Spoils of War

(I'd like to reiterate what is written at the title of my blog. There is a reason this blog is password protected, and that is so that I can say some things that Peace Corps or the government of Azerbaijan or the US in general might not agree with. Everything I am about to say it based on my own experiences with people I have met here, and are only that. It has nothing to do with PC, AZ or the US government. The people quoted below will remain nameless.)

I once again apologize profusely for neglecting my blog. I'd like to say it's because I'm busy but it isn't. I'm just lazy. There's an internet club in my town now, so I can check email and such on a regular basis without travelling to another region. However, it's so eat up with viruses that I can't use a flashdrive there, so posting on the blog still requires me to travel all the way to Göyçay. Also, there hasn't been much of anything interesting going on so I never feel compelled to come and spew a bunch of marginalia and nonsense all over the internet; there's far too much of that already.

So, featured above are some pictures from around Ucar, including the stadium (actually just a big mud pit covered in weeds with some bleachers on the far side) and the "Shehidler Xiyabani", or Martyr's Lane. There is at least one in every town, dedicated to soldiers who fell during the war in Karabakh. They are solemn places, but unfortunately most of them are neglected. The one in Ucar is filled with weeds, someone knocked the nose off the main statue, and I've never seen anyone other than maintenence guys there. I had a short chat with one of them while I was taking pictures. I didn't understand all of what he said, he kept talking about the Kurds in Turkey and something about war, but then he went up to a grave and pointed at the date. 1970-1992 it read. A 22 year old kid who was gunned down trying to defend a patch of land that most people in the world have never even heard of. Then the guy pointed to all the other graves. I looked around...and every single one of the soldiers listed was my age or younger. "They're just kids!", I said to the guy, "All kids!". I thought that was the point he was trying to make. But then he said "See here, 1992. All of these children died after Heydar Aliyev showed up. Everyone here talks about him like he is the greatest democrat ever. But him, and his son, they're not democrats...they're dictators. This isn't a democracy, it's a dictatorship!"

I was dumbstruck. This guy, making $100 a month to clean weeds out of a forgotten cemetary, has come out and said to me what most people here are terrified to even let themselves realize. I dunno if he said it to me because I'm a foreigner and he wanted me to know, or he just needed to vent his frustration, but it really got to me. The sort of helplessness felt here is overwhelming, especially considering the war-torn, unstable history of this country.

I've recently started hanging out with a couple of soldiers who were in Karabakh, asking them about what they saw, how they feel about it, etc. Obviously they don't want to talk about it, and if I had seen what they saw I wouldn't either. But one of them, while I was at a tea house, started showing me a video on his phone. It was a bunch of guys getting off a helicopter and walking through a field. I asked him if it was the war and he just said "watch...". Suddenly the camera pans down, and in a ditch is a body...then two...then five...and then the camera pans across the field. As far as the field of vision is a line of bodies, all thrown into a ditch. Azeris, Armenians, Russians....soldiers and civilians all mixed together. I was struck silent, I didn't know what to say. So I asked him "Well, we have these Martyr's Lanes everywhere, the government always talks about the war and uses it for political means, and you were there and saw all of this in defense of your country...what do they do for you now?" "Not a damn thing" he replied, "I drive a taxi for a couple of dollars a day, I do what I can".

It's hard being presented with experiences like this. As a Peace Corps volunteer I'm not allowed to talk about politics, but at the same time I feel compelled to learn about these people's experiences. It puts me in a bind that's hard to escape from, so I try to avoid it when I can, but sometimes people feel compelled to tell me things that they may be afraid to say to another Azeri, and I can't help but feel conflicted, as if they want me, a "foreign dignitary" as it were, to do something about it. In the end I'm just as helpless as them, and all I can do is hope that one day things will change for the better, and these experiences and lives won't be isolated here in this little country on the Caspian.