I GOT SUSPECTED OF BEING A MILITANT AT THE AZERBAIJAN BORDER
After eight weeks of hitchhiking - from Romania, through Bulgaria, Turkey, Georgia and Armenia –something came up back at home that needed taking care of, so, reluctantly, I booked a flight for the following morning from Tbilisi to London, via Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.
Bear in mind that Baku sits 344 miles from Georgia’s capital Tbilisi, and in the opposite direction of England. So in essence my route home was the same as flying from Sweden to Russia, via Wales.
As my flight was due to depart early the next morning and I’m not one for getting out of bed at dawn, I decided to pull an all-nighter instead; with a bottle of vodka for company.
The check-in hall at Tbilisi Airport was almost empty of people.
My flight took off at 9. My inebriated state was fast wearing off, being replaced by an overpowering feeling of exhaustion.
Exactly one hour later I touched down at Heydar Aliyev International Airport in Azerbaijan’s capital, Baku.
I was the last one off the plane and, as I smiled and wished the hostess on the door a good day, I had no idea of the fun that was soon to begin.
I was on Azerbaijani soil; a country ruled by an authoritarian regime, and one that I had been told was far from welcoming to anyone with an Armenian stamp in their passport.
Still, I expected to be left in peace, as I had no intention of passing through the border and into the country. I just had to sit in the departures hall for a couple of hours while I waited for the aircraft that would take me the 3000 miles home.
Now is probably a good time to educate those of you that don’t already know about the delicate situation that exists between the two former Soviet republics of Armenia and Azerbaijan. There is a region of Azerbaijan called Nagorno-Karabakh which is inhabited mostly by ethnic Armenians and is occupied by the Armenian army.
When Azerbaijan declared independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, fighting broke out in the region over control of the land, with the local Armenian population voting to separate from Azerbaijan and to be recognised as the independent Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh. This international recognition never came and fighting continued until 1994, when diplomats from the two countries hammered out a ceasefire.
Since then, Armenian armed forces have occupied about 20 per cent of Azerbaijan, including the disputed region.
Today, no diplomatic relations exist between the countries, as technically they remain at war, with the Azerbaijani government repeatedly threatening to take back the region by force.
And despite the almost 20-year old ceasefire, sporadic outbreaks of armed violence still often break out in the region, with troops from both sides losing their lives.
All Armenian nationals and people of Armenian descent are forbidden entry into Azerbaijan, as is anyone whose passport shows evidence of travel to Nagorno-Karabakh.
On a less serious note, but no less true, a number of Azerbaijani citizens were arrested and interrogated in 2012 for voting for the Armenian entry in the Eurovision Song Contest, on charges of being unpatriotic and a threat to national security. You couldn’t make this shit up!
Anyway, the reason I was the last one off the plane that day in Baku was that while my co-passengers were streaming down the aisle towards the door, I was faffing about with my passport, bending it this way and that, attempting to remove it from the official Republic of Armenia passport cover that I had picked up in Yerevan, partly as a souvenir and partly because it protected my passport from wear and tear.
I hadn’t given it a moment of thought up until this moment, but now as I pulled it from my back pocket it suddenly occured to me that it might not be the most sensible idea I’ve ever had to walk through Azerbaijani Customs, brandishing a British passport inside an Armenian case, with the words “Հայաստանի Հանրապետություն” (Republic of Armenia) emblazoned across the front like a red rag to an Azeri bull.
I removed the document from its offensive shell and slipped both items into different pockets. I then exited the aircraft, strolled down the tunnel and then on entering the terminal took a left and pushed open the door above which a sign read “Connecting Flights.”
“No. This way,” said a stern voice, as a strong hand on my shoulder guided me in the same direction as all of the other passengers, towards passport control and the baggage collection point.
“No,” I replied, “This way. I am flying to London.”
Two tall men guarding the door, who looked as if they modelled their style on the Secret Service guys that Travis talks to in the film Taxi Driver, then both asked me at the same time where I was from. I told them, and was instructed to follow one of them through the door.
Immediately on the other side of the door was the standard airport x-ray machine, and I was told to hand the man my passport, empty my pockets and to walk through the metal detector.
It beeped.
“Take off your belt,” the man told me, coldly, “And empty your pockets completely. I can see that you haven’t.”
I thought to myself, ‘Well, this isn’t going to look too good.’
The man watched me intently as I revealed the item that I had previously failed to remove from my pocket was an Armenian passport cover.
I walked through the metal detector a second time, before putting out my arms and spreading my legs so that I could be frisked.
“What’s this?” asked the man, as he picked up and examined the black passport cover.
“Something I bought in Yerevan to protect my passport,” I answered.
“Yerevan? Why did you go to Yerevan? And where else did you go?”
I was dead on my feet through fatigue and did not need this. As I pondered my response, the man flicked through my passport to the page that held the Armenian entry and exit stamps.
“I’ve just been travelling. I was in Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Georgia, and a few days in Armenia,” I told him.
“You entered and exited Armenia by car. Who was driving you?”
“I don’t know.”
“It is a simple question. Don’t mess with me. Who was driving you?”
“I don’t know. I was hitchhiking.”
“Wait here.”
The man disappeared back through the door, still holding my passport, and returned a few moments later with his equally stiff-looking colleague.
“Put your belt on and follow us over here with your bags,” I was commanded.
The second man then waved the passport holder in my face and asked angrily, “Why do you have this?”
“To protect my passport. Strangely enough, it was easier to find an Armenian one than a British one, seeing as how I was in Armenia.”
I didn’t like these guys, a couple of bored suits on a power trip. I knew I’d done nothing wrong, broken no law, so what could they do to me? I wasn’t going to kiss any arse.
“Open your bag.”
I bent down and unzipped my backpack.
As one of the men prepared to search it, the other disappeared with my passport, speaking Azeri into his radio as he went. And then, in the corner of my eye, I saw it. This really wasn’t going to do me any favours.
On one of my last days in Armenia’s capital I had stumbled upon an Army surplus store, and bought, just because it was so cheap - about 3 quid - an Armenian Army camouflaged vest. I had stuffed it into my backpack and forgotten about it, and now, just as I had opened my bag to be searched by this Azerbaijani immigration officer who was suspicious that I may have been harbouring Armenian sympathies, its distinctive pattern cried out for attention from the corner of the opening. It was found immediately.
“What is this?”
The man’s face was now a picture of intense seriousness.
“That, sir, is a piece of Armenian Army uniform,” I replied, keeping as straight a face as I could. There was no escaping the fact that this was a pretty funny situation I’d got myself into.
There then ensued ten seconds of silence as, with the vest resting over his left wrist, my interrogator just stared at my face with a look on his own as perplexed as it was incredulous, no doubt trying to work out if this was for real, or if he were the victim of a hidden camera prank.
°Yes I was really standing here.
°Yes I did carry my passport in a “Հայաստանի Հանրապետություն” cover.
°Yes I really did carry in my luggage a piece of military uniform of the country that his was at war with.
°Yes I really had been transported in and out of Armenia by men that I claimed not to know.
°And yes I failed to see the seriousness of the situation.
I had stumped my man. I returned his gaze blankly.
“Is this going to take much longer?” I asked, “And if it is, can we pause for a cigarette?”
“Um, just.. Just wait. Okay? When you were in Armenia, did you speak to any Armenians?”
“It would have been quite some feat if I hadn’t, wouldn’t it? I’ve only been in Azerbaijan 15 minutes and already I’ve made a local friend.”
“Yes. Of course. And what did they say about Azerbaijan?”
Was this conversation really happening? Was this an immigration officer, or was it a 15-year old girl who wanted to hear if her exboyfriend had been spreading shit about her?
“No one said anything about Azerbaijan. Most people had something to say about Turkey; they’re not too fond of the Turks in Armenia. But no one mentioned your country. To be honest, I don’t think the average Armenian really cares about Azerbaijan.”
The man looked saddened by my revelation; as if his whole reason for being was to hate Armenians, because in his mind they hated him equally, and now he had found out that he meant nothing to them.
I had been told numerous stories by friends that passing through Baku Airport was almost always an irritating event, thanks to over-zealous men in uniforms intent on finding out if you liked their enemy.
Why would a traveller from 3000 miles away, who had been in the region just a few weeks, have picked sides in a dispute that until very recently he hadn’t known existed? And so what if I had developed a soft spot for Armenia? What effect would that have on world affairs? I can see the headlines now:
“Completely unknown and unimportant man, Kris Mole, who lives on the south coast of England, quite likes Armenia. Azerbaijani Government recalled to discuss the threat!”
What made all of this even more pointless was the fact that I wasn’t even planning on crossing the border into Azerbaijan. My travel plans meant that I had come to Baku simply to sit in the departures waiting area for two hours before being flown the fuck out of the country.
As the man took in the news that Armenia didn’t care enough to spread nasty rumours about him, his mate returned, holding my passport. On seeing the item of clothing that hung on his friend’s wrist, he frowned, before growling, “And what is this?”
“That, sir, is a piece of Armenian Army uniform.”
The two men looked at each other, exchanged a few words, and then I was handed back my passport.
“Okay, we are finished. Put your stuff back in the bag and I will show you where you can smoke. I also need one,” said the man who had searched my bag, now in what could even be described as an amicable tone.
I followed him through a door and then saw human life bustling around me again. We were in the departures lounge.
Azerbaijan is a rich country, thanks to her apparently endless supply of natural resources, and this richness is evident in the airport. All around me were luxury goods shops: Hugo Boss, Salvatore Ferragamo, Swarovski Crystal, Porsche Design, to name but a few. The Azeri people killing time before their flights were all expensively dressed.
“We smoke here,” said the man who now seemed like he wanted to be my friend.
The smoking area was a pod that looked like a glass shower cubicle. The sliding door was heavier than it needed to be, and I embarrassed myself somewhat as I failed at the first attempt to open it, going in as I did with a limp wrist.
Inside, a strong, barrel-chested man, whose suit was worn scruffily, his shirt untucked at the front and his tie loose around his neck, with a hardness in his face that suggested a lifetime spent in the military, stood in the corner puffing on a cigarette.
My new friend nodded him a greeting as we entered and then offered me a light, before starting a conversation with me about English football. After all we had just been through together, the barriers had now finally been laid down completely and we were once again just two men.
‘Ah, these guys aren’t so bad,’ I thought, ‘they’re just doing a job.’
And so we bonded for a couple of minutes, discussing the beautiful game, until the barrel-chested man, whose authority over my new friend was obvious by the way they looked at each other, interrupted our chat to give my man a bollocking.
My friend looked up at him apologetically.
The barrel-chested man continued to reprimand his subordinate, before turning to me with a fear-inducing look and simply barking, “Your Passport!”
I handed it to him. He flicked through the pages.
“Armenia. Where did you go in Armenia?”
The other man quickly stubbed out his cigarette and left us alone in the pod.
I wasn’t going to get lairy or sarcastic with this guy like I had the other two. This man was not the type that would take any of my shit. This man was the type who would take me out the back and beat me to death with his bare hands, moments after raping me.
I sighed.
“I spent time in Gyumri and Yerevan.”
“Nowhere else? You didn’t go to the south?”
“Nope. Just those two cities.”
“What was the purpose of your visit to Armenia?”
“I was just travelling, man. I’m backpacking. I went through a whole host of countries, one of which happened to be Armenia.”
The man looked at me with mistrust in his eyes. He then spoke on his radio to someone, reading details from my passport page. Then something in his tone changed, as if he had just been told by mission control that I was the nephew of the Armenian President.
“Stay here!” he ordered me, before disappearing with my passport.
As I stood in the pod, lighting up a second cigarette, I felt the eyes of the departure lounge on me, as the locals all speculated amongst themselves who I was, what I had done, and why the scariest man in the airport had just gone running off with my passport, discussing me in harsh terms on his radio.
I sat on my bag and waited. Eventually the man returned, 10 minutes later, and with a disappointed look handed me back my passport and told me to go and sit in the waiting area until my flight was called for boarding, in about an hour.
Just under seven hours later, I landed in London. Azerbaijan Airlines are alright.
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You might also enjoy my book Gatecrashing Europe, documenting the time I travelled to every capital city in Europe without any money in my pocket. Available from all decent book sellers, Amazon, or direct from the publisher.
