Travelers never think that they are the foreigners. 

Russia:   As we leave Russia after 22 days, 7500 miles behind us and passed 11 time zones-we crossed Siberia, climbed and descended Urals and Caucasus mountains, sailed on Black Sea, saw 49 Lenin statues, stayed in 16 different hotels-dumps and hotel California, which could be heaven or hell, -were stopped 49 times by police check point, were bribed once. We saw Russian bureaucracy in full action in Vladivostok and most of all we met most amazing people who invited us in to their homes for vodka and horse meat.    Russia is a largest country-almost 17 plus million sq. kilometers.  Population: 143.4 million. Per capita consumption of alcohol: 15.1L per year. Number of Nobel Prize winners: 20.  

Here are our observations: We are proud of our accomplishment of being able to drive across this very large country from most eastern point to most western and trust me we felt it every day. Even local Russian told us that they won’t even try to do what we did. There were few days when we thought we may not be able to make it. We were so occupied getting through these roads that we hardly thought about our own safety. We drove through snow storm in middle of the May, where roads are covered with snow 2’ deep. Drive with your fingers crossed hoping that the car is still on road, as there no snow clear service available in this part of the world. All you see is pure white desert with tree branches touching the ground with weight of snow. We sat in snow with -15 degree for 3 hours due to non drivable conditions.Used road side and woods for daily output of bodily nectar and waste, as toilets are – well cannot describe in words. 

Russia is divided in two regions: East and West. We feel that East has not been touched since tsarist days. The population is very sparse, few hamlets distances away. I guess that's why it has not been developed as West. In west one can see the wealth is flowing. Russia is trying to make up for the lost time and rushing to full blown capitalism. It seems that they want to forget about the past, while in East it does not matter what system they have it in Moscow. The infrastructure, houses, people and even police are different. People from west tend not to cross Urals to visit east. We met few people and see their expressions-what's wrong with you, why would you do think like that- when we told them that we drove from east.They all always without failure would ask how we did we deal with militias (police). People still have old dogma about police and are still afraid of them. The KGB might be history, but ordinary Russians now look over their shoulder and rear view mirror of their newly imported cars for police. Locals still think they live in time of Stalin when it comes to police.

Even cars in west are different than east - more European than Japanese. But people across this massive nation are the same if you avoid the big cities. Great people, ready to help. City people tend to be more westernized than western people. They all well dressed, sometime over dressed, wearing high heels on dirt and dirty walks. Pants are so tight that one can read the credit card number from back pockets. I never knew so many European and American brands till I came here. They love their cars. The influx of foreign cars has only been around for the last 17 years and they don’t seem to get enough.

We will never forget those young samurais, who drive their new Japanese cars on eastern Siberian torturous roads for 5 days, while sleeping in car, carrying nothing but a single pair of clothing, bottle of vodka and 5 spare tires.  

Most wealth is concentrated in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Old Stalinist factories outside every town still puking out acidic black smoke, and are still in operation and support local communities. Ami hates these tall smoking chimneys-eye sores.  We think lightly that bad roads all over Russia may be a political strategy of Moscow controlling the imports by not giving them decent roads. Bigger cities we drove through are full of potholes. Life of cars must be 3-4 years. Work in progress on roads is slow or almost not existent. Road work ahead signs must be there for so long that they got rusted and rooted in grounds.

But overall Russians are proud of their nation and will support Putin to take them to next level if not into other planet. We must not forget that this nation was the first one to put a man in space. Now the cold war is over and not spending half of their GDP in arms warfare they could use this money for infrastructures.   Some people we talked are happy to have Russia as its own nation while others feel sad loosing the USSR. Our Syrian doctor friend loved old USSR. Everybody can travel along this vast area of earth in these old USSR countries. Now they need visa.  One Armenian couple  we met in ferry to Turkey who was travelling to Armenia by going to Turkey, than cross in Georgia to go to Armenia, which is only 100KM from Russian border which is close. He couldn't travel through Chechen and Dagestan area due to terrorism with the Caucasian people. You think British screwed up the world boundaries, check out the old USSR and Eastern Europe map. There are still new countries in waiting to be born such as Kosovo. 

Tourism: has been ignored. Most touris we see are from former USSR countries. Hotels seem to cater to local businessmen who are in plenty now.  We see things differently here, but for local people these hotels must be Hyatt or Marriot. We never got the welcomes in hotels as tourist. Immediately on our approach we get "Nyet" no rooms available. They couldn't care a less if we stay there or not. Second issue: Visa and its registration process. This old Visa registration system for foreigners is dysfunctional and we have not figured out what purpose it serves. It is highly important that one does not lose the immigration card-small piece of crappy paper. Losing it can create a huge problem and opportunity for huge bribe.  It creates a constant anxiety and stress. One has to find a hotel or OVIR office to register the visa if you stay more than 72 hours in same city. Most cities do not have OVIR office. There are no tourist offices in tourist spot such as Irkutsk - home of largest fresh water lake in the world. Hotel with registration facilities charge large amount of money for a night due to this service. We figured it out in end why these babushkas-old ladies sitting behind desk- in small hotels didn't care for us. Well they have to go through process by photocopying our passports and visa pages, make an entry in the log book and give us a receipt. Too much paper works for $100 a night room (insert sarcasm here).

We learned that Putin is trying to build a monument in Yekaterinburg where Asia and Europe plates are meeting. Well it will be nice if he fixes the roads first so people can see this monument.  

Economy seems to be good in west part of Russia. Petro dollars appear to be bringing lots of wealth in state. People have money o spend and supplies available in shops unlike what we saw on TV in 90s. They all seem to be able to afford high prices hotels and restaurants, designer clothes. Western brand stores are all over. Despite the bad roads, there are many cars on roads. Putin gets lots of credit for this well being.  People seem to ignore his desire for staying in power forever.   Overall we both liked Russia and her people. It's an interesting place, full of contrast. We never felt unsecure at any time.  

As they say in Russia, Da sva da nia (Good Bye)    

Best Regards    arun and ami  

Greetings,

I can't think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything.  - Bill Bryson

Volgograd:

Stalingrad as it was known during WWII, but as Stalin fell from grace it was renamed back to its original name.

We drove through Saratov . a medium size town between Volgograd -our next destination. Our first glimpse of Volga river. Awesome, huge river. It was so hot that people were out in their swim suits sun bathing everywhere. Feels like Europe.

Now we drive on bank of the Volgo river all the way to Volgograd. Police checks increased 10 folds. Every where, almost every 50 kms. Our first stop after that bad experience in Samara. Young police officer pulled me over and showed me his radar gun that I was clocking 90km in 70km zone. He was right. I walked to his car to talk to the officer seating in car. I explained my situation and showed him flyer of the trip and they seem to be nice and after few questions let me go. I offered him a packet of American cigarette as I saw bunch of packs in car. Wow.. it worked. The way this check points are: there is one or two cops on road with magic wands. There are other one or two seating in car. The one on road stops you and you take your papers and seat in car and negotiate. Now from here we get all bad cops. Second check point. They took me inside office where there was a computer with camera where I can see the cars coming in and they zoom on number plates. One cop asked other cop to show me my car picture on the screen. So he pulled the Suzuki coming in. I said myself so what. I was doing only 10km as the check point coming. Then they started making hand gestures that I crossed the white line and I almost screamed at them "nyet" I drove "priamo" straight. I just kept saying nyet..nyet and then I told them that I have been driving from Vladivostok and I know the drill. This calms them down. I told them I am calling American consulate and immediately they gave me my papers back and wave me to leave.. Ha .ha.. I got my confidence back and I am going to fight this. Next stop.. I asked Ami to come with me. I went on one side of the car and Ami stood on other side. Cop inside the car started making hand gesture that I illegally passed the car. He couldn't have seen that. He asked Ami to go back to car and Ami said nyet. Cop was nervous. He argued few times and I stuck to my argument as he didn't have any proof. He said he will keep my license as a last desperate effort to extract the money. I said keep it and I will call American consulate to get other one. I just sat there relaxed and finally he gave up and we drove off. I and Ami high fived and stick to this strategy. We both go out. This is first in Russia as we never saw in woman driver on these roads or they come out. It's always a man. Poor guys go the office and car and get extorted. Me and ami call this white line as "Extortion line". As we met few Russian drivers later on and they all get in to this trap. Poor folks don't know any better. They see their car in computer screen and they feel like they have done something wrong . One guy we met paid 15000 rubles. Dr. Manton Heres - our new friend - from St. Petersburg  paid $400. Wow .aren't we lucky.

Next few stops we get out in gang with "nyet" word and look straight at them. Well we made it to Volgograd without any fine. Roads were good and that explains why there are so many cops out there. I and Ami started looking for cameras now to find out from how far they can capture your car. After one or two more check points we found them . They were no high tech cameras. Just simple cameras stuck only few yards from check point on light pole. Well this is silly, as everybody comes to dead stop at check point anyway.

We arrived in Volgograd late afternoon. We could have done better but frequent police check points and cops on road stops took much time and detours "Embrace the detours".

Our plan was to see a world war II memorial and get out of the town to roadside motel. Well as it always happens, everything you want to see is always on other side of the town. We ended up driving across Volgograd. This town was rebuilt after German leveled it in WWII. Hitler's strategy was to cut supply chain to Moscow than take Moscow. River Volga is lifeline and most supply came through this town. Stalin made a treaty with Hitler to share the world, but Hitler was his own man. He surprised Stalin and Stalin made a huge mistake ignoring his generals about Hitler massing his troops in south. Finally Hitler took Volgograd and Stalin in desperate attempt to defend his country sent Marshal Zhukov, a brilliant general who came down on Hitler with 2 million red army soldieries. His strategy is not to defeat Hitler but wear him down till winter. It worked and as this battle took so long - fighting in streets, house to house - Germans were wearing out and then Russian winter sat in. Zhukov circled the German army in west and cut their supply. Almost 750,000 Germans and 2 million plus Russian -nobody knows for sure- died in this battle and it's famously called Battle of Stalingrad. We read that there is a mound where most killing happened. It's called mammy mound.  Asking petrol station attendant who directed us "priamo (straight)" across town.  As we were driving we saw this huge Mother Russia statue from distance and we aimed our car to that direction. Russian built this humongous statue of mother Russia. This is huge .. I mean huge. Windswept Lady with sward pointing to sky and mouth wide open as she screams to her army to fight. Famine body but very masculine face. Strange but extremely impressive.

This complex is huge. They have taken their time to build this. It's surrounded by water fountains and huge pools . One can have a great view of Volgograd. Both walls on side of the long stairs are carved with war scenes and huge statues of solders in different fighting poses. There another huge statue of weeping mother with her dead soldier son in her lap. Ironically Ami spotted a white dove sitting right on her head (see picture) First we thought it is part of the statue then it flew away.

The memorial itself is round hall with constant burning torch in arm coming out form ground. The walls are filled with huge banners with solders names . I don't think they are 2 million. There is constant war music playing in speakers with guns, grenades and machine guns noise. Ami thinks the memorial seemed to glorify the war. However it is a impressive site. I have seen few war memorials myself but this one takes number 1 spot. Good place to visit. By the way lots of mosquitoes. We got beaten again all over. At night we watched fireworks from this memorial as we checked in Moulin Rouge hotel. Casino and hotel. It was cheap in Russian standard, but still expensive at US standard. No window on room. We had to park car far away in secure parking.

Next morning we were heading south then west to Rostov-on-Don which is on black sea in Cyrillic spelled as POCTOB .here is little funny stuff: we translate these names in English so we can watch for signs, well we memorized so well that when we asked for directions we pronounce poctob and people say "what, who, where and get all confused. Then we pronounce it right way as Rostov-on-Don . This was funny and it happened few times to us. The drive was good. Few more pain in back, stressful and with some fear of unknown police check points. We entered outskirt of Rostov-on-don. We decided to take a ring road and avoid the town. Well we found the ring road and with all excitement of avoiding the town we entered in roundabout and got stuck in traffic. We thought everyone was bypassing this town. Well we sat there for full 3 hour and 11 minutes. I have never sat in traffic this long. It was hot, humid and painful. As we turn off the car to save the fuel and overheating. After crawling at 1 MPH for 5 miles we ended up on bridge. It turned out to be there were three lanes of traffic - in Russia 5 lanes as other two lanes driving on side walk and dirt merging in to one. On top of this there were two more lanes merging from right ramp, on top of there was this stupid police check point where people came to dead stop. I can never imagine people putting up with this kind of nonsense. Russian people take number 1 spot being the most patience people.

Eventually we got on road and headed toward Sochi. It was late evening so we decided to stay roadside motel. We spotted a nice one very next to police Check point. We inquired about the price and there was not  a single customer in there. Even the reception desk did not have anything , no chair or anything. Finally babushka showed up and the price was 3500 rubles almost $140. We declined and started back on road again. Well our road was right across the police check point which we avoided successfully. But we had to make a U turn to go back on our route. Well I forced poor Ami to make a U turn as the road was very quiet. Well it was not very smart. The police immediately looking for an opportunity whistled and stopped us. We knew we were in trouble this time, as this happened right in-front of them, let alone them making it up. We were called in this Rod Stiger in "Heat of the night" look like cop. Started asking bunch of questions and asked for our passports which I still don't understand why a traffic police will need our passports. He looked at Ami and started saying BIG PROBLEM. He showed is on his desk the hand written map and where we made a U turn. Well we know this as it happened right there. I told the chief that no harm was done and we were tired and looking for a motel. He just kept saying big problem.. big problem. I sent ami to get her passport from the car while I went for this chief. I told him that we have been driving in Russia for 20 days now all the way from Vladivostok and have been good drive all along. Then finally I said I should really call my US consulate and ask for their help as I reached for the phone he shoved back the papers and ask me to get out. I thanked him in Russian and he was furious as he couldn't get anything out of me. I rushed back to car and as ami was coming I told her to get back in car and drove off. Ami kept asking what happened in there. I explained and down the road we ended up in our first Russian bed and breakfast - well no breakfast, just the bed in this small house out of the very small hamlet in farm. I still remember that police chief face and I and Ami still laugh at his "Big Problem" stuff.

After few more police check points and mountainous scenic drive we made it to Sochi.

Greetings ,

All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost.
J. R. R. Tolkien

Sochi:

Well we got lost. I would add to Mr. Tolkien quote that all those who are lost may not be all wonderers. 

Sochi is a big resort area stretching for 145 km along the Black Sea coast, in the shadow of the Caucasus Mountains. It was a great drive through Caucasus Mountains. I had a wished before to visit this area and now we are driving through it. There is a story In Greek mythology- the Caucasus was one of the pillars supporting the world. Prometheus was chained there for life whose body parts will be eaten by vultures by Zeus after Prometheus had presented man with the gift of fire, which was stolen from Zeus but Hercules released him after 30 years.
A German anthropologist discovered that the people leaving in this area were healthiest and with good masculine body. Thus he gave these people name "Caucasian" even though they were not all white. Now you know how the term Caucasian came about.

It's small busy city and due to weekends it was full. Everybody seemed to enjoy full hot day at black sea. All one way systems, let alone no signs and few available are in Cyrillic. Finally found the hotel. Hotel Moscow: Huge tall building but a drag. Old, torn carpets. Old ancient elevator ready to plummet you to bottom of the earth . lobby with torn couches and a bar. So when they say they have renovated the hotel , take it from me it's only lobby. As we were parking our car in front. We attracted few tourists who started taking our pictures and bombarded us with questions.  We were rock starts for 30-40 minutes or so. Well the harbor was close by and we needed to catch a ferry to turkey next morning and we were not in mood of driving in this city. We found the harbor and ticket office. The ferry was schedule to leave next day around 4PM but they cannot guarantee that ferry will leave on time or not at all. If the ferry does not get enough passengers then it waits till next day for more passengers and I didn't fancy to stay one more night in that expensive rat hole. We were also advised that we should bring our car at 2PM to custom for clearance. We had a good walk on black sea cost that evening where there are nice restaurants, bars and gift shops. We met again hare Krishna group here, chanting and dancing. If they keep showing up like this I may just joined them. We watched football, Russia annihilating Greece that night in very noisy bar but with full of fun.. We met up with a young gentleman from Serbia -Nicoli, who is n engineer working in Russia and building new hotels for upcoming winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014--advised us that we should avoid Bulgaria and go through Greece as Bulgaria has bad roads and boring drive. We liked the idea even though it will create a longer drive. The road is on Aegean Sea coast and the drive is very scenic. We watched the football and drank good amount of local beer for rest of the evening.

Next day sharp 9am we drove to custom --with no signs or direction, we just parked in front of the gate obstructing the gate, this brought the custom guy out of his office so we asked him where we should take the car.  Here in parking lot we met a Syrian doctor studied in Russia and practicing in St. Petersburg  with his family. They drove from St. Petersburg to Sochi and got caught by police check point--fine $400 wow we consider our self lucky. We also met another Russian guy driving BMW -- fine 5000 rubles. Our Syrian friend was going to Tarbzon, Turkey -eastern port of Turkey-than drive to Syria. We will cross Turkey from east to west while he will go south at half way point, town called Samsun.  He spoke little English enough to understand me and helped me with custom. We filled out more forms. Went through passport and the lady took almost 20 minutes to check our passports. Custom guy was good. He asked us to bring everything out of car and put through the scanner. I dreaded opening up my roof bag and get all the camping gears and other stuff. I purposely left that on roof hoping that they may not notice. We dragged all our bags to scanner and cleared the custom, finally, one of the guy noticed the roof bag and asked to see and I told him that it's hard to open as zipper was very hard. He was Ok with that and we got away with that. The ship departed at 7PM and our room had two bunk beds. It was hot and humid and there is no fan or AC. We spent most time in bar with our Syrian friend and drank some Turkish beer and watch the sunset on dipping in Black sea. somehow I was relaxed. Found a cafeteria in base ment, Curried potato and bread. it was good or we were hungry. Took a shower and jumped in bed sweating whole night.

Regards

arun

In my previous journal I forgot to mention about Gulag.

As we crossed Siberia, I cannot help but remembering Gulag. Gulag means Main Camp Administration. Simply put concentration camps but also the system of Soviet slave labor itself, in all forms and varieties: labor camps, punishment camps, criminal and political camps, women's camps, children camps. Even more broadly 'Gulag' has come to mean the Soviet repressive system itself, the set of procedures that prisoners called the 'meat-grinder'. Which started in 1918. Lenin, the revolution's leader, locked up a string of aristocrats, merchants, and other people defined as political enemies. The camps were in every town and they spread mostly in Siberia. When Stalin took over from Lenin there were almost 27 million people passed through these camps. Only as recently as Gorbachev finally dismantled these camps. It is also said that more people died in these camps than Nazi's atrocities. But this was never publicized as during second world war west needed Stalin - an evil genius- to defeat other evil -Hitler. It was also not publicized due to communist sympathizers in west. Recently as 2002 articles started appearing about Gulag. There are more than enough movies and documentaries about Nazi's concentration camps and atrocities but nothing about Gulag. It is also said that Stalin killed more people than Hitler and Sadam Hussein combined. By race, by ethnicity, by political agendas, and any others who did not agree with his agenda. Soviet propaganda promoted greatly the picture of Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt all smiling as if they are all chums. Prisoners in camps attributed 3^rd of Soviet's economy power as they worked by hand on roads, railways,, mines and anything else. Stalin thought this is the only way USSR can be industrialized and expand economy power.

I encourage you to read 'Gulag' by Anne Applebaum. In fact the areas we passed during our drives from Vladivostok to Chita - the drive from hell- most villages were established by these people who were lucky enough to finish their time and decided to stay.

Chelyabinsk:

Our journey to Chelyabinsk:  We took small road as the M road ended up in Kazakhstan. This is the second time we took the road which was not on map. But we had to circle the border and go west. We travelled north first then west and south to catch the M road again in west. The smaller road was terrible. We thought we passed the bad part of the journey, not so fast. In Russia one can never take anything for granted.

That afternoon we encountered a section of very bad unpaved road which was very muddy and potholed, with standing water in the holes. Extremely slippery type of mud so it was difficult to drive. Unfortunately it had started to rain again. we are nearing Chelyabinsk, which is just on the east side of the Ural mountain range that officially separates Europe from Asia, here Asia being Siberia. After consulting the map, we decided to go to Chelyabinsk to the north, since it is a large city (over one million population) and we've had our fill of floundering around in cities and getting lost. We needed a service for our car as the engine light is showing up we needed the internet.

The drive here was extremely hard. Few times we were really scared as the ground clearance on our car is only 7" and ditches made by big Kamaz trucks were deeper. Few times the car was spinning as we hit the bottom of the car. Ami was driving and she did a brilliant job to put wheel on right part of the hill of the dirt. We were sitting in car very close to windshield with our lungs in throat and hearts in fist. I look back and not sure how we made it. We saw few cars stuck in there. Even large trucks had tough time. I am not sure how Russian people put up with this. They are extremely patience people. It was getting dark and we thought we may not make it this time.

It took us whole day to arrive to Chelyabinsk.  Scenery was great though. We passed some starches so long that there was nothing for miles and miles. Just steppe similar in Kazakhstan. It was kind of worrisome but beautiful. We were concerned about petrol. Ami drove brilliantly and intended to pass Chelyabinsk to avoid getting in town and getting out in the morning. This has taken lots of time. So we thought we should crash in cheap road side bunker hotels. But as we neared the town we decided to go in have a good sleep ,catch up with internet and look for car mechanic to check our car as it was showing the check engine light.

 Chelyabinsk is Industrial town was established to produce tanks and missile launcher to stop German army. Today it is still an industrial town. Ami navigated with good skill and we found our hotel. Tall large soviet era hold over building, but a good hotel. First time we came across two young girls behind the reception desk. We were taken by their smiles and decided to stay there despite of high price.  I handed over one of our "round the world drive" broacher which she took some interest in. We walked in town square which was nice to look for a restaurant. We ended up in pub and had a dinner.  We liked the town, reminded me Mill Ave. walk in Tempe.

Next morning we found a Suzuki service shop and girl at front desk gave us direction. We still got lost. It is hard when you cannot see or read road sign. We struggled asked few people. They all wanted to help but couldn't explain. Finally we were just about to give up and saw a banner sign with Suzuki . we followed that and ended up in Renault car dealer. Than I saw bunch of new Suzuki cars in a lot. We stopped and asked and yes, it was Suzuki and Renault all in one. Well after one and half hour circling half a mile area the manager said they were full for a day and couldn't take us in till next day. After few pleadings and telling them what we doing. They suggested that we go to next town - Yekaterinburg- well that happens to be our plan anyway. This town is in North and it is off our route, but being both of us history buffs  we wanted to visit this town to see Death site of Romanovs and Church of Blood and also crossing Ural mountain which separates Russia in Asia and Europe. Being in Asia for so long thought of being in Europe excited us as well. It was 250KM north. Manager called the Renault/suzuki service shop in Yekaterinburg, but unfortunately his friend did not work today. As it was a bigger dealership we had a chance. So we drove to Yekaterinburg. It was a good drive apart from frequent police check point.

We noticed that as we go further west there are more police check points. Manager told us that we will have a hard time to find this place as it is on other side of the town.  Well he was not joking. We have never seen 3 most complicated design round -abouts ever. We just couldn't figure out. We took care of first one but than got lost in other two. It happens to be all three together.  Russia, what can we say. It has lot for us in it's bag. Asking direction was not helping as they just could not explain us how to go about. After few circles, horns, some cussing form other drivers we found the road. We will always remember these round -abouts. We made sure that we create this track in our GPS so we can go back to Chelyabinsk. It was sure way out of the way, but we found it thanks to Ami's skill again. Here first time we saw Famous Golden Arch -Big M, McDonald. We promised to come back for lunch. Well there is aguy named Alexi was waiting for us at the Suzuki. He was in his motorbike leather gear. He specially came for us and immediately put our car on service bay. Alexi left after making sure that car was in computer and being serviced. They told us it will cost around 10000 rubles and two hours and they don't take credit cards. We walked around, got some money from ATM and came back and I slept on couch. Less than two hours our car was done. He told us it was due to bad fuel in Russia. Apparently as we did not have enough trouble with roads. Some fuel stations in Russia mix the petrol octane 92 to 80. You can never be sure. The total bill came up to 6600 rubles. The light is gone, car was washed and we were happy. We started back to Yekaterinburg.

Yekaterinburg:

From the execution of tsar Nicholas II and his family in 1918 to the high profile mafia killings in the 1990s, this town is notorious for it's bloody history. It's a beautiful city on river and with grand statues and here we have one more Lenin statue. The economy must be good as we see more European cars than Japanese. I am also happy to announce that we now see Ford and Chevys too. There are still few ugly looking ladas on road. Hummers are also on road. Russians are coming. Just 20 years ago this was impossible. The city was closed to foreigners until 1990 because of it's many defense plants. I asked young lady if the tourism is booming and why the hotels are so expensive- $250 a night in motel 6 room alike. She said the hotels are for local businessmen and not much for tourist. No wonder they give us a strange look when we asked for room. Ami took a picture of Lenin and right behind him there is a huge Samsung advert. Lenin must be turning in his grave as finally Capitalism has taken over his country and there is a new revolution happening. Mr. Putin is highly popular in Russia. People just love him and think he is the best thing happened to Russia.

This time we found a self catering apartment with washing machine. This was our main feature to rent this room as we long needed laundry. It was a great value. We found a Uzbek restaurant nearby and food was excellent.

Next morning we visited our two sites. The death site is now small wooden church where Nicholas II and his family have been revered as saint. I and Ami don't agree with that as Tsar did not do anything to be saint. Vertical city and Russian orthodox church agree with us. But locals have very large statue of nickel metal of whole family including 5 children with huge cross outside church.

What happened to the Romanovs: in 1918, Tsar Nicholas II, his wife and 5 children were murdered in the basement of a local merchant's house by Bolshevik guards. During the soviet period, the building housed a local museum of atheism, but it was demolished by then governor Boris Yeltsin - who was born here and raised in power to be chief of communist party. The house now demolished and there is small wooden church with small gift shop and prayer room. We entered the church and there was prayer going on. We could recognize the word Nicolai few times. So now the tsar is being prayed as a saint. We all heard story of Anesthesia. Well in movie Anesthesia escapes with her younger brother Alexi. But the story goes all five children were murder and bodies were dumped in abandoned mine. With acid poured on them to burn. The two bodies took too long to burn so they tossed several grenades in mine and to destroy the mine with bodies. It is an irony that there is a statue of Lenin across this church; whose people murdered this family.

In 1976 group of local scientists discovered remains of Romanovs and now buried in St. Petersburg's Peter & Paul cathedral, alongside their predecessors Peter the Great. Ami asks me how Russia would be today if Tsar still lived and Bolshevik revolution did not happen.

Church of Blood: The massive Byzantine -style church with golden dome is very impressive. Inside there was still some work going on. This church is built for St. Nicholas II and his family. So far we have seen more onion domed churches in this town. Ami covered her head with hood as this is Russian orthodox church. A book store displaying lots of literature about Nicholas II and his family -nothing in English - and gift shops. A small museum displaying Tsar's family and his old photographs. Anesthesia didn't look anything we see in movie. We both enjoyed these two places.

We now drive to back south to Chelyabinsk and back to our route to west.

Irkutsk:

 We were nearing Irkutsk after long drive in mountains. We came across some amazing view of the forest. The clouds were so low that they were hanging in valley underneath us. First time I have seen clouds from top except from plane. The trees and some taller buildings sticking out of the clouds and made the whole scene out of some mythological movie set. Our first view of the largest lake in the world was somehow confusing. We thought the blue sky was too low. The sky was hanging on lake. We couldn't figure out the size of the lake as visibility was low. But it look full of void. In size enormous and color blue.  We circled the lake for an hour to arrive the city. It was scenic drive.

we arrive in Irkutsk, a city of about 650,000 population some distance north of Lake Baikal, and the main road is soon lost in a maze of streets, with no road signs that we can read. Using the GPS compass we head in the general direction of the road leading south-east of the city toward the Lake. It's a beautiful city and we found our hotel with Ami's brilliant navigation skill. Unfortunately we got "Nyet" as an answer. No rooms. Now we start looking for another hotel. Finally we arrived at large hotel named hotel Irkutsk. Very modern with café and restaurant. We got Nyet again but this time I was determined to get a room. It was so large about 15 stories with at least 500 plus rooms. There is no way it can be full. I latterly pleaded to this woman who happens to be some kind of manager. She kept giving us different hotel address. Finally she gave in and asked us for the passports. We got the room -expensive. We took a walk in town square, found a book store and bought Russian Atlas as we don't have Russian map. We ended up in beautiful Italian restaurant and had our first Pizza. Pizza here were different thin and made out of puff pastry , tested pretty good and not filling so we ate two of those. As usual no internet in hotel.

Next day we drive to Novosibirsk-the largest town in Siberia. We found our way out of town and hit our nightmare roads to hell. So I put Chris Rhea Road to Hell CD. Here is small description of the road: Imagine someone dropped the bomb, created crater with original tarmac -already bad - inverted inside and all the dirt and rocks re-incarneted itself and created mounds on road. I mean hard and soft mounds at least 3-4 feet high -yes, no kidding here. Ami navigated brilliantly. We put one side of the car wheel on mound and second on ground.  Thus avoiding huge ditches which may hit the bottom of the car. Car was angled at 30 degree. Even on big trucks we couldn't see the rear wheels as they dipped so deep in ditches. We thought we have seen it all. No Russia has few surprises for us. This is first time we were scared that we may not make it. It was getting dark and raining and that did not help. We drove for about n hour on this road and then finally road improved and we pulled in café. There was old brick building behind it and I inquired ans surely that was a hotel. This hotel is old soviet era building. 1500 rubles. Smelly, no hot water, no seat on toilet with black water. Dirty, but had a two small beds. We slept and got bitten all over with bed bugs.

Early morning we were back on road and it was better after few patches of broken asphalt. We were closing on Kazakhstan border, only 5KM away. As we are not going to cross in Kazakhstan, we stopped at café for dinner and look for a hotel. In parking there was a car full of three beautiful ladies and one mussel guy drinking beer from big bottles. As they saw us , one girls said hello and I immediately jumped on opportunity to speak English. They all came out little tipsy but good behavior. We clicked immediately and bigger lady kept saying America .. America with her thumb up. OK this is a good start. They all came out , extremely friendly as we knew them for long time. We chatted, laughed and asked them if the food was good in café and direct us to the hotel. They all joined with us, took our pictures, car pictures. They were Marinar, Natalie, Julia and Alexi. Alexi is a cop, married but none of these ladies were his wife. They were all born in this small hamlet and having fun. We went to café in gang with beer bottles and they started asking us what we like to eat. We asked for chicken, and somehow they decided there chicken may not be good or something so Natalie took us back to the car and jumped in our car and we followed them to other café. In woods, wooden log structure. Here they talked to the owner and gave us separate room with large table. The café was full with young people, eating, drinking and dancing.  We had a ball here. They will not let me drink as they knew I was driving even though Alexi was having his 12^th beer and he drove. They offered Ami a small glass of beer which Ami took some sips. First time she drank the beer and she kinda liked the local beer. We ate dinner and talked about Russia, America. Alexi would jump in and scream " we are Russian" with big laugh. I liked the guy. He has 3 month old son.Marinar kept saying she was a queen of Omsk, which is next town where they all worked. We were all like school buddies. Everybody in café joined in our fun. Then Julia's husband - Alexandrie came with his 7 year old and joined. He is Russian police equitant of our FBI. Finally we requested that we go to hotel and sleep. They escorted us to their small town and helped us to check in only hotel in town. Again Babushka was there. I am sure if we had come on our own we may have gotten "Nyet" but with the gang no problem there. The room was Spartan. No hot water or shower, but two small beds.

Alexi made sure that we park our car in local police station under guard. We dropped the car there and said our goodbyes and hugged. Alexi took some pictures. It was amusing to watch Alexi with big bottle of beer and asking police officer to let us park our car next to police Ladas.

Next morning I walked to police station and got the car and on road again.

Again, one  more of great example of nice people in the world. Political differences aside, normal people are just people. We have been lucky to encounter so many nice people out here.

Mongolia:

Stat: Population 2.45 million as of 2003

Literacy rate 98%

Horse to person ratio: 13 to 1

Average life expectancy 64

Mongolia occupies a special place in the minds of many dreamers. The vast landscapes, nomadic horseman and the legends of the Mongol horde have enticed wayfarers here for the past 800 years.

Soon after famed dinosaur hunter Roy Chapman Andrews visited in the 1920s, Mongolia's doors were all but slammed shut for most of the 20^th century. But the fall of communism, an aggressive campaigned to put Mongolia back on map with other countries. Only US and Taiwan opposed entry of Mongolia in UN.

Road to Ulan-Bat tar, Mongolia was good and although there was lots of patching in some areas it seemed like a superhighway after the last five days. It felt like we were flying across the earth's surface! The countryside in this area of Russia was, while not spectacularly scenic, very pretty and attractive. It reminded me of parts of Montana but without the high mountains of our American West. There were many valleys surrounded by low hills, the valleys being grassland with an abrupt transition to coniferous forest on the hillsides.

This area was part of the mighty Mongol empire for centuries, and many Asian faces are seen among the people here, including horsemen sometimes herding cattle. It is said that Genghis Khan's mother came from a large, beautiful valley north of Ulan Ude and east of Lake Baikal. One also begins to see many houses in these areas with brightly colored shutters, usually light blue in color but occasionally green or other colors, which I assume are an Asian influence. As we got closure to Mongolia border we encountered few army post and they all stopped us for routine check. They all seem to see our passports. No problem here but it's just nerve racking seeing them with huge machine guns and impressive look with uniform.

We got lost in border town, although it is pretty small town. But finally we entered the border with apprehension and fear of unknown. The major worry I had was Ami's Visa registration. The law in Russia is that once you enter Russia one has to register their visa within first 72 hours or you could be detained and fine heavily. I just did not want to give them an opportunity. I had my visa registered as I came to Russia earlier. When Ami came we got so busy with custom  issue, we totally forgot and the hotel we stayed in did not have visa registration. There were few cars ahead of us and I saw a small gap enough to squeeze my car. I snaked around and put myself in front of all the people waiting. Some gave me strange look and I acted as an ignorant tourist. The gate was closed and Russian Border woman was seating behind the gate on pavement. After 10 minutes she opens only one side gate just enough to squeeze Suzi by leaving 2-3" on each side. I waited few minutes but she kept waving me in. I don't know the reason but only one side of gate. Here we go, I said to myself. First window:  "passports please" -Passporte pazalatsa . Checked the visa and asked for machina (car) we were lead to another window, parked the car right there and entered in small brick office where there was a Mongolian looking lady -nice lady- I started conversation with her in English with few words of russian, she seemed to speak little but better than the other guy who was a custom officer. We filled out custom declaration forms 6 times. The other officer will not like if we cross something. Finally we got it right. He took my precious pink -Temporary importation permit issued in Vladivostok- I am going to miss that as I suffered for that in Vladivostok. I requested to him that I am coming back to Russia in 5 days and if I can keep that "Nyet" . Here is the amusing part. Anytime I asked him something he just stamp that custom form. He stamped that form so much that all you can see is smudge blue ink stamps all over the form. He seemed to enjoy the stamping and showed his authority by banging the stamp on that poor form. Finally we got one copy and headed to exit window. Here is the small window with officer seating inside doing something on computer. He pushes the wooden box -similar box I see at fuel stations. I put my passports and push the box back and waited .. and waited. and waited. and waited. Once in a while I pop my head in window just to let him know that I am still waiting here. He would not pay any attention at all. Finally he walks away from the office and another guy walks in. I pointed to him to our passports. He checks the immigration card - here I start sweating for registration issue- than he puts the passports through scanner and hooray we got our passports back. I just couldn't wait to get out fast enough.

Finally the gate opens and we are in "No Man Lands -area between two countries border-we drove to similar metal gate on Mongolia side. Monoglian office points me to go through some strange looking water ditch- the ditch is made of concrete with metal small steps descending to water pool than ascending on other side with same metal steps. I have never seen anything like this before. I stopped and looked again just to make sure that I am supposed to drive through that. She kept waving me to keep driving through that. Finally I dipped the car in and slowly came out on other side. I and Ami seat uptight in our seats to see how deep that ditch was. But we came out fine. We parked the car at passport control. Here is a small booth where a young Mongolian in dark glass checks our passports and ask for car papers. I asked him what is this for and turns out he was selling me insurance which requires by law. We our purchased insurance for a week and paid by Rubles as we don't have local currency -tugrik. With insurance form and passports we head to passport control. We were the only people there. One small booth. Here we get our visa. Than we go to car and drive to small custom cottage -brick island building on middle of the road. Huge Mongolian custom lady with her pants stuck in leather boots, looked pretty intimidating. She looked our passports and as we couldn't understand Mongolian and she couldn't English. She came out her booth and started screaming for someone. Here comes another lady in suit small and petit, took us in that booth and started filling out small car form. Again similar as Russian asking me about car information which we don't have. Finally she accepted my hand written numbers for car and stamped the form and waved us to other window. Here another lady pops from somewhere and ask us 50 rubles - no idea -why.  She brings another custom lady who walks with me to car. Car was so dirty, she asked me to open everything and started inspection. I figured that 50 rubles was for inspection. Finally she gives up and stamp that little poor form. We go back inside and she gives us back our passports and small custom form.

We changed our money in same complex where custom office, duty free shops and cafe. We were waved to go. We drive the car to last gate where young Mongolian officer checks our passports again and asks us the purpose our visit. This is the first time someone has asked me the purpose of the visit since I entered in Korea. He wished us good luck and gate opened and we were in small village in Mongolia. we drove out side village and immediately treated with beautiful landscape with wild horses playing in stream of water. Ahhhh what a site. Mongolia exactly the way I imagined, Beautiful steppe with small green grass and miles and miles of wilderness with pure beauty. We passed Mongolian herder on horsebacks with sheep, horses , cows and gers. The nomadic life. Ami tells me that 45% of Mongolia's  population lives nomadic lifestyle. We saw this along the route to Ulan-bat tar. We were treated with group of dual hump back wild camels. They paused looked at us and walked away. One can see miles ahead just this small single lane road between.  After about 5 hours of drive we enter in Ulaan Baatar. What a city not what I expected. We entered late evening so it was packed with traffic. Before we knew we were in middle of pool of cars. Watching both sides of the car , squeezing our self with the traffic. The road is two lane but 4 cars drive so we have inches to spare. But these guys have to be great drivers. We learned immediately that other cars will squeeze you out on right side if you drive like you are in US. I started driving in middle and just kept pushing ahead. This worked fine.

The trick is you don't look back. Just ahead, the guy behind you or on your side will take care of his vehicle and you take care of yours.  In few minutes we were driving like Mongolians, honking, cutting, squeezing. Our Guesthouse happens to be on other side of the town. So we had to cross whole of Ulan-bat tar. Some 60% of population of Mongolia's 2.5 million lives in Ulaan Baatar. We felt that they were all out on roads today. Finally all tired , worn out and eager to sleep we managed to find our next called Oasis café and guest house, located way out side of the east of Ulaan Baatar. It was hiding behind fuel station. We saw the sign sticking out of the building and made our way through labyrinth of streets pointing toward the sign. Did you know that in Mongolia there are very few places has real street address. Mostly you find the places by Latitude and Longitude in your GPS. This is how we found the palce. Once you find it , you still have to figure out how to get there.

We were greeted by a night watch man and Cybil -owner of the guest house- was waiting for us. She was a pleasant German lady. She gave us a tour of the place. We had a choice of staying in ger or guest house with two bunk beds. Bathrooms and toilets are shared. The café was nice. She had a refrigerated full of sodas, water and other juices. We can help our self and we have to write down whatever we consume on hanging board. Breakfast was included.

We decided to stay in Ger as that was our plan to drive all this way. It was beautiful, had 4 small beds, wood burning fire in middle. We immediately liked it even though it was outside and cold. There was small wooden toilet outside - squat toilet-we can use.

Night watch man started the fire for us and in less than two minutes it was like a sauna.  Even tough we were all tired but zeal to eat Indian food was greater. Earlier Ami read a review of Indian restaurant in Lonely Planet book and it was good. We asked Cybill and we can a taxi to this place which was not far.

Taxi system in Mongolia is great, we loved it. You cross the road of direction you want to go and stick out your hand. Some one with old beaten Hyundai will stop and take you for Fuel money. It could have his family in car , we squeezed our self in small car in which only thing works is wheels and steering wheel. This time we met a young man who was driving for money to be a film producer. We bargained the price, but when he told us what he was doing we gave him a good tip. He had a hard time to find Hazara our restaurant - beautifully decorated in solid wood and brightly colored clothing, with small tents . Hazara is Afghani tribe imported by Genghis Khan and they never left Mongolia. Hazara was an excellent choice, opened about 10 years ago by a north Indian man from Jaipur who lives in UK. The manager was very nice , we ordered food and he suggested that it was too much so he canceled some items. Lesson # 1 never order food when you are very hungry. Ami is still suffering with throat infection and couldn't eat her food. I felt bad as I was stuffing myself with Genghis beer and kebabs. Manager brought full glass of turmeric and salted water, which Ami drank without any hesitation. At home she would have made a huge scene about this. But she has been suffering for 7 days now and she needed to eat.

Next day was beautiful we hang out in Café relaxing, Cybil showed up at about 9 and I bombarded her with questions. She came here from Germany with her Austrian husband Renee in 1990, when Mongolia was in desperate conditions. They were finally coming out of Russian rule and trying to be an independent country. What a history - one time these people had the largest empire than any other empire and since then they have been under control of Chinese and now Russians. They got involve with Russia when Japan invaded Mongolia. Both Russian and Mongolian waded off Japanese and Russian stayed over. As usual like any other Russian city there is a statue of Lenin point ting to west - it seems they manufactured these statues in large quantities.  But Mongolian people think highly of Russians. They definitely don't like Chinese. Every 3^rd car in Mongolia is Toyota Land cruiser. 90% of the cars are SUVs. There are only three roads in Mongolia rest of them are dirt tracks -crosses the rivers and streams. This is favorite place for motor bikes and 4x4 expeditions.  Cybil and Renee came here as Christian missionaries to help children. Renee opened up carpenter school where he taught to locals. I and Ami still wonder where they get wood from as everything is built in solid wood. They don't' have forest of trees here.  They built shower rooms for locals to have shower, then they added a hair salon and flush toilets- all built by Renee, than café, next thing they build a guest house and now they have good business going. They still do lots of good work in local community. This is place is favorite among Bikers and Adventurist like us. She is a brave woman. There is still lots of corruption in country. The election is coming. I guess any country changes to different system and see the power of money which they have not seen in other system, they all go through the corruption to pile up the wealth. This is true for all developing countries in the world. One of the major vice of Democratic society. Good thing about the free system that now unlike older system it can be exposed with free press. Mongolia is trying to get it's place in world. People still stuck into history of Genghis Khan who is revered as Budha's re-incarnation. We don't believe that as Genghis Khan butchered million of people to expand his empire. Everything here has Genghis Khan's  name attached to it. Beer, Vodka, gifts and others.  I just read in local paper that They just commemorated the place where Budha's statue in middle and Genghis Khan and his sons are under with current prime minister in bottom. Today we visit Gandan Khidd Monastery. Building was started in 1838 by fourth Bogd Khan. It was a beautiful site. Huge , right in middle of the town. We bought tickets and warned by people that watch out for pick-pockets and bag slashers . We also read that Mongolia has high crime rate. Not advisable to walk around at night. We were swamped by small kids trying to sell birds seeds for pigeon which were crowding up to us asking "please feed us" we were joined by young Mongolia girl who offered her service as a guide to practice her English, we couldn't be more delighted. She goes to local college and wants to be tour guide. She explained us in very soft voice. Monastery had different sections -lama's prayer room, his residence, local prayer room, large temple in middle of it all. Lots of prayers wheels every where. Wooden pole where people circle for good luck. We entered in large temple and were awed by huuuuuuuuuuuuger Budha's golden statue.

The original statue 27M high with gold and bronze was build by Bogd Khan was removed by the communists in 1937 and taken to Leningrad. It's fate is still unknown, one theory is that it is still hidden in storage and another that it was melted down to make bullets.

In 1996 after nearly 5 years of work, a this new statue was consecrated by Dalai Lama.

 I couldn't fit in my camera. I guess no camera can fit that with that close. Surrounding this large statue there were small glass boxes from ground to the ceiling which is about 50 feet. Each box is filled with small Buddha's statue in different position. So I guess there must be 10000 plus Buddha's figures in these boxes. Scary looking Mongolian with black goatee -looked like Genghis Khan's soldier offered me $8 to take pictures, which I declined.  Young monks are fun to watch , bold headed and bright colored robes. We joined the mass prayer and it was just great. Chanting and humming. Packed with people and monks. Mongolia claims to be 90% Tibetans Buddhist. After tour we walked on local street, which was busy with shoppers. Mongolian young are well dressed in western cloths with all name brands -far cry from old Nomadic style. Most of the elderly were dressed in bright colored silk robes with sheepskin boots. Looked so beautiful and graceful.

We walked to Chez Bernard café - by the way Ulaanbaatar is full of Café, pubs, night clubs and bars I have ever seen concentrated in one place. They sure do have alcohol problem. Chez Bernard is hang out place for backpackers from Europe, Australians and few Americans. We met up with people from Isarel, Poland, Canada, Australian and one young man from Boston, who is going to attend UCLA after his return. We enjoyed the afternoon chatting with them all. They were all impressed by our adventure and wished us the very best. I asked the young Israeli from Sanai that how hard it is for him to get Visas for other country and he said very hard. As I read that even if you have Israeli stamp on your passports some central Asian countries make a big fuss about that. He had a funny story. He says he flips the coin and decide which country to visit, hopes on plane and fly. That night we visited national gallery for arts. Song and dance where we watched traditional Mongolian throat singing and dancing. It was fantastic. The big Mongolian sang pretty good from his throat, but the big woman sounded like she was strangling the bird. The dance was full of energy and was based on old Genghis stories. We couldn't understand but it was highly entertaining, worth 10000 Tugrik we spent.

Next day we go Inner Mongolia to see the wilderness. Our concerned was the car driving on dirt tracks and crossing those wooden bridges and streams. But we had great time and saw most gorgeous country. Mongolia is indeed place to visit in 4x4 and camp out. People are wonderful; staying in Ger is even more wonderful.

We spent 5 days in Mongolia and enjoyed them all. Our car is now showing the check engine light, we hired a local interpreter named Achit who took us to Suzuki service shop. Here the mechanic cleaned the carburetor, changed the spark plugs and got rid of the light. Bad Russian Fuel was the issue. He only used one spanner to do all these. Mongolians are surely resourceful people.  Second thing we needed is roof rack as our cheap roof bag was banging on roof and we were worried that roof will come down soon.

We left Mongolia for Russia , hoping to get in without any issue and get our new permit. It took us 3 hours to cross the border but it was OK. Russian custom agent wanted to check our luggage but car was so dirty that he changed his mind. I jumped on his computer to type up my own information about the car permit. It was amusing as I was using Russian custom officer's computer with Cyrillic keyboard. Soon I got hang of it and was typing 60Chrs per minute.  I can proudly say that I arun patel was the only guy who used the Russian government computer in their own office.

Now we drive to west of Russia to our new destination Sochi which is last point on western frontier of Russia. We sadly decided to skip the stans as there are too many "ifs" specially the roads. We were just told that Stans roads are even worse than Russian , and we thought nothing could be worst than Russian roads. My Uzbek and Turkmenistan Visas are yet other issues. We were sad, but Ami's time to go back to school is more important. So sadly we drive to west to Ulan-Ude , Irtskuk, Novosbrisk, Omsk, Cheblainsk. Ufa, Samara, Volograd (Stalingrad) to Sochi and cross in Ukraine.

 Best Regards

May 28 - Wednesday Ulan-Ude.

After breakfast we started the same trip back to Ulan-Ude. Today was a better day.

Quoting Voltaire, said 'Everything happens for a reason'. It was sunny but still cold. Road was better and clear. We hit small traffic jam at detour. In Russia detour means you are driving on someone's farm's dirt road. The track was so deep that I had to put Suzi on top of dirt pile rather than inside the track due to low ground clearance on a car. One of the truck got stuck. Everybody pushed it out and off we went. People were driving all over the farms to get out of the line. It took us good 9 hours to get to Ulan-Ude. Our second police check point. Two huge Mongolian policemen stopped us to see the papers and asked where we were from we lied and told them India. They smiled and let us go. We arrived in town and headed for center of the town looking for the hotel. Found a rather huge tall building in center of the town. A big hotel about 20 stories high with good parking. We checked in there and it was rather cheap hotel mere 1500 rubles. Elevator was scary as if it was going to drop. Turned out to be old soviet era building. The room was not so good. Beds were like in Joe Arpio's tent city jail. No hot water. But it was cheap. Went out to look for internet and food.

Ulan Ude, the capital of Buryatia, is located in the middle of vast Siberian steppes, on the 5640th kilometer of the Trans-Siberian railway. It is a very unusual and charming city.

The first striking impression is an unusually calm and mellow way of life, distinct features of people (more than 50% of people in Ulan-Ude are native Buryats with canny almond eyes), and a slightly chaotic look of the city. This peculiar mix made me feel that after I made 3000 kilometers through the Asian part of Russia, finally I'm in Asia.

However, in some parts of Ulan Ude the "Russian part" comes into play: a huge head of Lenin on the central square, Soviet style hotel buildings, some remains of the typical 19th century architecture, traditional wooden houses along the streets. And at the same time little Korean passenger minibuses are rushing back and forth, like rickshaws, an old Buryat woman is selling hot juicy Pozas (traditional meat dish) on the street, the sun is unbelievably bright and hot, and you see the tips of the mountains surrounding the city.

According to local guy almost 90% of people are Buddhist. Kinda high for Russian town. In fact there was beautiful temple in our hotel complex. So peaceful people come and just seat on bench and star at Budha. As soon as we enter in town we hit some bad pot hole ridden roads and Suzi hits some of them. Now car is makeing noise from front drive side wheel. Kind of creeking noise. Made us nervous. So we two problems. Check engine light and now creaking problem. Engine light turns out to be for that octane 80 gas I used on that road to hell. We were now worried . as we went for fast food place, we saw some young girls having dinner and few laughs. Ami approached them and asked if any of them spoke Angleski. We went for fast food joint hoping that we may meet some young people who speak english.

There was small beautiful girl named Irina volunteered. We explained her problem and asked her if she knew of any Suzuki dealer in town. As we expected there is none so she thought we should go to Toyota center. She strated drawing the route for us then all of sudden she sasy follow me. Ami went with her and I followed her. We went few miles to this closed service shop as it was 9PM. So we agreed to meet Irina next morning at the hotel. At 9Am I called her and she arrived right away. We picked her brother named Stish who happens to be thai boxer. He jumped in my car and we went to his buddy's garage. It took them a while to duplicate the problem as the noise only comes when you break and pull the car from stop. After few reverse and forward they agreed that there is a issue. On the ramp she went and 4 guys checked the whole car. Shocks, shaking, moving wheels and all sorts. Finally one guy found some loose stabilizer which he tightened up. We are paying the price for that road to Chita now. They also put a diagnostic computer to see the issue with engine light. It was an oxymoron to see that diagnostic equipment was in English and I had to translate that in to broken Russian. It said there was small leak in evap. System. We couldn't do anything about it. But somehow the light is gone now. I think it was just coincident that earlier I added Octane Booster in fuel and finally it went through the fuel system and cleared the light. All these put us back mere 200 rubles. Irina and her brother brought us back to hotel and i abysmally made an effort to pay some money to Stis and Irana and both declined respectfully and wished us best of luck. Again here we are in strange country and finding the nicest and kindest people. Both took the time off their work and came with us and made sure that we are alright. Two more people on my list. If this trip has to offer a single best thing this will be it.

It was 11Am so we thought to hang out in town and check emails. We changed the hotel to more expensive one and now seating in cafe typing this report. Tomorrow we go to Mongolia to see the head office of Genghis Khan empire. Later we invited Irina and her brother for dinner.  We ended up in Mongolian bar and had a dinner. Both were born in Uzbekistan to Korean father and Russian mother. Irina has a small 2 year old daughter. Dinner was good. Mongolian soup and dumplings.

Hopefully border crossing will be Ok tomorrow. This border crossing makes me nervous now.

Will see.....

That's all folks for today.

Monday May 19^th 2008

At 9AM sharp we were-myself and Julia my interpreter- at custom office full of hopes that we get our car today so I can pick up Ami from the airport at 2:30PM.

We ended up in very small lobby with three offices with numbers on door. Few people were already seating there.

We waited to go to the first office which we were after about 30 minutes. Large size custom lady read the  Julia’s hand written letter and made a phone call and that’s it. We are done with the first office. My hopes are now getting high. This is easier than I thought. Now we wait for second office. Which we got in after a bout 20 minutes. She read the letter and stamps it and we are done. Now we go to third office, which supposed to be the main chief’s office.

After 30 minutes we were in third office all nervous. He reads papers and speak to Julia in Russian and put his signature on the same hand written letter and we are off.

Now we go to some counter with lady with curly hair and some stuff –kind of artificial ball of hair stuck in her hair. She goes through papers and here the whole process starts – Russian bureaucracies. After about nerve racking 30 minutes or so she comes back and break the first bad news that our papers are not in order and we should go to Ferry’s office at the port.

We go to Ferry’s office and  guy from that office makes some sarcastic comments about Russian authorities and gives us more papers with bunch of stamps –one of those paper was copy of Bill Of Landing with bunch of stamps on it.

We take that paper back to the curly hair lady and she examines it and says the paper does not have enough car’s information such as Engine number, Size of the engine, Chassis number and such. As in US our registration only has VIN number. In Russia they don’t use VIN number. so now they are asking some sort of log book. The alternative is to pay the custom guy and take him to the car and he prepares a document with engine number and other details such as CC, size of engine and serial number.

So we agreed and dispatched Alexi –custom guy- to the port. He arrives and calls us that he cannot get in car because border patrol has sealed the car with scotch tape and stamped it. He cannot break that seal.

Now it’s 2:30pm and we just have to wait to get hold of border patrol. I take off to airport with taxi which is about an hour away from the city. We got stuck in traffic and reached lat at the airport. Ami was outside nervous and almost in tears. Took Ami to Insurance Company and added her name. Insurance lady couldn’t believe when she looked at Ami that she will be driving. Talked Insurance lady out of charging us more for Ami with my broken English few words of Russian and reverse order for her.

We go to different hotel –cheaper one- and wait for better day tomorrow.

We hang around in lobby , used the wi-fi. At evening we walked down to a nice German Bistro for some great beer and German food.

Tuesday May 20,

With high hopes I and Ami woke up early. Didn’t bother for breakfast and waited for Julia. Julia came by and we hauled ourselves to custom office –amazing place. People hanging around, smoking and wait for their papers processed-nervous spacing perplexed and smoke more. Now I know why they smoke and drink so much. It’s the bloody system. I nearly went for a bottle myself on Monday night –but then settled for a beer from Russia. Today we pick up Alexi and take him to the port and wait for Mr. Border patrol guy who will untape the car. At around noon we tracked down both Alexi and border patrol guy and synchronized both to be at same place. We drove with Alexi –a fine young Russian man-who was amazed of our task. I took the opportunity and befriended with him talking about American movie and my Indian heritage which he seemed to like it better then my American citizenship. Suzi was parked in  damp cement multistory car park on ground floor . right behind her there was a dog wondering around. I saw the flimsy looking a 2” wide scotch tape on doors with some stamp on it. Ha ha so this is what they call sealed by border patrol. Border patrol guy was short and chubby in full uniform , reminded me old Bond movie with those evil Russian officers. He looked impressive though. He came by I shook his hand greeted him in Russian. He seemed to like me and started taking the tape off. Few other guys showed up. Opened the hood and with special light we found that stupid engine number. Alexi made his report that the car was legal and was not chop job. After few jokes and chat with border patrol and other custom guy while they preparing a report –hand written.

No we go back to custom with the gang to get our permit. I started making plan that I and Ami would start first thing in the morning our Journey toward Phoenix, AZ. Julia agreed that we should take the car today and stay one more night at hotel. At custom we waited for Alexi to approve the report and hand it over to custom lady with funny hair. We waited and waited and waited . after few cups of coffee from machine – 30 rubles each- we got the news  around 6PM that car cannot be released as there is a luggage inside and we have to make yet another list. They blamed it on the ferry who made a mistake not detailing out what we have inside the car. It says “Tourist Luggage”. Julia makes some arguments,  go to different offices with no avail. The solution is to take back Alexi’s and pay his fee and inspect every single item and make a list.

Wednesday May 21

Woke up on crisp morning hoping to get our car today.  So we make arrangements to pick Alexi up and take him back to the port. Alexi being a nice guy -probably hates the system - agrees to help us out with food items which he will ignore them  and not put on list. So we pile up all the food and hid it behind the car under some cement block where the dog was roaming free. I brought my duffle bag with me so we pile up some food in there too to smuggle it out later. We took all three bags, roof bag, emptied out on dirty parking lot for Alexi to see it all. Some of them were laughable items –such as toilet papers, V8 juice which I offered them and didn’t like it. –who likes vegetable juice anyway. There was duty free carton of Kent cigarettes. I purposely took it out so Alexi can see that’ his eyes widened with delight. He asked me if I smoked I replied back that I just started after this custom process. I offered him couple of packets and he accepted them with great delight. My purpose of bringing the cigarettes is already working.

After Alexi made a great detail list by hand, translated everything in Russian. By this time we were joined by Mike a fine young man from Magadan (Misha Russian name –Julia’s assistant)Mike started helping Alexi and both made gestures with some laughs and some nodes at my items- thinking these people must be thinking that Russia is backward and one cannot get these stuff here in Russia. Off-course where else can you get full size Planters Dry Roasted peanuts  – I will miss this later. We have toilet papers –that made them all laugh. Heat and eat camping food. They were amazed with Fix-o-Flat puncture pressurized cans technology. They thought wow America is a great country. By the way I will regret those fix-o-flats later on my trip. Baby wipes made them burst out of laugh, when I told them it’s for Ami.

The gas lighter for camp fire was amazing thing to see. Anyway after the report with our hopes high we drove back to custom office . This is it, we have everything they can ask for. There is nothing more they can come up with. I made a sarcastic comment to Julia that now they may ask us to weight every item and value it and we all laughed. Well we play the musical chair game again at custom office and guess what at about 6PM we got the clearance of car but not the luggage. Mr. Chief decided to give this idiot American a hard time. So he made a rule change and now we need to get a special company and list out the value and special codes for all these items before they can be released.

I said ha.. ha.. I knew it. This is where Ami started throwing tantrum. We all sat down in broken chairs watching all custom officers and good citizens of Russia chatting and smoking to death outside including Mr.Chief. Julia was all confused and I was in blank mode – where there is void and no thought comes up.

Later  Julia saw a young girl smoking outside whom she knew and asked her to help us to prepare the list. She agreed to meet us around 10PM at her home after the work. This will cost us around 10000 rubles and still not sure that it will be acceptable. How do you code used under wares, t-shirts. We made few phone calls to other shipping brokers.

Thursday May 22.

Whole  night I couldn’t sleep. I was full of good and bad thoughts. Finally early hours  I was able to sleep with thought that next morning we will make an effort to get the car out as we already have a car permit. Worst comes to worst we will leave the stuff behind. There was special note on permit which says in Russian only car no contents. Thursday morning Julia called and immediately we both agreed that we should go to the port and fool those people if we can. We had an hour before we meet Sunil. Julia came at 8:30 we drive to port and get the car. We arrived at port about 8:30AM. Office  was not opened  so we walked to other office to pay for parking fee for Suzi for extra days. With receipt and permit in our hand we were first at the window. I made them laugh with my broken Russian words while Julia handed over the papers and kept both officers busy talking and distract them so they won’t read that infamous note. I handed them the keys and after few minutes we saw Suzi at the gate. I jumped in Suzi , handed over the another paper to get keeper and drove off before they realize. We were all excited and drove to Hotel. Where I and Ami repacked the car, paid off Julia. Well we lost all the food behind the car.  Well someone is going to enjoy Health bars, V8 juice, Planter dry roasted peanuts . I will miss those. We drove around in morning traffic, filled up with first Russian gas –octane 92- we left at 11AM. All excited . After few miles we got our first police check. Nervous as a hell I handed them over the papers. They all carry famous Russian machine gun. Looks very intimidating. He said something I couldn’t understand. We converse little –none understood other . made some gestures and he waved us back in traffic. What a relief. So these are the check points people are talking about. I have heard that we go these check points a lot. And it’s all pure luck and depending on mood of militias (police) .

Next 4 days are going to be hell.

Friday May 23^rd - Khabarovsk