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And I don't know what it is about these kind of "i want to be independent but no body will listen to me" places, but the visas are always a pain in the butt. So the "border patrol" told me I had to visit the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to register and get a visa. It was actually quite easy, hand over some cash and, BINGO, visa. The people at the consulate were absolutely NO help finding a place to stay, so i headed into town. Hotels were surprisingly expensive, so i opted for the Lonely Planet's pick. Big mistake. Described as a quite, friendly place, it was neither. The owner wanted nothing more than a business transaction, and turns out that he now caters mostly to school groups. I had a Judo team of some 40 teenage kids running up and down the halls until late. No supervision as their chaperons smoked and drank in their rooms. So needless to say, I didn't get much sleep. The next day I explored the town a little. And there is very little exploring to do. There are a couple of small museums to check all. All free. The Artsakh (old name for Karabakh) museum even has free English guides. Although I found her to be quite defensive, bordering on rude. Of course I was asking about Azerbaijan at the time, so it's understandable. A couple of war museums, located right next to each other, are worth checking out. If you speak Russian the curator of the Museum of Missing Soldiers is more than happy to explain EVERYTHING in the museum. Feeling hungry, i looked for somewhere to eat, but even that was a challenge. There were a couple of overpriced restaurants, and cafes. The cafes had nothing available from their menus except ham sandwiches and hot dogs. Not the best time there.

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Hoping for something more, i did a simple day trip to the town of Shushi. Once the cultural capital of the Azeris in the region (before the war of course), it is quite different from Stepanakert. The main difference is it is much easier to see signs of the recent conflict here. This was sort of the last stand of the Azeri forces. Once the Armenians took control of the city, the war was pretty much over. Many buildings still lie in ruins and there are numerous bullet holes sprayed along the walls. There are a couple of old mosques here, destroyed of course. And while some effort is made to rebuild, or at least tidy up, some areas, the mosques are left to rot. NGO's and diaspora have been very busy in other part of the city. The heavily restored Ghazanchetots Cathedral has been spared no expense. The roads are largely rebuilt, all from money from Armenians abroad. The signpost all proudly display the charity work from each group. But this free money has bred a lot of street kids and beggars. The kids aren't old enough to remember the war, just the foreigners who come and give them money. I've visited many truly impoverished areas of the world, but not until i refused to give money to the kids had i been kicked and flipped off. Yeah, some bright future the NGO's are developing here.

Between the mixture of stupid bureaucracy, bad weather, bad food, bad hotels and frankly bad experiences with people I came out of the region with an overly negative opinion. It is unfortunate that anyone has to live through war. While buildings can be restored, it's terrible when they allow it to destroy their character.