"A few minutes ago every tree was excited, bowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship. But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease." ~ ~ ~ John Muir
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Border Crossings and Visas Aaaaargh . . .
I'm back in Yerevan after a quick jaunt to Georgia. I left on the train Sunday night at 8:30p. It's an old Russian train, well put together and I'm sure it was quite elegant in its time. It's an electric train so it was quiet, though slow - we were probably traveling about 25 mph. It took 14 hours, with a 2-hour border stop. I enjoyed my stay in Tbilisi, but unfortunately I didn't get my personal passport stamped as I had hoped. Border police are difficult to deal with, especially when you don't speak their language and they don't speak yours. I was sent to several different windows, several consultations were held about my two passports and finally my passports were passed to another window and I was told to go there, that everything would be taken care of. So the border guard stamped my passport - and I could swear he stamped my personal passport - said no problem, I said thank you very much and walked away. The microbus had been waiting for me so I jumped in and we took off. That's when I checked my passport, only to find out that they had stamped my Peace Corps passport, not my personal passport. It's all complicated, these border crossings. Suffice it to say that I'm still in a fix. I can't travel in or out of Armenia until I have a visa to stay after I terminate with PC. So back to PC to see what went wrong. I also have an American friend here in Yerevan who speaks both Armenian and English and she has offered to take me to immigration in a day or two to see if we can figure it out. I may end up going to Tbilisi again tomorrow night to try once again.
Labels:
Armenia,
Tbilisi,
Yerevan train
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