Yerevan, Armenia
August 19, 2007
By Dan
“To cross the border it is $255 for each car.”
Stunned, we asked the Armenian customs official for a break down of the costs.
He looked up from his peeling lacquer desk and grinned, “That’s $180 for the bank and $75 for me.”
Welcome to Armenia.
Armenia is proud to be the first country that declared Christianity its state religion. It converted in 301, and the world’s first Christian church is here. The country is fiercely Orthodox, despite the attentions of neighbouring Muslim Turkey, and the cities and countryside are littered with old churches and carved stone crosses.
We camped our first night on a patch of debris beside the road, then headed to the capital, Yerevan, which lies in the shadow of Mount Ararat, where Noah grounded his arc.
Unlike other former Soviet cities, Yerevan hasn’t pulled down its Communist monuments. They sit at the end of the main streets- huge rectangular slabs topped by giant muscular men wielding scythes, or strong boned busts of workers and leaders.
The Armenian women divided opinion: tall with slender legs and curved chests, but broad shouldered, with large, strong noses. Ladies with full moustaches were a common sight, and some of the older women sported freak show beards.
I spent a day trying to get metal plates welded beneath Gunther the Mercedes, to protect the oil pan and petrol tank from the Caucasian roads. All the mechanics had gold teeth.
We went on a day trip to the city of Echmiadzin, famed for it’s many churches. Goha, our Armenian contact, was our guide, and brought with her Marco, a Serb, and Albert Poghosyan, a 27-year-old Armenian who had spent the last three years studying in Salford.
An impressive and stout character, with a full stomach, a jet-black beard, and a shaved head to make best the receding hairline he inherited from his father.
He was studying eCommerce in Manchester, but had broad interests and a confident grasp of English- I found him stimulating company.
In the sweaty, crammed bus ride to the city, I I told Albert about our experience at the border and asked about corruption in Armenia.
“Oh yes, the corruption on a low level is very high. Here is an example: I want to set up an organisation here. I fill out the paperwork and go with the $20 fee. But the officials demand another $250 to stamp the paperwork. If I do not pay then they say there is a problem with the paperwork, that I have not done it right and they send me back to do it again. I come back with it, but again they want money, and I don’t pay so they send me away. This will carry on for 10 months or so and they let me know that if I don’t pay, they will never stamp the paperwork. So I pay, and it takes two days, not a year.
“The problem is people don’t care, they don’t want to finish corruption. They understand that the corruption is practical. If you pay then things are ok.
“When I say I will not pay, people are amazed. I say ‘why should I pay? I pay my taxes, you should go by the rules.’”
Don’t people go to the police to complain about corruption?
“No people don’t trust the police. The mentality is the same as the Soviet times when there was the mafia so nobody spoke to the police.
“Back then all the money came from Russia so if you stole the money you were a hero. Mafia were heroes. They were not stealing from Armenians, they were stealing from Russians, so they became heroes. People loved these guys and these guys protected them. Intelligent guys you know, speak many languages, can talk to you about Da Vinci, about Tolstoy, very clever people.
“Ordinary workers got two holidays a year, they could go to England or see their family anywhere. People were happy.
“But a free state had always been a dream, people wanted to be free from Moscow.
“In 1991/92 when the Soviet system collapsed the teachers and professors came to power in Armenia. They gave the mafia bosses three days to leave the country. But these guys are so powerful they don’t believe them. Then guys with automatic weapons come and just kill them. Maybe a dozen of them.
“But the mafia used to run the city, now who runs the city?
“The police. In small country like this it is the police people are scared of. The state has become the mafia. The police can take you away. They can take you to prison. The police are the new mafia. The state is the new mafia.
“Then the war with Azerbaijan and for five years we have a blockade. No electricity, no proper food. I had to read by candlelight, and I read a lot. It was the 19th Century.”
So what can be done?
“I don’t think there can be a revolution, there must be an evolution. We need to change the minds of the young people. Engels and Marx revolutionary theories are complete shit. They’re not working. Marx made his theory so good, so clever, with everything in it, Kant, Hegel, even Adam Smith, you have to respect him. But it is all lies.”
I suggested Marx only had a theory, it wasn’t a practical solution, it was Lenin who put it into practise. Albert nodded: “And Lenin was a German spy, sent by the Kaiser to cause a revolution in Russia.”
Bit of a bombshell: “So you’re saying the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 was planned and funded by the Germans to try and end Russian involvement in World War One?”
“Yes.”
I thought I’d best leave that one.
We arrived at the church where they claim to have the spear that a Roman soldier used to stab Jesus when he was on his way to Calvary.
I was enraptured by the rusty, old spearhead. Did it really pierce God? It felt very strange to look at.
Deep in the bowels of the church is a door that leads to an underground pagan temple. Apparently the building’s designers decided to hedge their bets, just in case the old gods tried to reassert themselves. Strategic thinking.
Ends
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