aka David Seville) are two others. Kerkorian has been especially generous, giving hundreds of millions of dollars of his own and his foundation's money. He got some measure of payback against Turkey when, as MGM head, he green-lighted Oliver Stone's screenplay of Midnight Express, in which the portrayal of Turks was over the top (even Billy Hayes admitted that).

When I think of Armenia and Armenians, I think: tough, smart, resilient. They have been through a lot, most recently during the early post-Soviet period. They endured a blockade by Azerbaijan, joined later by Turkey, and almost froze during the bitterly cold winters. They fought with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. Armen tells me of the days when they would receive a ration of 200 grams (about 8 ounces) of bread daily. If you didn't get to the store early in the morning, you were SOL. During these tough times, the population declined by about 25% through emigration. Things are much better now, especially in Yerevan, which has its share of building cranes, but difficulties (a euphemism) with Turkey and Azerbaijan remain, while relations with Georgia and Iran are generally good.  

Armen's aphorism, which I have used before, is one of my favorites and sums up his Weltanschauung. Recall that Kalashnikov is a powerful, universally-understood dialect of Russian. Still puzzled? Think "K" in "AK-47".

 "The optimist learns English. The pessimist learns Chinese. The realist learns Kalashnikov." -- Dr. Armen Saghatelyan 

The Georgia Report: OWGs and MAWGs Galore!

This will be a short post on the Republic of Georgia, as I spent fewer than 24 hours in Tbilisi. I've been here six times previously, and wrote an infamous tongue-in-cheek report several years ago. I also posted about my trip on the Georgian Military Highway last October. Here is some more information from the New York Times (the map below is from the Times).

I arrived in Tbilisi, Georgia, via air from Azerbaijan late on the 20 May 2008 after a short prop-plane flight from Baku. At the passport check in Baku the agent looked askance at my Armenian visa but there were no problems. Alles gut!

I had to stay at the Courtyard by Marriott because all the reasonably-priced hotels had been booked because of the national parliamentary elections on 21 May 2008. When I checked in, there were about 10-15 Euro and American OWGs (Old White Guys) and MAWGs (Middle-Aged White Guys) in suits looking very serious, and chattering away in English about the importance of the election to their national interests, the price of oil, world hunger, the local availability of a good American-style meal, and the prospect of getting Angelina Jolie (sans Brad Pitt) to visit here in her role as UN Ambassador of something-or-other. Quick! Find some young dark children! Nattering nabobs of negativism, as Spiro Agnew might have said.

By the way, you can skip the wisecrack - I realize I have evolved from a MAWG to a member of the OWG species myself - sometimes even the subspecies OWGIS (Old White Guy In Suit) as were the folks in the lobby.

I had nothing important to add, so I headed for my USD 325/night room to access my USD 19/day WiFi. Such a deal! Only about double the NATO per diem. When I asked for an exception, the Brussels folks said, "Why can't you just change your travel dates?" I did not bother to explain that I had a nonrefundable ticket (to save them money) so would NATO eat the penalties and rebooking fees? I sometimes wonder how we won the Cold War, although I am not so sure we did. But I digress.

I switched on the BBC to catch the news. A commercial from Zenith Bank piqued my interest. The ad trumpeted the fact the bank is "one of Nigeria's most respected banks" and "was awarded the Nigerian Bank of the Year award in 2007". Whoa - what endorsements!  Mary Frances, clean out our accounts and transfer our funds to Nigeria! The commercial also mentioned that for a limited time only, new customers will receive not only a free email account with a faux-USA address but also 25,000 North American email addresses per each $10,000 on deposit.

Tbilisi looks better each tiime I visit. The city is cleaner, and the building, while not on the Baku scale (no oil) has definietly increased. Hyatt and Kempinski are constructing two upscale hotels to accompany the two Marriotts and the Sheraton. Luxury apartments and condominiums are going up. The streets are clogged with BMWs, Mercedes, and the occasional Hummer and Range Rover. But more importantly, I see more mid-priced cars - Fords, Toyotas, and Opels, mainly - signifying that there is a rising middle class. I'm glad for the Georgians - they have suffered a lot since the early 1990s.

They do have serious problems with Russia over the breakaway republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. President Mikheil Saakashvili, the young USA-trained lawyer, has gotten criticism in the past two years for becoming increasingly autocratic, like his predecessor who was tossed aside in the Rose Revolution, Eduard Shevardnadze. Some of the crtiticism undoubtedly comes from people who are now "on the outs" and no longer have their hands in the proverbial cookie jar. But, hey, Saakashvili's our autocrat (see today's quote) and that makes it all right. If only he had oil...

Enough already. I had a nice dinner with my colleague here, Professor Nodar Kekelidze, a remarkably energetic 80-year-old physicist/materials scientist who heads the Georgian portion of our NATO project. He always insists on treating me, even though I am undoubtedly carrying around more cash than he sees in a month. "Hospitality" is the byword in these parts. He even insisted on having me driven to the bus station tomorrow to catch the minibus to Armenia at 9 AM. I knew it was fruitless to protest.

So it was off to Yerevan on the morning of 21 May 2008 and fodder for more reports.

Oh, yeah - looks like "our guy" and his party did indeed win the parliamentary elections.

If I seem a tad cyncial (moi?), I don't apologize. I just finished reading William Easterly's The White Man's Burden. More on that in a later post.

But all in all, it's fun being a pawn in the new Great Game.

"Every revolution evaporates, leaving behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy." -- Franz Kafka 

     

The Azerbaijan Report 3: Oil, Gas, the New Great Game, and the Silk Road Returns

My last day in Azerbaijan provided a good lesson in oil, gas, geopolitics, and what I call the New Great Game (click here, too). But in this Great Game it's not the British and Russian Empires jockeying for supremacy in Central Asia, but the West and Russia (and to some degree, China) positioning themselves for energy resources in the Middle East-South Caucasus-Central Asia. 

My friend Bahruz and I talked about this in the context of the players in the South Caucasus-Central Asia. Let's use the following map.

Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan have had some spats over the Caspian Sea hydrocarbon fields, but it's nothing real serious like the Nagorno-Karabakh issue with Armenia. In fact, the Turkmenistan president is visiting Baku this week, for discussions with President Aliyev. Turkmenistan is no longer is subject to the whims of nutso President Niyazov (aka 'Turkmenbashi'), who bought the farm in December 2006. He was the guy who decided to name the months after himself and his mother (so were there two months per year?) and constructed a 12m-high golden statue of himself that rotated so as to always face the sun (since torn down). Under him, Turkmenistan became 'Absurdistan'.

One of the things the two presidents are discussing is the prospect of a gas pipeline across the bed of the Caspian Sea between the two countries. This pipeline would then feed into the BTE pipeline (which has excess capacity) and could deliver Turkmen gas directly to Europe, bypassing Russia completely. This plan is backed by the USA and the Europeans. The Russians oppose the pipeline on environmental grounds (yeah, it would sure ruin their 'profit environment').

Turkmenistan is more amenable to the pipeline than previously, primarily because the Russians are taking them for a ride vis-a-vis gas prices. Former President Putin worked a deal whereby Russia would buy Turkmen gas at USD 50 per unit and then ship it out of Turkmenistan to Gazprom's pipeline system in Russia via an old pipeline that ran through Kazakhstan. But then Gazprom would sell that same $50 gas to Europe for $250. The Turkmen are none too happy, so they would like to send Russia a message. Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are also said to be interested in the trans-Caspian pipeline.  This will get interesting. Great Game, anyone?

Azerbaijan also has more serious issues with Iran over hydrocarbon extraction from the Caspian Sea.

Bahruz also drove me past the site for the new American embassy in Baku. The lot is huge, and I am sure the compound will be too.

Wonder why we are such friends with Azerbaijan? Baku puts 1M barrels of oil daily into the BTC pipeline, and a bunch of gas into the BTE pipeline, both of which avoid Russia.  They are friendly with us as long as we dn't push hard on human rights and democracy. Last year, President Aliyev told the country that oil at $60/barrel would produce $200B for this country of 8 million people. Can you imagine how much that will mean at almsot $130/barrel?

And, apart from pipelines, Azerbaijan is a player in a new Silk Road. They are building a rail line through Georgia, to connect with a line to Europe in Turkey. With the new container port under construction by the South Koreans, they will then ship cargo across the Caspian to a rail line in Central Asia that will carry goods to and from China other points.

They are also planning for the day when the oil and gas run out. Smart folks. Great country, based on my limited stay. Can't wait to see more of it, and meet more of its people.

"A wise enemy is better than a foolish friend." -- Azerbaijani proverb

The Azerbaijan Report 2: Absheron Peninsula

We drove north and east from Baku yesterday, taking a trip to the Absheron Peninsula.

Oil has been noted here for over a thousand years.

There were many oil and gas seeps. Most of these are are gone, but some still seep and a few burn. The peninsula also has some unusual mud volcanoes. Azerbaijan has more of these than any other country. They also occur under the Caspian Sea.

The Absheron Peninsula is also one of the world's most polluted places, according to the Blacksmith Institute (ranked number 1 in 2007). The culprit is the oil and chemical industry, centered around the town of Sumgayit (also spelled 'Sumqayit'), which was established as an 'industrial city' in the Soviet era to produce chemicals from the seemingly (at that time) ubiquitous oil wells, which are still evident today.

Heavy metals and untreated sewage are also problems. You name it, it's probably here. 

Unfortunately, the Soviets did not have environmental protection high on their priority list, so the place, is, in technical terms, a friggin' mess. Makes New Jersey's Linden-Elizabeth area of my youth look like Amazonia. This picture is from the Blacksmith Institute site.

It's not uncommon to find pools of oil and God-knows what else lying around, along with rusted machinery, including oil pumps. 

Here is a picture from neweurasia, Yes , that's oil (and other stuff mixed in, no doubt) pooled in the foreground.

I saw scenes like this. As you might surmise, the cancer rates in the Sumgayit area are way above (up to 50% higher) the rest of the country's. According to the Blacksmith Institute, a high percentage of babies are born premature, stillborn, and with genetic defects like Downs syndrome, anencephaly, spina bifida, hydrocephalus, bone disease, and mutations such as club feet, cleft palate, and additional digits.

The Azerbaijanis realize the place is a mess and are working to clean it up, along with help from international groups. They want to make the northern part of the peninsula into a resort area, but they have a long way to go: 20% of the Soviet-era factories are still operating, and it was not clear to me whether the remaining plants will continue to operate.

Untreated sewage is still dumped. Probably lots of 'nine-eyed carp' (or sturgeon) in the Caspian Sea here.

Read Nick and Kristy's exerro travel blog for more information about the Absheron Peninsula.

The day ended with a wonderful dinner at Lena and Bahruz's home, with their three amazing children - two boys (6th and 10th grades) and a daughter, who is studying for her MBA. Their English is extraordinary. Their daughter has her own Web-creation business, and she hires the younger son, who is an IT whiz. The older son wants to be a chemist.

Quite a fascinating day, one not soon forgotten.

"Shameful is not the one who doesn't know, but the one who doesn't ask." -- Azerbaijani proverb

The Azerbaijan Report 1: First Impressions

Okay, I'm all set to report on my visit to Azerbaijan, where I am this minute, ensconced in the venerable Soviet-era Hotel Absheron (aka "Hotel Abyssmal"). More about that later.

I will post identical items to both my blogs, Campanastan and WaterWired.

Robert's comment (on WaterWired) about my enjoying Quiet Riot's classic Cum On Feel The Noize on my Lufthansa flights was on target. Note that Quiet Riot not only covers the hits of, but follows the Slade school of spelling. Hot Chocolate's Every 1's A Winner, the fuzz-funk classic, was also another rediscovered gem on Lufthansa's awesome audio selection. But enough about music.

Back to my hotel. It's seen better days, as oil-rich Baku erects more modern and functional hotels left and right. The Absheron is refurbishing its rooms, and I was fortunate enough to get a room on a refurbished floor, which means a working toilet, TV, and refrigerator. But I am right by the Caspian Sea and can see it from my window.

Below is the view from my room, looking south. That's the Caspian Sea and a seaside park. The downtown is to the right.

The service staff is typical of the "Sovet-era" hospitality, best described as "You're paying for the room, you expect service, too?" Most staff have that I'm-shouldering-the-weight-of-the-world-so-I-cannot- be-bothered-with-your-petty-request look. You want soap? Hah! But what should I expect for USD 130/night? There are large numbers of tourists here, including the ubiquitous Japanese, with whom Azerbaijan has a very close relationship. Add the South Koreans, who are building a huge new port about 60 km south of Baku.

Baku is a very cosmopolitan ("European") city with a population of about 2M, around 25% of the country's total population (8.6M). There are many expatriates here, mainly because of the oil and gas industry. The city's opulence is everywhere. Mercedes and BMWs abound, and even the police drive BMW cruisers. There are a few Hummers and many Range and Land Rovers and Lexus SUVs. Upscale shops are not hard to find. Excellent restaurants featuring many cuisines are abundant. It's fat city, all right. And the merchants seem to prefer dollars to euros!

Although Baku is wealthy I've been told that the rest of the country is not as affluent.

Recall that Azerbaijan is a Muslim country, but I can count on one finger the number of mosques I've seen in Baku, and on one hand to count all the women wearing head scarves. I've heard no call to prayers, as I did in Cairo. The country follows a secular Islam, much like Turkey, with whom there is a strong bond. When I visited my colleague Bahruz's office on Friday morning, he proudly greeted me with a bottle of Azerbaijan cognac and insisted we down two shots. Then we visited the analytical lab, always a good thing to do after cognac. Yes, Azerbaijan now produces cognac as well as wine, but neither rivals the cognac of Armenia and wine of Georgia. But then again, Azerbaijan has two fluids neither of its neighbors has much of: oil and gas.

Below is a Soviet SS-20 nuclear missile silo cleverly disguised as a 12th-century A.D. tower in Baku's Old Town. Ah, those crafty Soviets! This one was capable of reaching Istanbul, provided the wind was blowing in the right direction and the rocket didn't explode upon takeoff.  

In the early 20th century, Baku provided about 50% of the world's oil; in World War II, it provided about 95% of the Soviet Union's needs. Today, most of the onshore fields are spent and the production has moved offshore. They send 1M barrels per day of the stuff through the BTC (Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan) pipline, delivering the oil to the Turkish Mediterrean port, passing neither through Russian territory nor Armenia, with whom Azerbaijan is "at odds" over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. There is also a BTE (Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum) natural gas pipeline that connects to a larger pipeline system in the Turkish city of Erzurum.

For a small country, Azerbaijan has great variety. The only climatic zones it does not have are arctic and tropical. In the north, elevations in the Caucasus Mountains exceed 4000m (13,000 feet). Forested slopes are in contrast to the 'semi-desert' around Baku.

Azeris form the major ethnic group, comprising about 87% of the 8.6M residents. Talysh comprise about 5%, then Lezgins, Russians, Armenians, and 'Others'. Some have told me that there are issues with some of the ethnic groups, especially the ones near the Russian border, that could portend problems. And Azerbaijan worries whenever the USA talks of attacking Iran, becuase that would likely trigger an influx of refugees. There are more Azeris (15M) in Iran than in Azerbaijan, and many would likely flee Iran in the event of an attack.

   

The USA is close to Azerbaijan and vice-versa, and since Azerbaijan provides the West with plenty of oil and gas, we are wont to overlook its shortcomings vis-a-vis corruption and human rights. The President is Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded his father, the revered Heydar Aliyev, who died in 2003. There are still pictures of the "old man" all over the place. Some pundits predict problems when the son leaves power.

My friend Bahruz's conversation is peppered with phrases like "during Soviet period" or "after Soviet period". That seems like a more natural time reference point than AD/BCE. What we in the West don't realize is how much suffering the former Soviet republics endured after the Union's dissolution. And Azerbaijan and Armenia fought over Nagorno-Karabakh. Bahruz is quick to add that Russia is interested in keeping the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict unresolved, and that without the hand of Moscow, Azerbaijan and Armenia could solve the problem. 

Bahruz asked me an interesting question yesterday: "What is it with President Bush on TV? He seems so unserious." He noted that Bush seems almost buffoonish on TV, unlike Putin, who is always serious. Bahruz wondered about Bush's IQ. I told him Bush has degrees from Yale and Harvard, two of the world's best universities. He gave me a puzzled look. 

As is the case with residents of many countries, Azerbaijanis do not think highly of our government but like Americans. The Presidential race is followed quite closely here. Bahruz and his wife like Obama, but she worries he will be assassinated. Bahruz wondered why with such a populous country we have so much trouble finding good candidates to run for President.

With that, it is time to turn in here - I am 12 hours ahead of PDT. More to come later, after I visit the terribly despoiled (like its namesake hotel) Absheron Peninsula.  Bahruz tells me we will visit a wonderful swimming beach. I couldn't tell if he was kidding me. If we do visit a beach, it will probably have "No Smoking" signs.

"Intelligence is in the head, not in the age." -- Azerbaijani proverb

South Caucasus Report: The Joys of Flying

This is for those of you many WaterWired readers who are desperate for news of my peregrinationss

I made it from Portland to the Frankfurt airport, where I now await my flight to Baku, Azerbaijan. The airport is shabbier than I remember it. But the men's rooms are Sen. Larry Craig-proofed.

The security folks made TSA look efficient, and I had to go through two more checkpoints even though I dismebarked from a secure flight and had no access to my checked baggage or other unsecured area.

The 10-hour flight from PDX  provided irrefutable evidence as to the need for: a continued ban on handguns for passengers; and family-only sections on all flights exceeding 10 minutes' duration.

I know - I just turned 60 and am becoming (??) a curmudgeon.

I sat on an aisle seat in the 4-seat middle row with a woman, her sweet daughter (about 5 or 6) and thoroughly obnoxious son (about 4, let's see if he reaches 5). When he wasn't throwing tantrums, he was kicking, waving his pencil around, spilling drinks, etc. The flight was full so there was no place else for me to go. I kept waiting for the large German man directly in front of him to turn around and glare at him, but I think he had had too many Heinekens. The boy did settle down after a while and a few glares from me. For safe measure I kept the earphones on, as I rediscovered the sheer ecstasy of Quiet Riot's Cum On Feel The Noize and its ability to shut out all other sounds.

When we landed in Frankfurt, the woman behind me said, "If I had been sitting there, he would have been dead by now."

Other than that, alles gut hier.

But now for some big news: USAirways has taken over Lufthansa!

So how do I know this, ahead of all the airline industry insiders? Experience, friends, experience.

As we departed the Frankfurt airport gate on 15 May 2008 to fly to Baku, the pilot came on the PA system as we hit the taxiway. In a slight German accent, he was embarrassed to admit that the plane had not been loaded with all the food nor any drinking water, so we had to return to the gate.

Like all commercial pilots everywhere, he was trained to utter the words all passengers ABHOR hearing: "Ladies and gentlemen, this will take only a few minutes and we will soon be en route to Baku."

Three hours later, we took off, and arrived in Baku after midnight instead of at 9 PM. Pity the poor souls who had to continue on to Ashgabat, the Turkmenistan capital - a bad enough destination even under the best of circumstances. Some of the crew members averted their eyes as we deplaned, and the pilot promised, "Lufthansa's normal high standard of service the next time you fly with us." 

As I left, the plane, I said to the head flight attendant, "So when did USAirways take you over?". She gave me a wan smile.

Or maybe it was Northwest.