Ex Patria

Car trouble

When we moved here, I inquired whether or not it would be OK to bring our Ford Galaxy minivan.  I was told that the streets were bad, and when I came to look for housing, I saw this was true.  However, the opinions among Expats varied.  Most agreed that when you don't try to drive up Ararat, you should be fine with a minivan.

Wrong.

There is hardly a thing that I regret more than that I didn't leave the stupid car in Germany with my parents, and stuffed a sturdy 4x4 into our 40 foot container.

The car came out of the container dead.  It actually had to be towed out.  The battery had not survived the long sea trip - but here's the thing:  it was the third battery for this car already.  That should have given it away but I am not a mechanic.

Shushi

'lo and behold, I'm still here.

Not much in the way of words today - we are having a ginormous party on Saturday (mostly because I invited everybody and his neighbor, thinking most people would not come - we had one person who said she could not come!).  It's an outside party (yes, in November), and it's raining (what a surprise, in November).  If you are wondering about my sanity, well - it's a German thing (the party, I mean) and I will tell you about it tomorrow or so.

For today, I have some pictures of the former capital of Mountainous Karabakh for you, from Shushi.  They describe how I feel about Shushi and about Karabakh in general: it's beautiful and breathtaking and utterly sad.

Beautiful Karabakh

We drove about 800 km. We saw unforgettable mountain views, gorgeous and humbling monasteries, dead cities, shelled cities, a 2000-year-old plantain, wonderful roads, really bad roads, the Armenian Stonehenge, and ever more beautiful countryside. We saw about 15 different countries all wrapped up in one.

Yes, we understand why you would want to fight over Karabakh -- and at the same time, my heart breaks for those who were exiled, who live in refugee camps on the hot baking plains near Baku, and who can't forget their beautiful mountain home.

We fell in love with Karabakh, as everyone must.

.

More later.  Off to bed.

2007: The saga continues

Did I taunt the gods?  What was I thinking to ask how things could become worse?  I must have been mad, mad!

Today I learned that Alan's school has a little outbreak of scarlet fever.  That's just great.  The last I need right now is three sick kids - hey, they are brothers, they share bacteria much more readily than toys.  I decided to leave Alan home from school for a week.  It's not as if he misses too much, the weather is really bad anyway (snow, snow, snow), and he'll happily go to David's pre-school with him (can you spell, play-date?)

Btw, outbreaks of scarlet fever are apparently not unusal in the former Easter Block countries.  Go figure.

Oh, I forgot to tell you that even before I got that piece of news this evening, I've been feeling really crappy, feverish and with a sore throat.  So, let me go now and check my thorax for little bumps.  It would make sense, wouldn't it?

The tastiest morsel

"Lavrov said that you have to bear in mind the following sequence: President [Mikhail] Saakashvili went to Washington; NATO agreed to take a new step forward in discussing membership with Georgia; and the next thing you know, Russian military officers are arrested. He said, “Trip to Washington, NATO decision, taking of hostages,” meaning Washington is encouraging Georgia to act against Russian interests."

There is an interesting interview on the web site of the Council of Foreign Relations. Stephen Sestanovich, former Ambassador-at-Large for the Newly Independent States under Clinton, talks about the crisis between Russia and Georgia, about the touted reasons and about real reasons.  It gives a good briefing about what is going on and why Russia is so obnoxious, and why the West should care what is going on. (I talked to my sister-in-law yesterday and she had no idea that there was something going on.  I gather it's the same for most of the US population.)

As an aside, all the Armenians I've talked to sided with Russia. They really don't like the Georgians and they are firmly pro-Russia.  I find that amazing, and it forces me to be really diplomatic in talking about this crisis. (That means, I keep my mouth shut.  I know, it sounds incredulous, but I can do that.)