Honeymoon Around the World » Armenia

Georgia and Armenia video

Arpi — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 07:00:06 +0000

We hope you’ll enjoy it!

Yerevan

Arpi — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 06:00:01 +0000

We thought Yerevan is a very good, easy to live in town, which we both liked a lot.
One defining feature of the town is transport. They have Metro (like in Budapest), trolleybuses and Marschutka.
The marschutka is a local speciality. These are old microbuses, which were adapted inside, so that more people would fit in. Every marschutka has a number, they travel along the route according to their line number, and you can hail them anywhere along this route. Getting off works the same way, you can tell the driver anywhere that you want to get off, give him the fare, a 100 Dram note (50 forints) and you can go. This is the technical part, this was probably not so exciting, but now come the people! :) At the back 3 complete strangers sit down on 2 seats! This is really serious, it happened to me too, it was a girl who squeezed me in next to her. And the luggage of those standing gets looked after by those sitting down.
This would be utterly impossible in Budapest, but here it works and it is a joy to behold.
Yerevan is a modern city, in downtown the streetscape is pristine.
The inner city has many parks, they are full of restaurants with outside places, where you can find perfectly good wifi – much to my delight.
The centre is perhaps formed by the Opera House and the surrounding sqaures and parks.

The downtown area is modern, you can find anything you want, food, drink, restaurants, pubs, markets, but quite a few fashion shops too. However, McDonald’s is banned! :D Apparently this gets the local youth rather annoyed, if only they knew how well off they are!
The outer suburbs are a bit more rundown, but they are still homely and livable in.

The townscape is dominated by the twin peaks of Mount Ararat. This is the holy mountain of the Armenian people, although nowadays it is in Turkey, but perfectly visible from Yerevan.
On the last night we were invited as guests in Yerevan, we visited Zita’s Armenian acquaintance, Lusine and her husband Laci.
We caught the bus from Yerevan to Tabriz in Iran, because otherwise we would have been unredeemably behind on our planned timescales. Unfortunately we had to stick to our schedule due to our visas and the approaching winter in Tadjik, Kirghiz, Chinese and Pakistani areas. Otherwise we would have literally frozen to our bikes.
After our departure we could admire the twin peaks of Mount Ararat in the first hour.

As soon as we left the valley of the Ararat, the bus travelled amongst higher and higher mountains. Occasionally we could climb 1000m in a few minutes, which would have taken us a whole day by bike. The views were unbeliveable, although due to the speed and looking through windows it felt like we were looking at a movie screen.

Thank you Armenia!
I can only write about Armenia that it was absolutely fantastic, both the countryside and the people. We both enjoyed our days spent in Yerevan, and by the end we felt it was our town too. Should you ever travel in Armenia, we suggest you quickly learn those few words with which you can thank the people for their kindness.

Ejmiatsin és Zvartnots

Arpi — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 06:00:33 +0000

On one of our the last days in Yerevan, we finally managed to visit Ejmiatsin, the Armenian Vatican, the main sight, which we shouldn’t have missed out at all.
We found the church and we admired it from inside and outside.
There was a part for a museum in the church, too. One of the interesting sights – if not the most exciting one – was the tip of the lance, which had been used to thrust through the crucified Jesus to examine if he was dead or still alive.
Zvartnots is just a ruin, but it is really old.
According to the legend, this place could be associated with the name of Saint Gregory the Illuminator, he had a vision here, after which he decided to introduce the Armenians to Christianity, so in 301 Armenia became the first country that took Christianity as state religion.
We admired the beautiful capital.

A text engrossed our interest, which was written into a stone column behind the church. It’s origin is estimated about BC 600. Characters are 2600 year old quite clearly readable and even touchable now.

Rush in Yerevan for Árpi’s money

Arpi — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 06:00:57 +0000

One day in Yerevan I received an sms. My mother sent it telling me to go to someplace where there is Internet access and start reading my emails.
To access my money from the reálhozam, I needed an authorization from the Hungarian ambassador in Yerevan. At the post office they did not accept the blanket authorization we left at home before embarking on our trip. I do not know what this “reálhozam” is, but the money it provides is enough for us for weeks.
Our next job was to find Aunt Ica. We needed her because, if we remembered correctly, the Hungarian ambassador in Yerevan did not speak Hungarian!
When we visited Aunt Ica a few days before, Laci took us to her place. Of course we observed everything but did not pay attention to how we were getting there.
Aunt Ica lives in a high-rise building, way up there; we took pictures from her balcony. On the basis of one photo, we found her place. She of course knew the ambassador and called him immediately. He was able to see us after 4:00 p.m.
We took a picture of the recipe for ”paprikás krumpli” (paprika-based potato stew) found in Aunt Ica’s recipe book.
We visited the Armenian Genocide Monument.
In a park we found a memorial tree planted by [representatives] a district from Budapest.
The ambassador is also an agent for the Gedeon Richter Plc., a pharmaceutical company; as it turned out, we met him in a pharmacy.
Ours was an exciting, action-packed day; we were given a task to tackle and successfully finish in an unknown and strange city. But we also had Laci and Aunt Ica to help. We are very grateful to them.

Garni and Geghard

Arpi — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 06:00:41 +0000

We devoted one day to visit two churches east of Jerevan, Garni and Geghard. We didn’t know much about them, but all the maps marked them as great tourist attractions.
We took Marschutka, which is the vehicle of local public transport.
The small bus out of the town, along the beautiful, barren mountainside as far as the town Garni.
The church itself looks like the Parthenon in the Acropolis in Athens and it’s setting is fascinating.
It is on the edge of a steep valley and if you stand beside it you have beautiful views in all directions of the valley and the surrounding mountains.
The Marschutka does not run from Garni to Geghard, so we took a taxi.
Already as we turned into the steep, rocky valley we saw that the side where the cloister stands is unique.
The main church built opposite the rock face is relatively new.
The older churches are hollowed out from the rock, and they open from the main temple.
The symbol of Geghard is the lion in the company of an eagle.
There was another temple on a higher level, we could enter it only from the outside climbing up a small flight of stairs.

As we were going up these stairs, we heard the sound of a choir singing.
If you go to Jerevan, you must visit the Geghard Cloister, because it is enchanting.

How can you get into „Good morning, Armenians!” programme of the ArmeniaTV?

Arpi — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 06:00:49 +0000

We met with the Hungarian family by caravan in Jerevan. (post: Soso and the Hungarian family travelling in a caravan) Nelli and her daughter, Diana, the Armenian hostesses gave a really delicious dinner for the gathered guests.

Nelli, the hostess commened us ti the „Good morning, Armenians!” (Bari Luys Hayastan) live programme of the ArmeniaTV.
We were invited to aunt Ica at the evening before the television programme.
Aunt Ica is a grandiose woman, who worked in the Soviet period by a company, which had plants in all Soviet states. She met the man who is her husband now in Armenia.
Aunt Ica cooked and baked lots of delicacies, when we were by her. There were chicken rissole with mashed potatoes, pancake and dumpling with plum.
Dumpling with plum is the favourite food of Zita.
In the morning, we arrived to the studio in time, we quickly got acquainted with the presenters then we pushed our bicycles to the studio. In fact it was fun to be on TV. After taking part in a live show I may not be so excited next time.
We downloaded the record from the archives of television of course, we cut out the newsreel, the commercials and the clips from it.

While we were on our way home we sew the beautiful double mountaintop of Ararat.

Laci’s story from Armenopolis to Yerevan

Arpi — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 06:00:21 +0000

On our first day in Yerevan we went into town, to the Matenadaran, Laci’s workplace, where they keep the oldest manuscripts in the world, where they archive them and exhibit some of them.
The Matenadaran, and in front the creator of the Armenian alphabet and his pupil.
Laci lives in a very modest little ground floor apartment in one of Yerevan’s Northern districts.
Laci has a dog, Jack, that is barking all night and keeps the whole house awake.
In Laci’s apartment (like in several Yerevan districts) you only get water in the morning and between 6 and 10 in the evening. This restriction made me think, how much we waste water. Eg. after taking a shower the waster water, which is only slightly soapy, could be perfectly OK to use for flushing the toilet, instead it goes straight into the sewers. I heard it somewhere that in 20 years a litre of water will be much more expensive than a litre of petrol…. I’ve no idea where the truth lies, but I fear we will see.
Laci was 13 when he found out in Szamosújvár (latin name: Armenopolis) that his grandmother is Armenian, which means that he has Armenian ancestors. In the attic of the church in Szamosújvár he found a large number of very old and very valuable manuscripts, took photos of them all, brought those photos to the Matenadaran in Yerevan where they keep the ancient manuscripts. He also made a new map of the cemetery in Szamosújvár. Finally, two years ago he made a brave decision, bought himself an aeroplane ticket to Yerevan, because he always felt, ever since he discovered his Armenian ancestry, that his place is in Armenia.
He got a job archiving manuscripts in the great archive, the famous Matenadaran.

After studying for a year and a half, he managed to learn to speak Armenian almost as well as a native speaker. Laci’s great dream and mission is to save those Armenian manuscripts he found in the attic space of the church in Szamosújvár and to exhibit them in an Armenian muserum in Szamosújvár.
We were very happy to spend 8 days with him, that he shared his apartment, his stories and his life with us. During this time we felt that Laci enjoyed our company as much as we enjoyed his.
He spent several nights telling us about his adventurous and very exciting life, and on this page I wanted to give a short account of the life of an interesting and valuable man with whom – to our great delight – we were brought together on our journey.

From the Sevan Peninsula to Jerevan

Arpi — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 11:04:20 +0000

Our bicycles were guarded by tree dogs on our accommodation, on the Sevan Peninsula.

We went up to the Sevanavank abbey separately, firstly Zita started the short, staired walk to the top.

As long as she was going to the top of hill, I was writing the blog.

Zita came back after 20 minutes with two new friends. She met a married Polish couple and the wife spoke fluent Hungarian because she was a university student on Hungary.

The peninsula was really beautiful although we could visit only one of buildings of the church. Of course, i prefered the view especially as you can see around from the top and I could see almost the whole lake and the surraunding mountains.

It was fantastic.

If you travel around here, this view worth the by-pass road to the top of peninsula.

The Sevan-Jerevan section was 70 kms, we fled before the stormclouds.

We arrived in Jerevan. Everything was uncertain. We didn’t have accommodation, we stood at the street corner without internet, we were hungry an tired and we didn’t have the idea yet where to sleep and stay for the next week.

Then we met with Vahagn on the street who was so nice and helped us with everything. We found friends after 20 minutes, the city welcomed us with love. Soon, we were 6 at the table after Laci joined us, who came from Transylvania and has Armenian ancestry.

We went to the Laci’s flat late at night then we talked still 3 a.m. finally we asleept.

The Karmir-ghat and the Sevan Lake

Arpi — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 06:00:55 +0000

We departed from Aygut with a big run but had to stop and take on some cloth as the weather was not so nice like one day before and at the 1400 m high we felt cold.

As we got higher and higher the weather got colder and colder and sometimes also started to rain so we had to wear also the raining coat.

Once we met Zsora, the grandfather from the ayguti family, we left them just few hours ago.Before Chambarak the land totally changed, we got high, lost the trees and everywhere just field and hills, and next to the road we found a little lake. We had a break next to a shop where we met a guy with a totally blue paint bicycle.

On this sector of the road we also saw a cow eating a plastic bag .-). After Chambarak the road got harder we could carry on just with 4-5 km/h.
The Karmir-ghat is on 2177 m high.
The ghat was experience but not like I expected (sunshine, nice view to the mountains) but reached is so could start the prize, the way to down and as you can see we take on many clothes for it.

The Sevan lake is on 1900 m high, was very cold and windy.
The lake was amazing together with clouds. We planned a lot to get to Armenia and finally we are here.Zita had bicycling under a big rainbow. At the morning we started on 1370 m, we passed a ghat on 2177 m and now we are next to a lake on 1900 m. At night we gave a surprise to ourselves, we rent a nice room.

Goshavank and Aygut – Being guests at a beekeeper’s family

Arpi — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 06:00:49 +0000

Leaving Ijevan, the surroundings became more enchanting. We were in a rocky valley, surrounded by forests, next to us a creek, and above us, on the mountain edge there are rocks and/or green fields. It was a delight to cycle here.
We met here an Iranian cyclist, Heider Azurpeik, who came from Teheran and will travel around the Caspian Sea.
At the Dilijan-Chambarak junction we decided to visit the Goshavank Monastery.
A steep road leads to the buildings, but a local took us up with a car.

At Goshavank we saw things that we have never seen before.
The church is very old, very beautiful, and many Kachgar, i.e., crosses carved in stone are around and in the church.

There were a school and a library next to the church.
A lot of teaching was ongoing here. A famous Armenian historical person, Mikhitar Gosh, wrote the “History of Armenia” here.
Gosh is a beautiful settlement; a few meters above, in the village, we found another small church.
As we left Gosh and continued our way in the valley of the Getik River, our surroundings became wonderfully beautiful around us.

On the border of the district, the police stopped us. There was a checking of cars going on along the side of the road. The police looked into each car and greeted everyone. They gave us all kinds of treats.

In the village of Aygut, we were guests of Zsora, Rustam and Nuna.
They are a wonderful, fairytale family in the countryside with three children.
An old, well-thumbed English language book was found, and with its help we could communicate relatively well.
They showed us their apiary.

There were domestic animals: two cows, a small calf, a donkey, a few geese, and a small dog.
The grownup son already has a profession; he is a barber. He cut my long hair.

We took a picture of the family.
It was already afternoon when we said “good by” to the family; but we did not really mind, because we were rested, well fed, had many new experiences, and our hearts were full.
We left their village, Aygut, with a happy heart.