Day Three

Monday started after a great night of sleep, I woke up with the intention of meeting Hasan to try to find generators for the Pedal Power workshop I am running coming up on Friday. Walked down stairs and left my key with the hotel (it’s just what they do here), he offered me a breakfast and noticed that I was in a hurry so he mentioned that by no means did I have to eat so I took the offer and went about my way.
I arrived at the school and was given a lap top to use for the next few days and then met up with Hasan, we agreed to meet after lunch and he would take me to “his guy.” I went to office and started the long process of documentation for the trip and the upcoming conference.

I meet up with Hasan at the agreed upon time and we jump in the AUK SUV and here we go. While driving, he talks to me about how he used to work on cars and was quite familiar with what I was doing, which put me at ease a bit. He also talks about the importance of the idea of power on demand and how he has tried successfully before to make his own windmill out of bike parts. He also mentioned how strange it feels to have gone so far backwards during his time here. He has grown up here and lived here through the war and is now seeing the aftermath. He talks about a time that there was not power shortages and the streets were not all torn up. He says it’s never been a bad place to live but now he sees more people that need work. The thought had not occurred to that was actually a time before the war, a time when people were happier and did not have to worry about not having enough electricity or their water shutting off from time to time. Hasan sounds optimistic and tells me that he sees things getting better all time, but with improvement come trouble. All the new technology that keeps coming out such as computers and cell phones all takes up mass amounts of energy. When the energy that they have for the day is used up then they must go without. At times that can be hours or at critical moments or when they need heat for their homes.

We continue twisting around the streets and head up a large hill to a narrow street where Hasan asks me to get out, because if I did not I would not be able to after he parks. I get out and look down below at the city then at the yard that has now popped up where a house used to be. From where I am it’s about a 20 foot fall to the yard and the old foundation. I shimmy up the sidewalk toward a man who is eyeing Hasan and assisting him park and then I hear a loud crack. I hope that these guys are old friends because Hasan just rammed into the front of what seems to be this guy’s car. In most places in New York if this was to happen someone would most certainly lose their temper, but in this situation it all seems fine. The man signals me to follow him into this open garage with the skeleton of a 67 ford mustang rusted out with green paint on it sitting in the middle. He immediately starts speaking to me…in Armenian. I wait politely for him to finish and give him a queer look and say excuse me. He stares at me and snickers; Hasan is here now and starts to help translate. The man shows me two old generators that have been pulled from what I think would have to be old Volks Wagons. I think they should work and he is insistent this will do the trick. He also tells me that he is going to mount them to the bike stands so that they have maximum tension. He is speaking my language without a word of English. His shop for having enough junk in it to get whatever scrap that you need is nicely organized and quite clean. It is very reminiscent of the Rochester community bikes organization. I try to thank him gratefully because he has basically down everything I was nervous about doing myself. In fact there was very little that I have actually had to do myself while I have been here. In one sense has been disappointing, and in another sense has been wonderful to see that everyone is excited enough to help out with this. We leave the generators with him and go to the next shop to buy some electrical cable and tape. As we are parking I noticing all the people just hanging around the city, the time is about 1:30pm so I sort of shrug it off to a late lunch. When we walk into the shop, it’s a little smaller then my hotel room and has a very familiar smell of cigars. I pick some cable and we decide if we need tape then we walk out. I am sort wondering why we did not have to pay or how we have really not paid for anything today. I have heard people explain to me that Hasan is just someone who is connected, so I hesitate and still ask “so how come we have not had to pay for anything yet?” Hasan explains it me and sheds a whole lot of light about how things work there. It’s nothing suspicious or illegal, but still I am not going to go blabbing about it on the internet. With that we go back up the hill to the campus and he tells me about how he loves his job more than anything, sometimes, he says it is hard because you have to do some jobs that you do not really want to do but the good stuff very much outweighs the bad stuff.

For dinner that night we ate at a small Italian style restaurant down town and I get risotto with mixed seafood. Sven drops by and we get free Raki, this one is more the true style, and taste of anise. This is something that is good for one round a night; I don’t think you would ever want more than one. We stay and talk for four hours and then head home.