My trip started off rough, with an important first lesson that all our professors would appreciate: don’t trust Wikipedia. I have historically relied heavily on its page “visa requirements for US citizens,” but apparently Azerbaijan only provides visas upon arrival when flying on Azerbaijan Airlines from New York, which sadly I was not. However, I was able to quickly apply for an emergency visa at the airport and only three hours of waiting and the second season of You later, I was able to finally enter the low-lying coastal hub of Baku.
I was tossed in the front of a taxi, which leads me to lesson two: always sit in the back seat. No sooner had I settled in, the driver affectionately grabbed my hand, clearly excited at an American in his vehicle. However, this quickly evolved into him grabbing other parts of me while I awkwardly tried to bat his hand away. I won’t dwell too much on this part, nothing bad seriously happened, and while it did end with me shouting as I struggled to leave the car, I was able to escape relatively unscathed.
I checked into my little bare-bones hotel and quickly went to explore the city. Baku is gorgeous, with a thriving city center full of European restaurants and stores. I ambled along the promenade by the water, lining the Caspian Sea, and got lost in the towering, regal mosques of the Old Town. Christmas decorations flooded the area, teeming with Santas and bubble-blowing vendors selling children’s toys. I walked for the entire day, through the cobbled walls and sea-lined streets, marked by looming towers of LED lights and Western enclaves, until I reached the borders of the city. Finally, I returned to my modest hostel and slept like a baby.
Now, I had to figure out the boat. The Caspian Sea ferry goes from Alat, an hour south of Baku, to Kuryk, Kazakhstan or Turkmenbashi, Turkmenistan. I couldn’t get a visa for Turkmenistan, so Kuryk was my destination. The ferry doesn’t have a schedule, and leaves at random hours on random days 1-2 times per week, so the only way to figure out when I could board was to call every day (with the help of the kind people at my hostel). I found out it was leaving that day, my second in Baku, at 5pm, so I wandered the city a bit more and then hopped in a car down to Alat (this time in the back). I arrived cautiously early, at 4pm, and wandered the empty port by foot until I was able to get a ticket. I snuggled up in the heated waiting room in refuge from the cold outside with a handful of others, all going to Turkmenbashi, none of them English-speakers. I waited, hour after hour, every so often traversing across the port to annoy the security guards to ask when the ferry would be arriving. Finally, at 10pm, the freshly pressed armed guards came to my little waiting room and notified me that I could board the ship.
This wasn’t entirely true - the boat had arrived at the port, but it needed to load the 43 cars and trucks before it took passengers. I waited out in the cold until it was my turn, but before that moment came a young Kazakhstani polyglot offered to let me sit in his car. Thus, lesson three: learn who to trust, and who not to trust. This is not my strong suit, but to be fair, it’s not the easiest task in the world. As a young woman, I’m often offered kindness from strangers, it just matters who expects what in return. This boy, just 25, having recently come back from studying in Canada, seemed decent enough to me, so I sat in his car and accompanied him as we all entered the boat. It turns out he was planning on driving to Beineu after landing in Kuryk, which is exactly where I needed to be for my next train, so we made arrangements to meet on the other end and drive together until that point.
The most terrifying part of the boarding experience was when going through customs, during which the Azerbaijani authorities looked at my passport and realized I had an Amernian stamp. Apparently, it is forbidden to enter the country with such a stamp, and they simply didn’t notice it at the airport. However, despite their shock and horror, I was on my way out of the country and they anxiously let it slide.
By the time we were all settled on the ship, it was about 1am. I was the only passenger traveling without a car or truck, the only Westerner, and the only woman — except for two lovely women on the crew who adopted me for the length of the trip. Even though my ticket was for a four-person cabin, they placed me in an empty, locked, two-person room with a private bathroom and shower. However, apparently this wasn’t good enough because about 30 minutes later they came back with the captain and escorted me to a private crew suite, afraid that the truck drivers would get drunk and harass me in the night. I ended up with a spacious single room with a gorgeous view of the glistening turquoise water, and after I put down my stuff, the captain gave me a tour of the bridge and declared that it was now “my boat.” With a big smile, I finally went to bed at around 2:30am, and the boat took off two hours later - a full 12 hours after I had arrived.
The online reviews of this boat include horror stories, with people spending three days on the boat with no food or water. My experience was extremely different, with three meals served (mostly lentils and kasha, which was not particularly to my interest, despite my Russian heritage on my maternal side), and the trip taking about 27 hours from stepping on to stepping off the boat. In fact, one of the women even woke me up during a nap because she realized I wasn’t at dinner. The second-captain also took me under his wing, giving me tea and Azerbaijani sweets on the bridge as we discussed religion, politics, and gossiped about the drama of the ship. However, the conservation somehow veered into his sex life with his wife and how she never wants anal, and how he learned how to go down on her from his American colleagues. I quickly left to explore the rest of the boat after declining his offer to do the same to me.
I had free reign, the boat being much more like a cargo ship than any kind of cruise. I wandered through its double decked hull, up and down the extremely narrow stairs, ducking through the engine and avoiding touching anything that could derail the trip.
We pulled into the Kazakhstani port at about 3am, and while my customs process was fast and painless, we were only able to fully leave the area at about noon due to the car needing to go through registration. However, with a couple of Terry Pratchett books and it being the first time I had internet in over two days, I wasn’t complaining. Finally, the young Kazakh man who agreed to take me to Beineu and I began the drive, whizzing through huge swaths of empty road, surrounded by empty territory reminiscent of Namibia, Jordan, Iceland. He had no aux cord or radio, leaving one frustratingly annoying home-brewed mixtape CD to listen to, filled with mariachi, reggae, Blurred Lines, and Take Me Home, Country Roads. The area was known for its oil and gas industry, which was explained to me as we passed hundreds of drilling sites, and the occasional camel. We stopped in Shetpe for lunch at the driver’s brother’s house for a traditional meal of beef and potatoes, with hand-made waffle cones as desert. While eating, the brother’s wife inquired in broken English, while tending to three young boys and a baby, about life in America. “What do you usually eat? Do you cook? How expensive is food? How expensive is rent?” She was simultaneously horrified and amazed at my answers, and I felt a little embarrassed admitting to how often my roommate and I order in sushi.
Soon, we were back on the road, and the driver and I awkwardly tried to make small talk. “So, you are married?” he asked. Fourth lesson of the trip: always say you have a boyfriend, or are engaged. However, I discovered a bit of a catch-22 in this regard: many men will only respect your space if they believe you are the property of another man. But, if you have a boyfriend and are not married or engaged, you’re clearly a slut and therefore open territory. So, next lesson: just wear a ring and pretend to be married. It’s so much easier that way, and I’m currently trying to make an acceptable ring out of a keychain and necklace to prevent further issues. The boy was very kind, I believe that I was correct in deciding to trust him for the drive; he only tried to hold my hand once before being swatted away.
Finally, at about 10pm, we pulled into Beineu, which to my surprise was not a city but in fact a tiny village that happened to have a train station. The streets were lit up with sparkling strobe lights, with children setting off fireworks in the street to celebrate New Years, and I was a bit overwhelmed. The handsy driver helped me get my ticket to Bukhara, and went on his way to finish his journey home. Turns out the next train left two days later, which meant I was stuck in this strange little place for roughly 43 hours, leaving lots of time to explore. I dipped around the corner and found a little hotel with a comfy big bed, which was much needed after being awake for 24+ hours. The most frustrating moment was when the hotel guy followed me into my room and asked if I really wanted to sleep alone, but he finally left after some strong words. Again, get that costume jewelry, ya’ll.
I sat in my little room, thinking back on the past year, very thankful for all my experiences thus far, the opportunities I have been given, the people I have met and hold close. I toned down my traveling this year — I wanted to spend more time truly appreciating where I was, to travel consciously, and not to visit incredibly “problematic” places, which were all part of my 2019 resolutions. I still want to work on being more environmentally conscious, and I definitely didn’t live up to my promise to act with purpose or to be better to myself. I still have a lot to work on, but I think I’m on the right path. I think this trip is an important chance for me to improve upon myself, being possibly the most intense and risky that I have embarked on so far, mostly due to its length and the fact that I am completely alone. I am absolutely loving it but it reminds me that I need to stay safe, and that despite all my past adventures, there is still quite a lot to learn.