Today we are off to Yavlar (which is spelled with an "x" at the end, but it sounds like Yavlar, or Yav-loch, but you'll probably never be here or learn the language so you don't need to know that,) with England and Indy. We are submitting our application and accompanying documents for the work permit and residence permit. Indy is going with us to pick up her work permit, she has finally been approved.
England calls at 10:30 or so, "I'll be there in five or ten minutes." Which turns out to be five. Beloved is just starting a quick egg (a fried egg--yuck) when he knocks on the door. England is in a hurry, there will be a couple stops before getting under way. We drive about six blocks to the first stop, "I'll only be a minute," he says as he darts into a small doorway. It is lightly raining/snowing this morning, and cold. After nearly 40 minutes he re-appears with the completed documents from the house owner. England is a patient man, but even he comments about the frustration of taking nearly an hour-and-a-half to fill in five lines on a document.
Next stop, The Training House, where we collect Indy as England confers with Mrs. P, "knower of all things for submittal of visa documents."
Finally we are under way, on-track to arrive 20 minutes before 1:00, the lunch break. England assures us that this will not be a good thing, that the attendants would be very grumpy if we want to submit a whole pile of documents just before lunch. So, we are hurrying, hoping to arrive in time to not interfere with lunch.
The drive is not much to write about, the combination of just enough precipitation to make the roads wet thereby filling the air with a residue of windshield-coating mud and the mostly ineffective windshield wipers on England's truck kept the sight-seeing element to a minimum. Not that there is much to see on this stretch of road anyway, it is the perpetually-under-construction main road to Baku.
After 45 minutes or so, we arrive at a wide spot in the road, don't blink--this is Yevlax/Yavlar/Yavloch. Turn off to the right, about 500 yards or meters, turn in on the left to a newish-looking building. Having now been in more than a few Post-Soviet-era bureaucratic offices, police stations, hospitals, etc., between Estonskia and Azerbaijan, I had in my mind a picture of what we would find--I was preparing my spirit soul and body for a thousand-year old building that had worn-out everything, a hundred people waiting inside in no type of a line or que, huddled around one haggard, mean, power-hungry, demoralized government official sitting at a circa 1971 desk under one light bulb hanging by its wire. He would have a dozen stacks of paper on the desk, a ruler to cleanly tear paper in half (I'll tell you more about that one day) and a stamp. God forbid there be no stamp. Shall I go on? Let's see, paint peeling off the ceiling, holes in the wall where the plaster had fallen off, freezing cold because there is no heat on today (maybe next Tuesday), there would be three chairs in the waiting area but they would all be broken, (these would be from the '70's also) and throw in some faded photographs of former directors, presidents, cabinet members, ruling party members, dictators, you get the idea.
This was none of that. Well, almost--it was cold inside the place. And there were photos of the former president, who is dead now, more on that another time too. Other than that, this place was clean, well-lit, the photos of former party leaders were not faded, there were plants and the nicest couch I have sat on yet in Azerbaijan. (Pity it will probably still be there in 25 years) The ceilings and walls were all in good repair and painted, and the three officials were situated more like tellers at a bank. You could sit in a chair that was provided, but they were behind glass. There were only two other applicants before us, so we were able to approach the glass immediately to begin out transaction. One of the officials even smiled.
We have made good time and now have 45 minutes before invading the lunch break. England will do the business, we will do the waiting. After about 15 minutes, any perceived momentum came to a halt--there was a document missing. All of our documents seem to be in good order, this is a different document--a new process that we knew nothing about. True and honest, this is what they were hung up on--England, a senior official of The Bank (where I am employed) could not present the application, he would have to have another member of The Bank present the documents, with a properly stamped document stating that he was acting as power-of-attorney for England. This was the only way they will accept these documents and the application for the work permit. Welcome to Azerbaijan.
Indy got her document (congratulations) and we left. England shrugged, "What else are you going to do? They make the rules."
The ride home was essentially the same scenery-wise, but we ended up using the whole time to work on language, which was actually fun. Well, actually grueling too, but fun. England is an infinitely patient teacher, which I needed today. We spent 45 minutes working on, "I write, you write, he writes, we write, you all write, and they write." Not so tough, huh, well I finally got to the point that I could get 5 out of 6 correct inside of 30 seconds. My afternoons Azeri lesson sounded like this; (I will use the english-sounding equivalents--the Azeri language uses some strange mutations on english letters like ü and ∂ and ç which I will forebear at this time) "Man yazeram, San yazersan, O yazer, (the word for he, she and it are all the same, O) Biz yazeruck, Siz yazersiniz, and Onlar yazerlar."
It's slow but it's coming!
England calls at 10:30 or so, "I'll be there in five or ten minutes." Which turns out to be five. Beloved is just starting a quick egg (a fried egg--yuck) when he knocks on the door. England is in a hurry, there will be a couple stops before getting under way. We drive about six blocks to the first stop, "I'll only be a minute," he says as he darts into a small doorway. It is lightly raining/snowing this morning, and cold. After nearly 40 minutes he re-appears with the completed documents from the house owner. England is a patient man, but even he comments about the frustration of taking nearly an hour-and-a-half to fill in five lines on a document.
 |
| A rainy day in Ganja |
Next stop, The Training House, where we collect Indy as England confers with Mrs. P, "knower of all things for submittal of visa documents."
Finally we are under way, on-track to arrive 20 minutes before 1:00, the lunch break. England assures us that this will not be a good thing, that the attendants would be very grumpy if we want to submit a whole pile of documents just before lunch. So, we are hurrying, hoping to arrive in time to not interfere with lunch.
The drive is not much to write about, the combination of just enough precipitation to make the roads wet thereby filling the air with a residue of windshield-coating mud and the mostly ineffective windshield wipers on England's truck kept the sight-seeing element to a minimum. Not that there is much to see on this stretch of road anyway, it is the perpetually-under-construction main road to Baku.
After 45 minutes or so, we arrive at a wide spot in the road, don't blink--this is Yevlax/Yavlar/Yavloch. Turn off to the right, about 500 yards or meters, turn in on the left to a newish-looking building. Having now been in more than a few Post-Soviet-era bureaucratic offices, police stations, hospitals, etc., between Estonskia and Azerbaijan, I had in my mind a picture of what we would find--I was preparing my spirit soul and body for a thousand-year old building that had worn-out everything, a hundred people waiting inside in no type of a line or que, huddled around one haggard, mean, power-hungry, demoralized government official sitting at a circa 1971 desk under one light bulb hanging by its wire. He would have a dozen stacks of paper on the desk, a ruler to cleanly tear paper in half (I'll tell you more about that one day) and a stamp. God forbid there be no stamp. Shall I go on? Let's see, paint peeling off the ceiling, holes in the wall where the plaster had fallen off, freezing cold because there is no heat on today (maybe next Tuesday), there would be three chairs in the waiting area but they would all be broken, (these would be from the '70's also) and throw in some faded photographs of former directors, presidents, cabinet members, ruling party members, dictators, you get the idea.
This was none of that. Well, almost--it was cold inside the place. And there were photos of the former president, who is dead now, more on that another time too. Other than that, this place was clean, well-lit, the photos of former party leaders were not faded, there were plants and the nicest couch I have sat on yet in Azerbaijan. (Pity it will probably still be there in 25 years) The ceilings and walls were all in good repair and painted, and the three officials were situated more like tellers at a bank. You could sit in a chair that was provided, but they were behind glass. There were only two other applicants before us, so we were able to approach the glass immediately to begin out transaction. One of the officials even smiled.
We have made good time and now have 45 minutes before invading the lunch break. England will do the business, we will do the waiting. After about 15 minutes, any perceived momentum came to a halt--there was a document missing. All of our documents seem to be in good order, this is a different document--a new process that we knew nothing about. True and honest, this is what they were hung up on--England, a senior official of The Bank (where I am employed) could not present the application, he would have to have another member of The Bank present the documents, with a properly stamped document stating that he was acting as power-of-attorney for England. This was the only way they will accept these documents and the application for the work permit. Welcome to Azerbaijan.
Indy got her document (congratulations) and we left. England shrugged, "What else are you going to do? They make the rules."
The ride home was essentially the same scenery-wise, but we ended up using the whole time to work on language, which was actually fun. Well, actually grueling too, but fun. England is an infinitely patient teacher, which I needed today. We spent 45 minutes working on, "I write, you write, he writes, we write, you all write, and they write." Not so tough, huh, well I finally got to the point that I could get 5 out of 6 correct inside of 30 seconds. My afternoons Azeri lesson sounded like this; (I will use the english-sounding equivalents--the Azeri language uses some strange mutations on english letters like ü and ∂ and ç which I will forebear at this time) "Man yazeram, San yazersan, O yazer, (the word for he, she and it are all the same, O) Biz yazeruck, Siz yazersiniz, and Onlar yazerlar."
It's slow but it's coming!
I thought you were coming along really well by the end of your trip-drilling! Way better than I was a month into it! Keep it the determination and hard work!
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