Xinaliq

22 September 201

Getting to a new destination is always part of the adventure of travelling.

Making my way to the mountain village of Xinaliq was no exception. The bus ride from Baku to Quba, a neighbouring town, was very quick and straight forward but then the fun began. I though I was going to have to give up trying to make it to the village as I was having no luck finding transport. I later learnt that I had been pronouncing the village name incorrectly and waiting in completely the wrong place. In the end, the village driver found me as I asked around in the market. I negotiated a fare with Aziz and then spend the next two hours driving round Quba in his green Lada, collecting supplies for the village; flour, a window, building materials and a sack of onions. Then we collected the other three passengers from a wedding reception; of course we stopped there for a while to have food, drinks and a dance. Eventually we hit the road - on the way we stopped again to survey the scene of a recent road accident and to have a drink of tea at a waterfall. This is how travelling unfolds. You never quite know what is ahead. I use my instinct to decide whether to trust people, appreciate that I haven't a clue what is really going on because of lack of shared language and limited knowledge of the culture and then just go with the flow. Lovely spontanteous experiences always unfold as a result.

Xinaliq is a fantastic mountain village. The older part clings to the side of the mountain, well hidden as you approach up the valley. The houses are made of mud bricks merging beautifully with the landscape. Aziz dropped me off at his neighbour's house belonging to Zaur and Giyana. They let me stay for the night and I joined their lovely family of three young children and grandma for dinner and breakfast. I slept on a mattress on the floor in one of the main rooms, the rest of the family slept together on the floor in another. For dinner, we ate potatoes which were served with mutton. Breakfast was the usual bread and sour cream cheese with hard boiled eggs. The children had apples which grow near by.

In the evening Zaur's sheep came down from the high pastures to an enclosure next to the house. He has 40 and spent time that evening checking each ewe's backside!

The village is changing since a road was built connecting it to the main town in 2006. Some houses now have tin roofs and PVC window frames are slowly replacing the traditional wooden ones. A brand new school has been built in the lower village. The English teacher there speaks excellent English and is doing an amazing job teaching the language to the students.

Zaur and Giyana are such a lovely couple. They married in their late teens and have two daughters and a son. They work together to manage their herd and support their children. Each evening they sit round the kitchen table with their older two children, practicing the Azeri script and basic counting skills.

This man was one of many villagers who was standing on the roof of one of the houses gazing with binoculars towards the mountains. He and his friends watch the movement of their flocks from this vantage point throughout the day.

Piles of sheep and cow dung line the walls of the houses. These are dried and used as fire fuel particulalry in the winter time.

I had planned to go trekking from the village but a rather vigilant group of Azerbaijani soldiers are now stopping anyone walking towards the nearby Russian border. Instead I wandered along the valley which heads south. I armed myself with small rocks as there seem to be several barking dogs around. These turned out to be shepherds'dogs and as long as the lads were close by, the dogs left me alone. Not the most relaxing walk I have done - I must admit!