Once we got to the Yerevan, we realized that we missed the ones heading to Yerevan and Tbilisi, so we decided to take the one heading for Trabzon. Lonely Planet assured me that there was a daily bus from Trabzon to Yereven so we just decided to pick up the final bus there. We had to wait though till about 3 in the afternoon for our bus to leave though. It was going to be an alnighter. However the waiting time allowed me to witness the gifts of my traveling compadre, Ross.
Ross is for some reason gifted with Turkish. He is able pick up new words easily, remember most of the words he was taught, and is able to actually have a conversation with Turks in Turkish. It is unbelievable at times. Now sometimes he bullshits about how much he understands but if he doesn't understand at all he will then respond with "Bilmiyorum." However when the other speaker gives an alternative to what he/she is trying to say then he might sometimes pick up on what they are trying to say. This is one of the perks with living outside the Superdorm. Ross was a mixed blessing in this regard. It was nice to have someone who can ask something and then understand their response, but it was also annoying when he dominated the conversation. One of the things I wanted to do on this trip was to practice and increase my Turkish by forcing me to practice and use it. With Ross around, the people we would meet who spoke Turkish would always talk to him and not me. He would further his skills while mine deteriorated. I made certain that he was aware of this, but this only stroked his ego. He knew that his Turkish was awesome considering that he has only been speaking it for a few months, and he loved that fact. Hell, I would too if I had those skills.
The total bus ride to Trabzon was 16 hours long. The view wasn't anything I haven't already seen so I decided to sleep while Ross continued to talk to all the Turks around him who were very friendly with him. It was alright with me because I only had about 3 hours of sleep the night before trying to get packed and ready to check out of the Superdorm. I slept almost all the way to Trabzon. Once we got to Trabzon we asked around for a bus to Yerevan. It was going to stop by in 10 minutes at a bus stop and pick up anyone in Trabzon going to Tbilisi. We were incredibly lucky because if we arrived 20 minutes later, we would probably had to wait another 5-7 hours for the next one, if there was a next one. So far our luck panned out. However this didn't give us enough time to use the facilities in Trabzon so once we got to Rize we were able to make a pit stop. It was the most disgusting rest stop we ever had to endure. Afterward we talked about it and confirmed it.
Warning: DON'T READ IF YOU ARE ABOUT TO EAT. I AM ABOUT TO GO INTO DETAIL ABOUT THE EVILS OF THE TURKISH TOILET AND IS NOT SUITABLE FOR THOSE WHO ARE ABOUT TO EAT, HAVE JUST EATEN, ARE THINKING OF FOOD, ARE WEAK IN THE STOMACH, OR THOSE THAT HAVE ACTIVE IMAGINATIONS (FOR IT WILL BE FOREVER IN YOUR MEMORY). We had to pay 75 kurus for it and we only received two bloody napkins when we tried to take more he would take them away from us. What made it worse was that we were forced to use Turkish Toilets. Now these toilets are horrible for many reasons. First, you have to squat and exercise your thigh muscles much more strenuously. Second, there isn't one Turkish toilet in existence that doesn't reek. They really don't hold in the smell well at all. And also consider the fact that they don't even give you enough "napkins" if you decide to go Number 2. I couldn't go because it was just too disgusting, so I gave mine to Ross. I held my need to go to the border.
The border was a long dragged out process. Thankfully though, we had a far easier time with it then others. It was actually quite amazing. We were talking with a Georgian student that we just met and a Chinese American woman who were both traveling, walking to go through Georgian customs when we were motioned to get back on the bus by one of the bus attendees. This was glorious. Rather then having to stand in line for 90 minutes outside in the middle of the day, we got to ride all the up to customs and when we were motioned to get off the bus, we got to cut in line with all the bus staff. It was awesome! Take a look at the pictures below to get a better look as to what we avoided.
It was satisfying. However I did have to let the customs agents scan my bag and they were incredibly suspicious of it. They were digging through my cloths, my books, and they examined my iPod for a long time (considering it was just an iPod). Then the man that we just met asked to customs agent why he is bothering with an American. After that I was left alone.Once we crossed the border, the bus started heading for Batumi. Batumi is a town that has like the rest of Georgia trying to restore itself from the dismal cultural destroyer called the Soviet Union. However, much of how Batumi was trying to rebuild took the form of Casinos that are themed after Casinos in Las Vegas. The only difference is that the theme looks good in Vegas, where as here it just looks like a place where you loose your money and have no fun with it at all.
The country side however of Georgia looked however like it was just gutted to death when the Soviet Union fell. There were factories and places of industry everywhere but they are all abandoned now. It was like walking through Eastern Turkey to see all the ruins. Except here the ruins commemorate the rise and fall of the Soviet Union and not the period of Antiquity. It looked as if Georgia was falling apart and was in decay. I also realized that distance wise, it isn't far from the coast of Georgia to Tffilis (Tbilisi) but the roads winding through the mountains, and the state of those roads would make the journey last nearly 8 hours! I was getting incredibly tired of bus travel by this point. A couple of Swedes joined us on your journey however. We got to talking with them and it made part of the trip go a lot faster. The trip stopped being exciting when it was getting dark. At that point it was hard to tell what we were looking at.
We finally arrived in Tbilisi late at night around 10:00pm Georgian time. We arrived to a closed up Bus Station where it would be now impossible to find a bus going to Yerevan. We had no choice but to stay the night. We tried asking to see if there was a bus but the only people who were there were cab drivers. They tried telling us that there was no way to get to Yerevan by bus. Only with a Taxi could we get to Yerevan they told us. They were obviously full of shit. We chose to ride with the only caby that understood a little English. We told him that we needed to go to an internet cafe. He demanded that we give him 30 dollars at first. We just shrugged him off and told him no pretending that we knew our way around enough to get by. He lowered it to then 10 US dollars. We reluctantly accepted. It took him a while to find an internet cafe. This guy however was trying to still show us hotels and we told him we wanted to find a place online! He was by far the worst cab driver ever. He wasted our time considerably. The interesting thing though was that we got to see two parts of Tbilisi. The new and restored old city, and the soviet style that catered to gambling and prostitution. Actually the cab driver took us to this part of town which actually gave me the creeps a little. He was taking us to the shadiest of places looking for an internet cafe. At first I didn't trust him for the life of me.
Once we got to an internet cafe we paid for a few minutes and found a cheap hotel to stay at called the Green Stairs. We had him take us to the hotel, where he would get lost again in trying to find it. While we stopped, I went to currency exchange place and exchanged a small amount of Euro for Georgian Lari so that I could pay the cab driver. Once we finally got to the Green Stairs, we proceeded to ask the owner if there were any rooms available. There weren't any. We were then just in a state exhaustion because we have been literally running around with a Cab driver who didn't know where anything was in his own city for the last 70 minutes. The owner saw this though and offered a common room with a couple of mats for us to sleep on for free. Hearing the magic word "free" we gladly accepted and brought our stuff in. We were couch surfing for the night!
However when I rushed out to get my camera, the cab driver took off and I wasn't able to yell, "you have my camera in the back of your cab you Dick!" However, if he was trying to make a split for it he was an idiot for he gave us his phone number to call if we needed anything while in Tbilisi. I got hold of the manager had him call the cops, and he told me to wait outside for a little bit. After 20 minutes of waiting and starting to get nervous, the cops finally came. This was when the night got very interesting. I gave him the number I was trying to dial even though the ass turned off his camera. However, when the cops called the number, he got through and intimidated the taxi driver into coming back with my camera. I was amazed. Then they started talking to me in English with American accents.
Basically as we were waiting for my camera to return to me, they told me that after Russia invaded South Ossetia last summer, the United States has offered support to Georgia in the form of military assistance. For instance, much of the Georgian military and police forces are trained in the United States in Albuquerque New Mexico. We then started talking about the local politics between Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia and Turkey. He told me that Russia wants to have an oil monopoly on all the oil coming into Europe. Georgia however stands in there way. The major independent oil producer in the region is Azerbaijan but they are a landlocked nation. The only other nation possible is Armenia but they are currently in state of war against each other and the only thing keeping them from fighting is truce that has been in place for nearly a decade I believe. They have to then ship it through Georgia because that is the only trading partner that they have good relations with and is in the direction of Europe, the oils market. Georgia therefore gets its share of the oil profits and is sitting on a prime piece of real estate. This is a constant side ache for the Oligarchs in Russia who want more control over setting the price or crude coming out of the Caspian. Turkey desperately wants good relations with both Georgia and Azerbaijan because they need access to as many oil producers as possible to buy from since they have to import it. In order to have good relations, Turkey must continue to screw with Azerbaijan's enemy, Armenia, which is exactly what they did when Turkey closed its borders to them in the 90s putting Armenia into geographic, and economic isolation. They also told me how they loved George W Bush in Georgia. I was almost appalled to hear it because I greatly despise the man. However the people of Georgia see him as a hero for standing up to the Russians when they invaded the previous year. They especially loved John McCain. However the cop was no fan of the current Georgian President because the President last year did the stupid thing and provoked the Russians directly. He also wasn't certain about his feelings toward Obama. I found this incredibly weird because everywhere I have been to so far, everyone hails me for being an American, the country of Obama. Here they hail me for Bush...
The cab driver eventually showed up and was pissed that he had to come out, and I felt guilty because I did leave it in his backseat. However I still remained suspicious of him. He told me that he demanded compensation: 15 lari. Knowing that it would be close to 10 US dollars I was appalled and then the Police told him in Georgian to calm down and to stop trying to rip me off. He said that 5 lari would be enough. After I paid him the 5 lari, he left with a forced smile on his face probably cursing him while the police officers were cursing him back. I loved the Georgian Police. They were so incredibly helpful that night. In fact, Goga, which was the cop's name, gave me his name and a number to reach him by. He told me if I ever was in trouble and needed help to call him personally and he would be there in a hurry. I told him of course, shook his hand, thanked him considerably and let him head off. I told the story to Ross when I got back. He was amazed as well.
We slept that night somewhat comfortably. The mats we were sleeping on weren't very comfortable but they suited the price. In the morning, the shower we were allowed to use had absolutely no hot water. I took a cold shower, which woke me up and nearly froze to death trying to dry off since I didn't bring a towel. Ross just didn't take a shower. We asked directions for the closest place to find internet, and the manager of the Green Stairs told us the McDonalds down the street had it. So we were off.
I haven't eaten at a McDonalds in years and there in Georgia I broke the trend because I was starving. Ross likes McDonald's so it wasn't a big deal for him. As we ate our burgers for breakfast, Ross found all the ways to get to Yerevan. Our options were to take an overnight train through the mountains, to take an expensive bus later in the day, or take a minibus within the hour. We opted for the minibus and looked up a way to get to the minibus terminal. We figured that we just needed to take the metro near us to the terminal. We ran across the street and caught the subway straight there. When we got there we realized that we were back in Soviet Style Tbilisi. The Green Stairs was located in the more culturally revived old town. Being surrounded by these Soviet buildings, I felt incredibly proud for being American. I am awfully critical of America for many good reasons, but when it comes to just culture, I would have probably offed myself if I had to live in the U.S.S.R.
We asked around and finally found the minibus to Yerevan 10 minutes before it was going to depart. The minibus however was incredibly small and it was going to be another 7 hour bus ride to Yerevan since we are going through mountains. I didn't have any more Georgian lari on me to pay for a bus ticket and a drink of water. That blew. Thankfully Ross came prepared with a water bottle. After a little bit of waiting, we restarted our journey in a crowded, small, non air conditioned bus to go to a what I would come to realize was a completely different world...
