When I moved to Armenia in 1998 I have to admit that I wasn’t prepared for the high level of corruption to be found in almost every sphere from international organizations to the public sector. In fact, it didn’t take long to discover at all, but what struck me most was how politics and the economy were pretty much simply a battle between competing clans with the population ostracized from anything remotely resembling an albeit embryonic democratic system.

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Railway Station, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian / Oneworld Multimedia 2007

It’s all a little quiet for me in terms of work at the moment, but rather than just find myself out almost every night drinking with friends until the early hours like I did last week, I thought I’d start to do something a little more constructive. Basically, I decided to update my photos of Yerevan with newer shots as well as make a few return visits to children’s institutions I haven’t been to for something like a year now.

First stop on my photographic return visit today was Yerevan’s Central Railway Station which I think many tourists seldom visit. That’s a pity because it’s quite an interesting place for people watching and the interior architecture is magnificent, in my opinion. It’s unfortunately better known for being the location where Soviet troops shot six people to death in 1990.

And although I do remember an short article in The Times newspaper in England listing it among the top ten most architecturally interesting railway stations in the world, there’s little information available on it on the Internet. Indeed, all I really managed to find was a passing reference to it from an old Soviet guide reproduced on Cilicia.com, and even then that information is really only about the metro station underneath.

Its one of two ground stations of the Yerevan Metro. The moving staircase descends you into a wonderful entrance hall, decorated with bas-reliefs, subjecting ancient Armenian heroic epic “David Sasuntsi”. Through the underground passages under the railway platform, one can approach the railway station of the city with a square adjoining it. In the middle of the square there stands a grand monument to the hero of the epic David Sasuntsi (author–E. Kotchar). The building of the railway–station is the visit-card of the whole ensemble. For a tourist who is on visit to Yerevan there is always a chance to get photoed at the monument.

Nowadays, the square is turned into a large construction site: a cornfortable hotel with capacity of 500 living rooms is in the stage of finishing and its going to be one of the main elements of the whole ensemble of buildings situated in the square. To the left from the square goes the Hoktemberian Avenue, linking it with Lenin Square, to the right–Bakvi street, leading to an ancient fortress–Erebuni.

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Komitas, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian / Oneworld Multimedia 2007

Although I always enjoyed playing chess when I was a child, I’ve never ever been into backgammon, or nardi as they call it in Armenia. It is, however, a very common sight to see on the streets of Yerevan during the summer. As temperatures soar, groups of men — usually pensioners — gather under trees to play each other in competitions which usually seem far too serious for what they actually are.

Actually, I shouldn’t be surprised at that, I suppose, as the first time I remember ever playing nardi with an Armenian was in 1994 soon after returning from work in Nagorno Karabakh. Then, Father Shnork Baghdasarian from the St. Sarkis Church in London invited me round to his home for dinner and to speak about the trip.

Of course, having come met his brother in Yerevan on my departure from Zvartnots airport, it was almost as if he actually wanted to relive his memories of when he lived in Armenia through me.

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You know when it’s close to election day when you find yourself sitting in a restaurant with other foreign journalists. True, it was only two of them — the photo editor from EurasiaNet and the Regional Head of AFP — who had arrived in town for the 12 May vote, but it does make a difference when you see that others outside of Armenia are interested in events as they happen here.

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Got chatting to the guy who I assume is the owner of my local kiosk last night. It seems like it’s his, although he doesn’t seem to do much when he’s in the shop apart from sit in a corner, smoke and drink coffee. He does at least drive around in a Mercedes, and his wife and grown-up kids seem well to do, I suppose.

Anyway, after all the obligatory pleasantries the conversation turned to the biggest news of the past week. “Why did they hang Saddam?” he asked as if I somehow knew the inner workings of Whitehall and Washington. Funny how people here think that every Brit and American represents the policy of their Government.

Certainly, it was interesting to discover that he believed Saddam was executed to suit western interests rather than anything about Iraqi justice prevailing.

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It’s [Armenian] Christmas in Hayastan today, and time for another Letter from Armenia even if it is only a day after starting the column. Now, you can’t really tell its Christmas in my part of town at least, and I suppose that’s the same throughout Yerevan. Maybe the centre is a little different if some events are being staged, but close to the Mergelyan Institute at the start of Komitas there’s nothing going on.

This marks a complete change from previous years when at least a tree was erected at one end of the park opposite my apartment building. Santa Claus and a dozen of Armenia’s pop singers used to be bussed from district to district to mime to their own songs, and the kids in my neighbourhood at least got a few evenings of fun. Hell, even I used to enjoy the sound of the zurna and dhol that announced the start of proceedings.

However, like I said, this year there’s nothing, and it’s anyone’s guess as to why. Given that parliamentary elections are scheduled for May, it’s especially weird as we’re used to all the stops being pulled on the New Year to get voters in a more sympathetic mood to the local powers that be. I can only guess why that’s not the case this year. Is it because they’re spending too much money for the same purpose in other areas, for example?

For sure, the number of roads being repaired — something that always happens when elections approach — is considerable throughout town, but even so, missing out on providing local residents with communal festive events seems a little odd. Potentially dangerous for the year ahead, I’d say, especially as there’s really not much else to do at this time of year. If that’s the situation in Yerevan, I can only imagine what life must be like in the regions.

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Sisian, Siunik Region, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian / Oneworld Multimedia 2002

There’s no doubt about it. I hope that this will be my last winter in Armenia for some time. Famous last words, perhaps, but as this is my ninth consecutive winter when almost every other foreigner but me has packed up and gone somewhere warmer, I think I’m allowed to comment on what must be the dullest period in Armenia. Don’t get me wrong, the whole country is beautiful when there’s snow on the ground, but all those other peculiar things that make Armenia what it is kind of get amplified and thus detract from what would otherwise be a picturesque White Christmas.

Maybe I’m being unfair given that while many in Yerevan now have gas, it’s cold in my apartment. Actually, it’s freezing in the living room as well as the kitchen, toilet and bathroom. Yes, I know. I can have the luxury of gas heating if I really want to live dangerously, but I just don’t trust it. At least three Armenians from the Diaspora and dozens of others have died from inadequately installed heaters in recent years, and I’m not going to put my life on the line in the face of corruption, incompetence, and what is still probably the lack of any mechanism for oversight.

This would have been my first winter with gas had I decided to buy a heater, because while all the pipes and meters were fitted last winter, they forgot the most important thing of all. Yes, that’s right. They forgot the gas.

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Starting from today, the Oneworld Multimedia Blog will change a little, but first some recent history. I started blogging over at Blogrel in February 2005, but since starting this blog over at Blogspot in June the same year, before moving it here the following month, the site now attracts somewhere between 250-300 unique readers every day, and as many as just under 800 unique readers and 1,312 pageviews if a major event happens. In comparison, the main Oneworld Multimedia site attracts an average of only 64 unique readers and 109 pageviews a day.

Certainly, the case for blogs as opposed to static web sites has been made.

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