Azerbaijan the best and worst experience in a long time!
Azerbaijan is a very complex and diverse country. It is situated in Europe and Central Asia. They sell off the capital, Baku, as their jewel. This will be my first post depicting gay life and the lack of human rights. I remember all the discussions in the running up to Azarejian hosting the Eurovision in 2012. Would gay people from Europe going to Baku be free, or could they be in danger of arrest? Several from the Norwegian fan club stayed home that year. The authorities promised to look the other way; they even opened up a gay club during the song festival, which was closed again shortly after.
Why visit Azerbaijan in the first place?
Knowing what I knew already from before, you may ask why I wanted to visit Azerbaijan. I desire to visit as many countries as possible and like to pick from different areas of the world. Central Asia, with its historical Silk Roads and magnificent cities, does attract me much. Azerbaijan is not the most prominent country in that sense. However, I only had one week available for this trip, so this was how far I wanted to go from home.
There are several exciting and lovely places to visit.
In other posts, I will write more about the lovely places I saw and visited in Azerbaijan. This post, however, will be more about what I read and learned while in this country. Plus, a personal meeting that made a significant impact on me, first very positive, afterwards dreadful.
Before visiting a new country, I usually go to the library and find some literature written by an author from the country or other books about my upcoming country. This time, I could only find one Azerbaijani author in the library, who lives in Norway under ICORN international cities of refuge network.
The Story of Isa Shahmarli
I thought the book I found would be feministic, so my surprise was immense when I realised the story was about a young gay activist who committed suicide in 2012. I google the name afterwards, and I did find several articles about this case and the note and picture below. It was a very moving story, and it terrified me. Isa was an openly gay activist in Baku who had been thrown out of his parent’s house when they found out he was gay. The police fooled him into a trap where he fell in love and had sex with a man. This was arranged in a hotel, and the whole scene was filmed. Now, the police started to blackmail Isa for money, saying he could get money from his gay supporters in Europe. Later, instead of giving them money, they forced him to report on all the gay men he knew about. He could not live with this pressure, so he committed suicide. He hanged himself in a rainbow flag. According to the book, his mother should have been happy he took this action.
Is there no hope?
I thought this story was so sad, so I wanted to tell parts of it here. The book is very informative on how the government silences all critics. I also read several other articles on homophobic rhetoric among Azerbaijani politicians. However, Gay apps are very much used in the country, even if at least one is forbidden. I also found a lovely cafe in the centre of Baku, where I could see some lesbian women meeting, and in the evening, even a few gays, but it was difficult to approach them, and I was afraid of how they would react. I could be a spy.
On the move from Baku.
I have been in several countries ruled by dictators, and I get used to seeing posters of the president everywhere. In Azerbaijan, propaganda is almost everywhere. On the larger roads in and out of cities, you find these posters of soldiers in uniforms, and below, it says when they were born and when they died. To remind us all of how many brave soldiers the country has lost.
A story from another town
I was sitting in a park minding my business when a young guy approached me, asking if I was a tourist. I said yes, and he wanted to sit down and talk. We talked for over an hour, and he was curious about Europe, especially the girls. He wanted to move to Europe. The fact that I had chosen not to marry, he could not understand, and I did not want to enlighten him there and then. He wanted to take selfies together, and he even invited me to come and stay at his parents’ house; they had plenty of space. I thanked him kindly and said I had my hotel room. The day after, he wrote to me and wanted to invite me for a traditional meal, but I had already left the town.
On the plane back home, I wanted to tell him who I was. So I wrote a long message about myself and why I did not want to tell him the truth. I got an answer immediately when I turned off the flymode. First, he was a bit shocked and curious, and he started to ask very personal questions, which I told him was unnecessary. Then he became abusive, and one of the last messages I got was the one below. I understand this is not all his own words, but it is a product of anti-gay propaganda, like in Russia and other ex-Soviet states in the Caucasus region. From being such a hospitable and friendly guy to turning 360 degrees to becoming so hostile, I was surprised. In retrospect, I am glad I did not tell him the whole truth in the park.
