Road trip..

Ha ha!
No, i'm kidding... there weren't any roads! it was just a roadless trip!

2 kilometers to get out of town, a left turn out of the road and off we are for 20 days of bouncing around on all the bumps and holes we could find.. heading south to the Gobi (i could say the Gobi desert but Gobi means desert in mongolian so it wouldn't make sense, although none of you know that, or care so it wouldn't make much of difference.. anyway)

To those of you who think the desert is nothing but a boring infinity of nothingness, i say think again! It is actually a fascinating infinity of nothingness!
After Arizona, the Sahara and the Thar, the Gobi is the fourth desert i visit, and from what i've seen it's probably the most interesting.. The Gobi is not just one desert, but dozens of different deserts.. plains, rocks, cliffs, sand dunes, moutains.. you name it.. and after 4 days of driving through non stop desert dryness, you end up just behind the next hill into a paradise of mountainous greenery and... an ice valley! then you're really blown away!

Like many deserts, the Gobi is the bottom of an ancien sea.. so at some point i started to think of Mishka -our driver, very nice- as a sailor.. a sailor on a long gone sea but that was not to stop him! His destiny is to sail this sea, so as the water dried out and the waves petrified into rocky bumps and sand dunes, Mishka (he's our driver) (very nice man) exchanged his old sail boat for a rock solid russian van and just kept going like nothing had changed...

I don't know if i introduced Mishka.. he was our driver for 20 days.. a really nice man.. The stereotypical desert sailor! if any such stereotype exists! Tough short body, mongolian moustache, his skin burned by the sun (only the arms actually, under his shirt he's super white!), not talking too much (especially since he doesn't speak english!), but just put him in front of a kid and he melts like an ice cream in the Gobi!

So we camped the first night in the mongolian wilderness.. the second night we arrived at a small ger camp.. the gers are the typical mongolian nomads houses, that some of you might know as "yourts" but that's the russian name.. the proper name is ger, which is cool cause it allows extremely funny people like me to come up with hilarious play on words in french, such as "a la ger comme a la ger", "ger et pets" or many others that you probably don't want to know..
so anyway we arrived at the ger and realised that it was so much more comfortable, fresh, typical, nice... than our tent that we just kept sleeping in gers for the rest of the trip.. Being with families, we also got to see some typical nomadic lifestyle activities.. such as the killing and skinning and cutting and emptying of a goat by two men and a pocket knife.. while the woman and kid were cutting a sheep's wool with a pair of scissors.. we also helped mounting a couple of gers, that was pretty cool..

camping the first night..

our first ger in the middle of the desert..
some desert roads.. (this camera only sees yellow so you'll have imagine some more colors!)

a herd of horses by the ice valley..

and then we found this ibex(?) up on a cliff!
so i went to ride it!

and Mishka touched its balls for good luck!
a place of worship of some kind?

of course i had to try it on!

Terry shares his experience and teaches me how to recognise a dinosaur bone when you find one; supposedly, only dinosaur bones stick to the tongue, like this one! (i'm glad he didn't find a femur!)

The 3rd night (or was it the 4th?) we reached the first shower place!.. When Bobby showed us our itinerary at the UB guesthouse, on a map of the whole country she pointed 3 spots: "you can take a shower here, there and there" she said! After 3 days of driving in the dust, our 1000Tg (~1$) for a shower were no luxury!

After the desert, we drove up north to the central part of the country, to the white lake and up north to Hovskol lake and then back east and south back to Ulaan Baatar.

Yet, after 20 days of driving all around this huge country, i still have one question: is there any part of it that sucks?? everywhere we'd look was just endless beauty.. it's one of these places that make you think that the whole world would be just like that if it wasn't for man to mess everything up...

The central and north parts of the country look just like switzerland! A gigantic version of switzerland i mean, with lower mountains.. like switwerland mashed and spread by a giant rolling pin.. and with yaks instead of cows, and gers instead of wooden houses and herds of wild horses and real cowboys horseriding everywhere...
ok at that point i may as well admit it's got nothing to do with switzerland except for the color of the grass!
In many ways it's actually closer to being in a western movie.. the towns are so far west like, with their wooden constructions and empty wide dirt streets.. not to mention the evening bal! That was an awesome exprience.. one big wooden room, with chairs all around and everybody sitting.. people of all age, from kids to teenagers to adults to babouchkas.. the music starts, the light gets dimer.. people looking at each other for a few seconds and the bolder ones getting up and starting to dance, soon joined by more until the dance floor is packed.. then the music stops, the light is turned back on and everybody runs back to their seats! and it starts all over again with the next song!! hilarious! but i had so much fun.. learning the mongolian valse and dancing with local ladies..

leaving the desert..

lunch break

a herd of yaks..

the volcano close to white lakecrossing rivers!

one of our last squats..

And i shot these two with Patricia's camera.. amazing what you can do with a digital camera, a 300 zoom.. and an eagle!!

So much beauty, so much to see, so much that is hard -when not impossible- to translate into words or images...

It's a hell of a lot of driving.. but the view is really worth the trip!

I even found a cable!

I'll rearrange these later (they're more or less in reverse order) .. and add subtitles..
it's been uploading for hours and i can't take it anymore!

Ulaan Baatar exists.. i found it!

Greatings from Ulaan Baatar everyone.. Just a quick one to let you know you'll be without news for a little while again.. We managed to form a group of 5 to fill in a van and go on a 20 days excursion throughout mongolia.. one italian girl, 2 french girls, 1 corean guy and me.. driving south to the Gobi desert for the first week and then back up/west to the white lake and way north to Hovsgol lake...
So no need to be worried.. we'll be in a nice old russian van which should just break down in the first whole! We're in good hands!

I'll let you know when we get back...

The Baikal..

Well.. that's gonna be a hard post to write, because i'm just speechless!

...

After arriving to Irkutsk on the 3rd, i just spent one night in the city and jumped the next morning in the first bus to Khuzhir, on the island of Okhlon, 6 hours north of Irkutsk on the lake... and i just landed in paradise!

I'm not sure how to describe the clear blue waters of the lake, the white sand beaches, the pine tree forests with pink flowers covered grounds, the red cliffs, the immense prairies, the mountains skyline, the sunrises and the sunsets changing the color of the lake.... all i can say is if you get a chance, that's one place that is worth seeing! And after visiting all these cities the fresh air was very welcome! I'm glad i still have a month of emptiness before reaching giant Beijing!

I'm taking a train tonight to Ulaan Baatar (or however you want to spell it!).. I'll get there on the 11th.. Thierry (Joseph) if you're reading this, your postcard will come soon! ;-)

.. and while i'm here writing to everyone; after almost 2 weeks cut from the world i'm over 50 emails late so it'll take some time to catch up! please apologise.. and i doubt it's gonna get much better with Mongolia.. so thanks a lot everyone for your patience and support! :-)

The Baikal crew!

4 days in a train..

So that was it.. I travelled the famous Transsiberian and i must say it was awesome!
4 days in a train with no book and no music and i didn't find a minute to get bored! (robbed certainly but not bored!)

First, being the cheap person you know, i had to travel "platzkart".. in "kuppe" it's twice the price and you travel in a closed 4 bunks compartment with 3 other people.. but in platzkart, the whole wagon transform into a big dorm and you just make friends with everyone, sit on every bed, talk to everyone, learn russian, play guitar for the whole wagon... it was great! (the only counterpart being that i had to sing "i will survive" about 200 times in 4 days! it'll teach me to not know any popular song!)

So I was the only foreigner in the wagon.. There was Andrei, whom i took for an american backacker when i first saw him, because he seemed to not talk much to others and had a "typical backpackers necklace"! (we all have our prejudice, right?)
But Andrei turned out to be a very nice Russian lad, no more american than you or me (although i'm not so sure about some of you!) and before getting off in Krasnoyarks, he actually gifted me his necklace as a souvenir from Russia! So now i'm the one with a typical backpacker's necklace!!
Aside from Andrei there were Gene, and Ravil (who kept asking "Tina Turner!" every five minutes!) and Ilkhome and Sergei and.... all super nice and helpful.. and eventhough none of them spoke a word of english we somehow managed to talk the whole time and i did end up learning quite a bit of Russian..

Russians..

After a month in this country i guess it's time to share with you the analysis of my experience:
"Russians: the ones who don't rob you are incredibly nice!"

Is it only bad luck if I got robbed again in the train?!!
Don't worry nothing serious this time.. just a drunken military shithead (which is probably as close as you can get to a pleonasm) stole my (second) wallet with about 500 roubles, from my pocket while i was sleeping.. everyone knows who did it as the guitar pick i kept stored in the wallet was found just at his bed, but of course he denied..

Having said that, i must also say that the whole wagon pretty much felt responsible for it and everyone insisted to give me money and food and friendship and what have you! These people are incredible! With all my efforts to refuse i still ended up with 150 roubles just gifted to me!

You know what?

You are just one lucky bunch!!

Before letting me go on my transsiberian ride, Albina gifted me a new small digicam!! No joke, she really did! Just so that you, dear blog readers can still have images to look at! (at least until i drop it or get robbed again!)

I'm quite a lucky bunch myself as my little Albina/Vladimir/Anton russian family has taken such good care of me during these last days in Moscow.. They even helped me prepare the food for the train and cooked and wrapped some chicken and potatoes and vegetables and fruits... They're awesome!

So now thanks to Albina's camera, i was able to take some shots of the siberian landscape and share with you some of the things i've seen and learned...
except that.. hum... i'm just missing a cable to transfer the images! so you'll still have to imagine a little bit!

Birioza : the most typical tree on the way
[photo of a Birioza!]

Derieva : tree - Liess : forest
[photo of a forest!]

Plain/Field : Pole
[photo of a plain!]

Dom : house
[photo of a house!]

Dierievna : village
[you guess..]

Oziero : lake
[and so on.. you got the idea]

On the road again!

Allright folks.. enough of Moscow now!

Thanks to Vladimir's help, I got my papers from the police today! Yoohoo!
We had to make up some bullshit about me being a professional photographer working with the french ambassy and Vladimir being sent by the ambassy to serve as my interpret!! But it worked great and i got my stuff.. and no bribe!

Vladimir also helped me buy my onward tickets and everything.. How can i ever thank him for his hospitality??

So i'm back on track!.. On railroad tracks to be precise.. 4 days straight to Irkutsk and i'll see the Baikal! I'm leaving tomorrow night and i'll reach Irkutsk on the 3rd.. That's one train ticket i shall keep as a souvenir!


Oh.. just a precision following the many questions i've had:
I was "only" stolen my camera bag.. i still have my main backpack and my guitar! (and even a couple of cameras actually!!)

Many many thanks..

Many many thanks to all of you for your concern and friendship and... everything :-)
I've received many emails and comments and it really helps not feeling alone! (talking of this, you should sign your name or something in the comments.. it's weird to get anonymous comments of people who sound like they know me!.. and it's cool to know who's following me!)

Many many thanks to Lydia and her son Serge, from whom i was renting a room when it happened.. They've been very helpful.. Serge came with me to the police to serve as an interpret help me do the declaration while i was completely stoned! And he called after that many times to try and get me a copy of it..

Many many thanks to Albina who helped me out in Moscow and introduced me to Anton..

Many many thanks to Anton and his dad Vladimir who so generously host me now and push the limits of the legendary russian hospitality!..

What happened certainly sucks, but it also brings out the nicer side of so many people... thanks to all of you i simply don't feel abandonned, and that's the greatest feeling!

After 3 days of pretty much non stop sleeping the effects of the drugs have finally disapeared and i feel much better..

With the time i "lost" here, i won't have the time to visit as much of russia as i would have liked to.. so i asked for my Mongolian VISA, and, provided that i manage to get a copy of my decaration in time from the police, the plan is to head straight to Irkustk (4 days by train) to see the Baikal before my russian VISA expires..
So at best i'll leave Moscow on tuesday.. i'll keep you posted!

It's only money.. right?

Well.. first thing first, i'm fine!

You hear all these stories.. it can't only happen to others, i guess.. so this time it was my turn.. just when i left the internet place last time.. i couldn't find my way out of the mall, so i asked these two chicks.. and on the way out we started to chat.. we walked around the kremlin for a bit and then they suggested we should have a drink.. so we just bought a beer each at a stand.. and we found a bench to sit..
I don't know how or when but they drugged my beer, and by the time i realised what was happening i just collapsed.. when i woke up on that bench the next morning, my bag was gone and all my pockets were empty...
By chance they didn't find my safety belt so i still have my passeport, my credit cards and most of my cash...
But my cell phone is gone, my mp3 player is gone, my digital camera is gone, my notepad with all contacts and history is gone.. worst of all, my Leica CL is gone.... fuck..
I know.. i was warned!
Anyway what is done is done.. and it's only money, right?
I've been sleeping almost non stop for the past 48 hours and i still feel like shit.. and so weak.. I don't know what they put in that beer but i'm glad they didn't put more!

Anyway.. no need to worry; i'm safe and alive.. everything's good..
Only the police won't give me a copy of my declaration -which i need for the insurance- until next week, so now i'm stuck in Moscow..
Hopefully they give it to me early enough for me to head straight to Irkutzk and check the Baikal.. I won't have time for the cities in between...

Oh and i'm sure you got the bottom line: we're back to mediaval times with a no picture blog..
sorry everyone..

Map of the trip..

Jerome has been updating a map of my trip so now you can see.. er.. were is Moscow! (for example)

Pulp fiction..

Talking of Tarentino, i found the punch line for his next movie.. "..and in Moscow, you can get porn in Mc Donald's!"
Ok.. sorry for the terrible pun, but that's how you spell "Royal cheeseburger" here!

It's only fair..

With everything i said about Russians earlier, i owe them a nice post!
Indeed, with few exceptions, most russians i met or just stopped in the streets to ask for directions have been very nice and helpful.. eventhough we're talking about major cities like St Petersburg or Moscow.. I wouldn't expect half as much attention from parisians!

This being said for "real people" (to quote Tarentino), i'm still scared of cops and pretty much anything wearing a uniform! I haven't had any problem yet, but you hear so many stories of people being robbed by the police; they seem to be the biggest criminals in this country! "Stay away", "hide your money" and "don't hand them anything" are the basic rules to respect..
The cool thing about thiefs in uniform is that you can spot them from far away.. the bad thing is they have the law with them to come and harrass you!

Moskva..

So.. in case you had not noticed, i've actually been in Moscow for nearly the past week!
I'm so late i'll just post some random tourist views of Moscow just to say i was here allright?

A bit like with Warsaw, i'm pleasantly surprised by Moscow.. there's more to it than just big square concrete buildings; the center is actually pretty! It shouldn't come as a surprise i know, but hey, i have my cliches!
Yet everything just looks huge! The avenues are all about a kilometer wide so crossing without an underpass can be pretty adventurous (all the more since they drive like maniacs!)

How not to start with this one??

the red square in the rain..

the world..

a fancy supermarket..

and a couple of "golden hour" pics again.. i'm just always amazed how any random ugly place can look cool just with proper lighting.. can't get tired of it!

Sunrise on the Nieva..

All right a last one about Saint Petersburg.. I'm starting to be really late for these posts! But i thought this Sunrise between the Nieva river and the winter palace was pretty cool..

The must sees...

Since i was here, i kindda "had to" go see the Hemitage museum!
Visiting Saint Petersburg without seeing the Hermitage would be total nonsense! like seeing Paris without seeing the Louvre! (which i probably wouldn't have a problem with actually..)
But anyway, so i went.. and as nice as it is, i have to say it's just too much gold in there! can't breathe!.. but i did love the amazing wooden floors!

The view out the window on the square is pretty cool too..

..and talking of the must sees, the "Church of the spilled blood" (cause it was build in memory of the assassination of the Tsar.. er was it Alexander the 2nd? i forgot already!) is pretty cool..

Hello Max!

In Saint Petersburg i met with Natalia again.. It was cool cause it's the first city i come to where i already knew someone.. I had met Natalia in Paris as we were playing guitar by the Seine with Max and she came to sing with us.. Natalia is a pretty famous singer here, and just the week before my arrival, her face was on all the city's walls to announce for her concert!
And she told me the whole story of Saint Petersburg.. She's a real encyclopedia when it comes to her city! (I whish i knew half as much about Paris!)
So anyway, Max, Natalia says hi!




And then we went to visit "Peterhof", a Tsar palace made in the style of Versailles.. pretty impressive golden fountains i must say..

Are they that much bigger here??

Sponsored..

It's funny how all the symbols of capitalism and americanism, that i pretty much find normal anywhere else just strike me here, like they're out of place... all the kids wearing the latest fashionable clothes and skating or riding BMX everywhere..
Of course i sound like i'm 15 years behind, but still, it's my first time here and i grew up with all kinds of cliches and stories about people exchanging jeans for caviar and stuff like that..

..yet, when i see the sign for the main touristic street sponsored by Coca Cola, i can't help thinking they jumped from an extreme to another!

The Russian border..

(Ha Ha that was a good one! I should tell them that!)

So i made it Saint Petersburg.. And in the process i had to cross the Estonian/Russian border..
So we're stopped at the Estonian side, and they collect the passports and stuff.. and they even have a dog come in the bus to sniff everyone! So i'm thinking "ok that's some serious border we have here"..

Then we cross to the Russian side and there, no collecting of passports; everyone has to actually get down the bus, with all luggage to go through the control point..
Ok, so we go.. it's 3:30 in the night but we go..
Fill the form, go through control, go to the guy who tells you how to properly fill the form, go through control again!...
Good, passed!
But then after the passport check, i see everyone line up in front of some closed office and enter one by one.. I'm thinking "they're really not joking here, individual luggage control in a private room!!"...

...

until i realised everyone was actually just waiting to go to the bathroom before going back to the bus!!

well, we all get confused don't we?!

Before entering Russia..

So there i come to the limits of Europe..
And before entering Russia, there are a couple of rules to respect. One of which being "thou shalt not look like a tchechen!!"
So as promessed, I had to shave..

I just wanted to take the opportunity to suggest our female readers a little poll in order to make this blog a little more interactive!
So according to the before and after pictures below, which looks best?! (i didn't say good, i said "best"!)
...we'll work on the haircut some other day if you don't mind! One thing at a time!

Wanted! Cute French men..

My friend Laura asked me to publish an important communication here!
She, along with a couple of friends, is planning to set up a (non?)profit organisation in order to recruit some cute french men to move to Latvia.. Anyone interested?!

Not yet?
Ok. According to a preliminary -and pretty thourough- market analysis, it turns out that Latvia has 57% girls (and with the highest "gorgeous to ugly" ratio i have ever encountered!) And the 43% of men include a good portion of rollerbladers and other gay/ugly men! (allright, i'm kidding.. rollerbladers are not necesserely ugly!)
So, to quote the president of the organisation, it leaves "an average of 5 girls to one man"! and "the girls are waiting!"

Did you just read that guys? I repeat: "5 girls to one man, and the girls are waiting!!"
Laura alone could probably drive half of the french male population out of france! But imagine hordes of Laura, Dana, Liva and other names in A! (or don't imagine.. people have gone mad for less than that!)
I'm talking land of honey and milk here, so move it!

Oh i know, now you're wondering why i'm still on the road and why i ever left this paradise!
Well, I guess i should stress the fact that this is intended for cute guys only! No matter how hard i tried, my application got rejected and i was very kindly encouraged to pursue my journey! So i'll just have to go get my honey and milk at the supermarket with the other ugly ones!!

So if you're wondering what's "cute" according to the president, we could mention Mikael as portrayed here during another hard day at work (you win this battle Mikael, but not the war! you bastard!)




..while i'm here, i'll just throw in a couple of views of Tallinn's old town.. it can't hurt, and after all, i shot them for you!

Beware of the Russians!

"I'm not trying to scare you, but you should be careful with the nazi punks and the dunken russians.. we have quite a lot of these around here!"

That's all i hear of around here.. well, thanks mate.. now i'm scared!

Anyway, for the little story, after visiting the occupation museum in Riga and talking to the locals here and there, i learned a lot about the situation in these baltic states..
After about a hundred years or so of German occupation, they finally got there independance in the 20's.. for about 20 years, it worked out pretty well.. but!
But then came the communist russians.. occupation again, nationalisation of all companies.. loss of property..
Then barely one year later, bang! Germans again! Kicking some russian asses, so the locals were pretty happy at first, since the Germans gave back some of their property.. (the small stuff at least, they kept the bigger ones!) But soon they discovered the Nazi ideology, propaganda and other killing of jews.. not mentioning that the Germans were not just freeing the locals from the Russians, they were occupying themselves...
So that was it for the time of the second world war.. and the people here (that i keep calling "the locals to avoid saying "the Lithuanians, the Latvians and the Estonians"!) were even forced to enroll in the German army, to help colonise their own country.. pretty fucked up mess..
A few years later, end of the war, the Russians come back, super angry, to kick some German ass.. and they do!.. So the Germans loose, the two giants split the world, and our poor locals become Russian again... new occupation, new nationalisation.. and for 50 years the Russians kept sending new settlers..

Only in the 90's did the baltic states gain their independance again.. the russian settlers got to choose wether they wanted the local nationality or not, and most of them, probably thinking it wouldn't last refused it.. yet they were not granted the Russian nationality either! So they became official "non citizens"! (with a passeport that says so!) And now about half the population of these countries are actualy non citizen russians!

So anyway, that's the story.. but it helps understand the people here.. and also the whole nazi punks/drunken russians mess.. From what i hear, the russian non-citizens are pretty frustrated with the whole situation.. and now (i leave it to you to make a proper correlation!) their favorite activity is to get drunk and start up fights for no reason..

So beware of the drunken Russian!

I thought these works i found at the Tallinn museum express the nazi/russian thing pretty well..

The Brit, the Japanese and the Turk..

Ran into this at the new museum of art in Tallinn.. and cracked up!



... did i mention i was in Tallinn by the way??

Cycling on the beach..

Just a quick one to mention that i went to the beach in Jurmala for my usual out-of-the-city tour, half hour away from Riga.. 25km of white sand beaches.. how do you like that?!
Rented a bike for a few hours.. and had a great time!

When did THAT change??

Statement of the undersecretary of state released to the press on July 23rd, 1940.

Can this still be applied at all??

More artwork..

Some of you enjoyed last time, so here's some more from my personal collection! ;-)
(I even found a computer with picasa to present it better! rocking!)

Love bridge

In Latvia, when they get married, they attach a padlock to a bridge and throw the key to the rive.. ain't that cute?!