Yerevan

It was time to leave Tbilisi, the capital that felt almost like home to me. Being surrounded by like minded people of fellow travelers and refugees, and the friendship I made during the two weeks i spent there. Sure it was full of good memories, but it wouldn’t be anything I would cherish if i get too comfortable with myself. So I decided to leave to Armenia.

I was warned by a lot of content I watched online about how they will interrogate you in Armenian border if you have Azerbaijan stamp and vice versa. But it was just a mere question of formality by the officer, or it could be that my face did not qualify enough to become a spy.

Arriving in Yerevan took me by surprise with the freezing cold temperatures. It was a solid zero degree once I stepped out from the Mashrutka I took from Tbilisi. Even more so, the driver dropped me in the middle of the road, forced me to walk to find a nearest metro to get myself to my accommodation. Slightly different than Tbilisi, Yerevan’s metro required you to generate a QR code upon entering the gantry but thankfully my credit card is accepted at their ticket machine (another reason to not get some cash.

I spent the next few days with Ama and we visited the city’s landmarks. We decided to book a tour to the outer city of Yerevan the day after and we met Gregory, a retired French businessman that has traveled here world since.

We also went to watch a few performances at the Opera house. Just in time for their holiday season where they have performances almost every evening. We managed to watch the Nutcracker ballet, and it was my first time seeing a ballet performance in person. The excitement was real, the ballerina, the musicians, it was arguably one of the bet performance i have ever seen. It surprised me that the musician and ballerina was highly skilled and have really good sense of art. My time in Yerevan couldn’t have been better.Read more