TURKMEN HOMESTAY

Glancing over my shoulder I saw a portly woman, modestly dressed in a long skirt, her eyes glued to the floor. She entered the apartment quietly and slid into a room with Roshan’s friend. I wouldn’t have guessed she was a prostitute, but Roshan’s blatant hand gestures left no room for a mistake. He looked me in the eye and smacked his fist into his palm repeatedly, nodding towards the room she had just entered. It was an invitation for me to take the next turn. No thanks. Derick and JP also kindly declined.

We sat in a circle on a floor covered in Turkmen rugs. Empty soup bowls, a couple loaves of bread, and a dish of candies filled the space between us. It was nearing 2 AM and we were on our second bottle of vodka. Roshan had approached us on the street an hour earlier with blood-shot eyes and a drunken grin. We’d parked in front of his building and not a minute had passed before he invited us in for the night. We accepted his invitation, and followed him up into a dark, concrete apartment block. He flicked on the lights and woke up an old man named Casper who was curled up on the floor, and another he called Chief, who had passed out on the flat’s lone piece of furniture. Roshan sent a third man out to buy more vodka, and he returned with with the hooker. It was an impromptu soirée in a room of Turkmen oil workers, their temporary abode while out on the job. The conversation was broken but lively, and we bonded over shots of vodka and manhood. Casper didn’t speak a lick of English, but he managed to dominate the conversation, building his stories with a pair of weathered hands. Roshan translated what he could, and we chipped in with muddled smiles. After being stuck on a cargo ship in the Caspian Sea for three days, capped off by a hellish five-hour trudge through customs, this was our introduction to Turkmenistan.

It was 3 AM by the time we convinced our hosts to let us go to sleep, and they held their promise of an early rise by waking us up the next day before 7. With the call girl there, I doubt Roshan and his friends got much sleep, but they were as chipper as could be as they saw us off. After some tea and a round of hugs, we drove into the dessert. Our first twelve hours in Turkmenistan had been surreal. And it would only get weirder. We were happy to be on the road again. On to Ashgabat!

STUCK AT SEA

After staring out across the Caspian Sea for a while, she slowly pulled herself up onto the railing. First she sat, and then she stood, balancing a few stories above the water. There were a few of us out enjoying the sun, and as she made her move, we exchanged a volley of nervous glances. It was a long drop, and there would be no easy way to retrieve her from the sea if she were to jump. Not from a cargo ship. 

When the crew noticed from down below they didn’t hesitate. A group of men filed up the stairs and raced towards her. With the language barrier, there was no coaxing her down, and before she could jump they aggressively yanked her from the railing. She landed on her feet and stumbled. One of the men grabbed her arm but she angrily twisted free, yelling at them to let her go. At that point I was up, and she ran over and clung to my side. The angry sailors shuffled over as I stood there shielding the frantic women. They shouted at her, and looked at me, searching for answers. I didn’t understand a word, but I got what they were saying. 

The woman’s name was Adrian. She was a school teacher back in the states and was doing the Mongol Rally with her uncle. Her restlessness had been growing. We all had cabin fever, but she had it bad. 

It had taken sixteen hours to cover the 200 miles between Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan. We left Baku early on a Saturday afternoon, and by Sunday morning the Turkmenbashi skyline broke the horizon. Then we dropped anchor. And sat there. Floating. Waiting. For three days. It would’ve been fine if we’d been moving the whole time, but with the Turkmen coast looming before us, and repeated false promises from the crew about heading into port, the waiting game began to test our sanity.

Ten Mongol Rally teams had squeezed their cars onto the boat along with the regular cargo. It was a boisterous group - six British teams, a German team, a Canadian team, and two American teams including us. Everyone brought their fair share of booze for the voyage, but the generous Germans came with enough beer for a party. There was a three-car team called the Desert Spoons who had joined forces with another gang called the B-Team. We’d met them for the first time in Romania at the all-night beach party on the Black Sea. They were a young bunch, most were still in university, but they were fun and interesting, and I was enjoying our budding friendship. On the roof deck sat an inflatable kiddie pool, and not long after setting sail the beers were floating around in the warm water amongst a dozen pairs of feet and some stirred up sediment. It seemed oddly fitting for a grim and dingy cargo ship. The sunset that evening was spectacular, and everyone was in good spirits as we cruised into the night.

I didn’t have a bed. The few available bunks were snatched up first come first serve, and those left without had to fend for themselves. There was a common area just off the corridor where the bunks were. It had a few windows, but was dimly lit. The ceiling was a few inches above my head, and the walls were lined with grimy chairs that were all connected - probably pulled from an old passenger boat. People lounged about, read, played cards, and smoked cigarettes. At night they hung out and drank. The space became cluttered and filthy. People slept there, on the chairs, or strewn out across the floor on sleeping matts. Not me. I knew I wouldn’t sleep a wink in that dungeon. So I found a spot up on the roof deck.

Luckily, white noise knocks me out. At home I have a fan going in my bedroom year round. And on airplanes I rarely make it to liftoff before I’m drooling on my neighbor’s shoulder. But the cargo ship was the ultimate sedative. Although I had nothing soft to sleep on, the hum of the engine, the warm sea breeze, and the sound of the ocean had me sprawled out on the deck in a slumbrous coma. And I barely woke up the next morning. Maybe I had a slight hangover, but the entire first day I was nothing but a lethargic zombie, stumbling around the ship and collapsing into spontaneous naps. I needed the rest, but the day-long sleeping binge threw me off. My mind was blank. I had a book to read but couldn’t seem to follow the words. 

Once we anchored off the coast of Turkmenistan, the waiting game stretched the clock and time seemed to creep along. After weeks of being stuffed in a tiny car, tumbling through an ever-changing landscape, I was suddenly stuck on a hulking vessel, staring out over a vast and static panorama. When I became tired of looking out to sea, I would turn and fixate on the ship, the machine that was holding me captive. The texture, the gears and metal, the layers of chipped and pealing paint. It was cold and lifeless. I was detached from the world. Stuck between two places. The ship slowly pivoted around the anchor, the rugged coast shifting back and forth from one side of the bow to the other.   

Every few hours news would trickle down from the crew that we’d have to wait a little longer before heading into port. A few more hours. Later today. Tomorrow morning. There were a handful of other cargo ships in line. The port can only handle two boats at a time. Sporadic wind and rain with choppy seas was another excuse.

We had only brought enough food for a few meals, so after a couple days the crew started to feed us. Two meals a day - stale bread and the same potato and onion soup, more watered down with every serving. One day we had pasta. There was no sauce so we put ketchup on it. At night we’d convince the crew to sell us vodka. They’d claim it was their last bottle, but the next night they’d have another, and charge us more.

On the last morning I woke up to a glassy sea and clear skies, and a few hours after Adrian was pulled down from the railing, the anchor was lifted and we made our way into port. It was dusk by the time we set foot in Turkmenistan, and after five long and puzzling hours in customs, we entered one of the most mysterious countries in the world. 

AZERBAIJAN

Our one-night stay in Tbilisi was a complete tease. I could tell on the way out the next morning that we’d missed out on a splendid city. But ‘tis the nature of the Mongol Rally. Adios, Georgia! Onward ho! 

It was around sixty kilometers from Tbilisi to the border, and after leaving the city we cruised into a barren landscape. Henry and Brad were still following us, and we convoyed east through the desert towards Azerbaijan. The border was backed up, and the bottleneck brought together a caravan of around ten rally cars. 

I took over driving from Johannes once we crossed the border, and soon after that I was pulled over by the cops. It was a lonely stretch of road, and off to the side stood a big police station. At that point in the rally there had been cars driving through Azerbaijan for at least a week, and rumor had it that the police were notorious for their rally car shakedowns. Sure enough, as soon as they saw our car cruising along with a big Mongol Rally sticker across the hood, they waved us down. We were towards the front of a staggered convoy, and watched as they plucked our fellow ralliers from the flow of traffic. 

My approach to interacting with authorities in foreign lands has always been to do so with a smile. Body language is everything. The only thing we understood from the cop was that he wanted 800 Euros. That’s over a thousand bucks. No need to fuss! I kindly smiled, shook my head, and acted confused and oblivious to the gratuitous demand. I was unyielding, yet cheerful. A few other policemen filed out of the station as the line of rally cars grew, and with a number of guiltless drivers to choose from, they eventually let us go. It pays to be nice. How’re you supposed to feel good about swindling someone if they’re jolly and dumb? Being confrontational in situations like that won’t get you anywhere. We heard later that there was an ATM inside the police station, and that a few unfortunate teams were coerced into withdrawing hefty fines.

We drove towards the evening through a bleak and lifeless landscape. The sporadic villages we passed through were dismal - tiny grids of simple brown-concrete structures, dimly lit and seemingly deserted. Traffic was heavy at times, and full of menacing trucks that kicked up dust as they barreled through the desert. For a while we joined a small convoy of rally cars, but eventually broke free from the pack. At some point we lost Henry and Brad, but knew we’d bump into them down the road. Everyone who was in Azerbaijan for the Mongol Rally was heading to Baku to board a cargo ship across the Caspian Sea to Turkmenistan. We’d heard the boat schedule was inconsistent, and before boarding we needed to acquire our Turkmen visas. The embassy was only open on Friday and Monday mornings, and it was a Thursday evening, so our hope was to get the visas taken care of the following day so we could jump the next ship to Turkmenistan. We thought we'd find a place to camp outside the city and get an early start in the morning, but I was in the zone, and before we knew it we were cruising into the capital.

Baku glowed. It was a complete contrast from the drab terrain we’d been driving through all day. We breached the city limits around 10:30 and entered an oasis of oil money opulence. The streets wound along the bay past immaculate buildings with brightly lit facades. Three modern skyscrapers called the Flame Towers illuminated the skyline, with LED light shows that wrapped the exteriors and dazzled the night sky with dancing flames. After the monotony of desert driving, Baku was a sensory overload.

We found a small pub with wifi and looked for hostels over beers. We didn’t have a guidebook, but once we got online it was apparent that Baku was not a popular destination for budget travelers. There were only a few cheap hostels, but we managed to nab a few bunks at a place within walking distance. A resurgence in the petroleum industry has added a modern and lavish layer to the capital, but at the heart of Baku, surrounded by towering walls, is the old-city. Our hostel was inside, and once we passed through the gates we quickly lost our way in a maze of narrow alleys and winding streets. We were tired, but it was a beautiful place to be lost, and eventually we found someone to show us the way.

I always imagine foreign embassies to occupy stately buildings, perhaps located along a wide, tree-lined boulevard. The Turkmen embassy was situated in a dusty alleyway off a smoggy road in the further reaches of Baku. It would have been easy to miss had it not been for the growing crowd of Mongol Rally teams waiting outside the gate. Henry and Brad were there; we knew we’d see them again. They’d joined another convoy and had attempted to camp outside of Baku but had been roused by local authorities and chased away in the middle of the night. They were with a large group of young brits, many of whom we’d already met a long the way. I could tell we’d be boarding the cargo ship with a fun and lively bunch. 

Acquiring a Turkmen visa required a letter of invitation, which we took care of before we left home. Brad and Henry didn’t have one and were denied their visas. They would still board a cargo ship, but instead would head north to Kazakhstan. Once we got our visas, we took off to find the port of departure. There was a massive eight-lane street that ran along the bay, and just past a Bentley dealership was a dirt road that took us to the docks. A small assembly of Mongol Rally teams had already started to form, and word had it that the boat wasn’t leaving until the next day.

With some time to kill in Baku, we set out with Brad and Henry to explore. Our stroll revolved around beer and local cuisine. And then vodka and more local cuisine. From park-side cafes, to underground beer halls, to late-night hookah bars, we saw as much as we could. It was a fun day, and it was well after dark by the time we stumbled back to the shipyard to call it a night. 

The next morning we woke up early and stocked up on groceries for the boat. We said farewell to Brad and Henry. It had been almost a week since we’d met them in Batumi, and we had enjoyed their company along the way. We were about to set off on different paths, and it was the last time we’d see them.

People were anxious to set sail, but getting ten cars through customs and loaded onto the ship took a while. It was early afternoon by the time we made it on board, and a couple hours after that when we finally pushed off and set out into the Caspian Sea. The city of Turkmenbashi was less than 200 miles east, and we were expecting to reach our fourteenth country the following day, but little did we know...