I’ve been experiencing the longest writer’s block when I arrived at this entry. I just couldn’t find inspiration to write about Azerbaijan. It’s not that the country itself was boring – I mean, it’s called “The Land of Fire” – which is what I drew me here in the first place. But in the end, apart from the shiny capital of Baku (rich with oil money), I tried to find other interesting spots to make detours around the country but ultimately didn’t find any – not even natural “weird” geological phenomena like Yanar Dag could tempt me to make a trip.
I wish say this though – the Carpet Museum of Baku was one of the most interesting museums I’ve ever visited in the entire world! You may ask why I’d be interested in carpets of all things. But have you seen carpet-weaving art? It’s stunning and very intricate!
I remember the first meal I had after touching down in Baku was McDonalds. Yes, McDonalds. When you’ve been on the road long enough and had plenty of ethnic dishes, as delicious as they were, a cheeseburger/fries/sundae combo was very much in order to bring me back to “Western-world-baseline”.
You can tell Azerbaijan is one of those countries that spent a lot of their new-found oil money to catch up with the First-World – at least their capital Baku did. The country definitely tried to model Baku after European capital cities like Madrid and Rome. The buildings and roads were very new and there always seemed to be construction going on.
Aside from wandering the shopping district in Baku (where modern shops, restaurant and coffee-house chains fill the space), the city promenade provides great views of the Caspian Sea and was a pleasant stroll.
There is some semblance of an Old City that normally is preserved in cities that undergo drastic transformation and Baku had one as well. To me, there was nothing note-worthy apart from certain structures being preserved for cultural heritage – the rest felt touristy (as expected).
I’d stayed in Baku for about 3 days. In those days, besides walking around, I had another craving – to watch a movie in a cinema – and coincidentally, the latest Mission Impossible was out so I found a location playing a non-dubbed version and enjoyed the movie. (Little things like having a cheeseburger and watching a movie in a cinema bring certain comforts after being in foreign lands for some time.) After a day out, I ended up at the promenade once more and settled down before noticing some pretty colors in a distance – the Flame Towers were lit up!
Of course, I can’t visit a foreign land and eat McDonalds. My favorite meal was in a restaurant that was adjacent to a popular town square but the fun part was that it was hidden away – you can to find an unmarked entrance, then descend down a flight of stairs to find a place called “Firuze“, a popular spot for locals to eat classic Azeri dishes. (Check out the link above for the extensive menu of dishes of not just Azeri but common Caucasian food.) The waiter was very friendly and welcoming and through broken English and some non-verbal body language, helped me select some dishes. I had some “qutabs” as an appetizer and a lamb “gunbaz” as my main course. (I couldn’t find a link for the latter dish in Latin letters – that’s how you pronounce it though – and the menu describes it as containing “lamb, eggplant, onion, cherry, rice, and pomegranate paste” all wrapped up and cooked in a vegetable case.
Would I go back to Baku? Probably not. I do want to try more Azeri food (and finding Azeri restaurants isn’t easy outside of New York City) and it was interesting to see what oil money can do to give a former Soviet Union city a face-lift and to bring it to the 21st century but there’s little else culturally that draws me back to it the way a city like Istanbul does.