Georgia on my mind

08/19/09, 10 am in the morning, Luka’s place, Tbilisi

I was going to write about the border experience at the Georgia/Turkey crossing, and the value of videotaping in order to convince guards with M16s to leave you alone, but PP did such a good job describing that experience that I’ll instead focus on my current environ, and my initial, cursory impressions of Georgia.

I’m writing this from an apartment we found on CouchSurfing, on the eastern side of Tbilisi (there is a river that runs through the city). The apartment is large, with several huge, high-ceilinged rooms. Walls are a white, peeling plaster, covered with paintings, Georgian maps, and inscriptions in marker or colored pencil that are etched onto the walls themselves. The place is not the cleanest – floor is dusty, the old comfortable chair that I’m writing this from has soaked up god-knows-what, the toilet flush is broken (requiring us to fill a large basin with water to physically force our excreta down the plumbing), and the shower is temperemental – while giving up hot water, it occasionally shuts off mid-stream. The apartment is located on the 3rd floor of a decaying building, and the first floor is redolent with…

Ankara to Capadocia

8/14/09, 1:15 pm, en route to Nemrut Dagi (Turkey)

Having passed through Ankara and Capadocia, we are now en route to Nemrut Dagi, a mountain where a pre-Roman megalomanical king carved his face and those of the Gods (to whom he thought he was related) into massive boulders on the mountain’s summit.

We’ve about 5 hours left of driving, so I figured now would be a good time to chronicle the adventures of the last few days. We’re all in good health still – my lips were pretty chapped and were bleeding a bit, so I bought some chapstick and now they’re doing better. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of buying the strawberry-flavored kind, so although it tastes good, my lips are now a ruby-red… I look a bit funny.

Astrid (the car) has fared a little worse than us. Today we took her first to one mechanic for welding the muffler back on – it had been rattling alarmingly. About half an hour later (and about fifteen minutes ago), we discovered that when the muffler loosened, it also caused a front exhaust leak. We therefore took Astrid to a second mechanic, to have the leak fixed (a hose in the front had…

Istanbul or Constantinople?

En route to Ankara from Istanbul, 8:10 pm, 8/9/2009

Europe or Asia? Secular or Muslim? Istanbul, the city we spent the last 3 days in, is a cultural crossroads, a palimpsest that has
been written over many times by Christians, Muslims, historical forces both old and new. The best way I can make sense of the city is to describe it as a hybrid. The streets are dirtier than in Europe, but not as dirty as the cities of the far east (Mumbai, Beijing). The bazaars are crowded with tourists and locals, but not as choked as the markets in China or India. Cars are both new and old, and walking about the city one sees both miniskirst and Burkhas. There are many mosques, some quite old (The Aya Sofya was first a church, in Emperor Constantine’s time, and a mosque in the time of the Sultans), but also many a ‘Turkcell’ phone booth scattered throughout the city (these are glass bubbles with bright-eyed young men and women who will sell you a 3G card). Even the people themselves are a hybrid – olive skins, black hair with green or blue eyes, with the occasional red-head thrown in to add a spash…

Borders, Belgrade, Barges, and Bulgaria

En route to Plovdiv from Sofia, 9 pm, 8/4/9

No major health problems as yet (for either humans or the car), although we had to reattach the right-hand passenger mirror after I inadvertently knocked it off (it was loose to begin with, when the car was purchased), and we are all developing a slight heat rash because of the temperature, which regularly exceeds 90 F. I suspect it will only get warmer as we head further east.
The heat also is suppressing our appetite – we are down to ~1.5 meals a day, usually a light breakfast (coffee, the occasional bowl of cereal or pastry) and a heavier linner. We just don’t feel that hungry, in part because we are probably burning far fewer calories as we drive and walk around cities than we do in our normal activity-filled days back in the States. I’m fairly sure I’ll return home ~10 lbs lighter than when I left, although this is nothing new (when I go to India, diarrhea usually thins me out a bit).

I had mentioned last time that we had some issues at the borders. Turns out one needs a ‘green card’ – essentially a proof of insurance in multiple languages.…

Eastern Europe: Grittier, Edgier, Cheaper

8/2/09

11:50 am, Belgrade

I’m writing this from the nice hostel we checked into late (~3 am) last night, while I’m waiting for T$ and PP to rouse themselves. The last few nights our driving has fallen into a pattern – get up around 10 am, explore a city until ~4pm, then drive into the evening and night to get to our next destination. While ok, this has been a bit fatiguing, so we’re taking a ‘down day’ in Belgrade to recharge our mental and physical batteries before continuing east. We need to do a better job of planning our route- the atlas we have is good, but it would be even better to google-map our ongoing route to help us with directions. It’s time consuming to drive into a city and try and find a place to crash when we arrive in the dark, rather than making a reservation beforehand and taking advantage of the daylight. In Slovenia and Switzerland, we could get away with camping near town, but in the large cities of the Eastern bloc, this is less viable. The good news is that these cities seem not to sleep, so we have been always able to find some…

The Journey So Far: Vienna -> Croatia

7/30/09, 1:30 pm

I’m writing this in the car again – we are headed into Southern Croatia, eventually to Dubrovnik on the coast, the ‘pearl of the Adriatic’ according to Lord Byron. The countryside could be classified as Mediterranean – lots of scrub, the occasional evergreen, low-lyiing hills, and squat box-like buildings built into them. Now is a good time to write about the places I’ve been so far.

I flew into Vienna on 7/21, from DC by way of NYC and London. My friends picked me up a few hours late, a consequence of road construction and traffic on the long drive over from Prague (things taking longer than expected has become a common feature of life on the road – despite the way our car eats km up, poor signage is common and we don’t always have clear directions on our atlas). I was pretty tired when they picked me up, so we spent the next day in Vienna while I recovered from the jet lag. Vienna is a beautiful and interesting city – lots of parks, lots of cool architecture and gardens. Of particular note was the butterfly house, a greenhouse with many different species of these colorful insects.…

Initial Meditations on the Trip, 07/28/09

4:30 pm, local time

I’m currently writing this while in the car, finally full with all 4 of us and our possessions. We picked up Peretz Partensky (PP) in Vienna this morning, and are currently en route to Slovenia – had thought first about heading to Ljubljana (the capital), but now may divert to a national park instead. The car, a 1994 Opel Astra, is a blue station wagon, currently stuffed to the gills with tents, backpacks, carbs of various kinds, ice (and regular) tea, pillows, various electronics including PP’s mini laptop that I’m writing this on, the walkie-talkies that PP and Tristan Ursell (T$) are chattering on while in the car, many more items of various functions, and the 4 of us (PP, T$, me, and Amand Dunn, aD, who is driving). I’m sitting in the backseat, and am cramped but oddly satisfied. There’s something great about heading towards a country you’ve never visited before, could only vaguely pinpoint on a map, and *not* having a set plan. Why the trip? Where are we headed? Will the car break down? Will we be able to tolerate each other for the additional 5 weeks that I’m here?

Impossible to answer all these…