🇬🇪🇦🇿🇵🇱 You Assess Our Dissolution

Hello Adventurers, 

This last week was miserable. Like, I was happy to be visiting the Caucasus for the first time (and returning to Eastern Europe for a second time)…but Mother Natch was under the weather, and super duper grouchy.

She was crying and coughing all over me, and the wet and windy weather left me soaked and shivering on some pretty unforgiving terrain.

But I was grateful for the heavy-rain-as-free-outdoor-showers. Why? Because I peed myself. Like, unintentionally. And twice. And on two separate marathons…in two different countries…within 24 hours of one another. Incontinence across continents (yes, plural)…but luckily no one saw, and I don’t know why I’m confessing…I guess I can’t keep anything bottled up…be it shame or urine.

Anyhoo, I’m apparently a 41 year-old toddler…and this dispatch covers five-but-two-pee’d-myself marathons across Tbilisi, Baku, and Warsaw. And before we get into it…do as I say, not as I do; go use the washroom (like an adult)…before I recount some of my childish follies.

- Ben Pobjoy

P.S. I’m writing this issue of the newsletter after back-to-back all-nighters, each with a red-eye flight. So please take mercy on me…as well as any typos that my sleepy eyes didn’t catch!

2023 TREK TRACKER

Where in the world...record am I?

• Countries visited: 29

• Flights taken: 35

• Kilometres flown: 56,743

• Marathons completed: 91

• Kilometres trekked by foot: 4,288.5

• Total kilometres trekked since 2015: 67,380

RAPID WEEKLY RECAP

A speedy synopsis for time-crunched readers

• The Wildest Thing: Spending three days in the Orwellian autocracy that is Azerbaijan🥴

• The Biggest Obstacle: Ryanair cancelling my flight…the day before I was supposed to meet the missus in Rome (who I haven’t seen in a month)🤯

• The Lesson Learned: It is better to pee one’s shorts than pee one’s pants…the latter just funnels everything into your shoes🤢

FIELD NOTES: TBILISI, GEORGIA

A place of high fantasy…and I need a sequel

Folks, I beefed my time in Tbilisi…by accidentally giving myself a single day to marathon there…because I idiotically screwed up a flight booking. And I’m gutted…because this crumble-y, slope-y city full of young culture makers (breathing new life into an old place) seems spectacular…or at least it genuinely felt that way in the rain and fog. And while I just left Tbilisi, I’m already itching to go back.

Anyway, Tbilisi is one of those places that is unlike anywhere else (because of the unique interplay between its action-packed history and its motley architecture and its geographical diversity). And it dazzled my eyeballs as soon as I exited my amazing herringbone floor’d flat / amazingly cheap Airbnb…so much so that I’ve made the decision not to reveal too much photographically because — should you go — I want it to hit you, like it hit me (hence little to no ‘visual spoilers’ on my part).

Basically, this city-full-of-stray-dogs has a mix of lovably wonky wood-clad, grape-growing residences from the 19th century jammed into tight and windy alleyway-like streets as well as now-falling-apart khrushchevkas on grander Soviet-style boulevards from the 20th century. Both of these straddle a river that cuts through the city, where the city itself is surrounded by / half built on a few different mountain ranges…which is why Tbilisi is 380 to 770 metres above sea level…depending on which part of it you’re standing on. Furthermore, it is just absolutely sprinkled with the most quirky landmarks, and everything is plastered in Georgian’s visually beautiful Kartilian dialect / script.

For me, the total effect of this place was a Harry Potter-esque city centre that felt like Pauline Baynes illustrations made real surrounded by epic Tolkien-esque nature (and monuments) outside the city limits. Tbilisi is by far one of the coolest places I’ve been to, and the following is what resonated with me…

Um, this place feels like it fell straight outta the pages of a high fantasy novel! How so? Well, Tbilisi has a waterfall in the middle of it (that feeds surrounding sulphur baths)…which is like a few blocks from a gorgeously-housed funicular…which is a few blocks from a puppeteer’s charming / tilted clock tower…all of which exists in the shadows of this hill-top, towering aluminum ‘Mother Georgian’ statue that’s described by Wikipedia as follows, “She symbolizes the Georgian national character: in her left hand she holds a bowl of wine to greet those who come as friends, and in her right hand is a sword for those who come as enemies.”

You may not know this, but Georgia is believed to be the birthplace of wine, and the country has been invaded a bazillion times. Oh, and there was a magical revolution here 20 years ago where non-violent protestors stormed the parliament with roses in hand to end Soviet-era leadership…and 15 years ago Russia bombed the shit outta Tbilisi and Georgia (which is why it isn’t surprising that the city is today covered in seething anti-Putin graffiti due to the Ukraine war). Oh, and to cap off all the history…there’s just the most insane monument outside of the city that feels like something outta The Lord of the Rings.

And the kicker? Tbilisi isn’t just an old place stuck on being old (and y’know, lazily resting on its bygone laurels). Rather, there are so many new things growing outta the city’s cracks and crevices. Stand outs for me were the Meiden Bazaar (being a wine and antique market in an underground brick tunnel), all the contemporary restos and cafés southwest of Liberty Square, and the factory-turned-cultural hub that is Fabrika (as well as all the surrounding shops in the area full of to-die-for antiques). Young people are doing some really rad things in this city, and I found it to be as entertaining as I did energizing…and I give it a huge co-sign, and really recommend a visit.

FIELD NOTES: BAKU, AZERBAIJAN

A heavy hand in a satin glove

Azerbaijan fucking sucks. Like, it is an objectively terrible and tyrannical place…and this originally compelled me to go…but in hindsight it ultimately left me feeling very icky, and just really questioning myself and my decisions.

Now, if you visit its capital Baku — with blinders on and/or just blind to the country’s history, politics, and fuckery — you’ll likely have a good time…because this place is a convincing illusion that presents itself as everything that it really isn’t. So yeah, it’s got everything from whacky Dubai-like, ego-driven modernist buildings to copycat Paris-styled street name plaques on old buildings in the city centre to a re-creation of Venice.

But me? I knew too much going in, and I just couldn’t separate the art from the con artist. So where do I start in my synopsis? Well, in the early 1990s, Azerbaijan proclaimed its independence from the USSR and a short-lived, democratically elected president was soon ousted by a military coup that installed Heydar Aliyez…who had been a high-ranking KGB official for nearly 30 years (what could possibly go wrong!). He took over as a repressive, authoritarian dictator…that did bring stability to the country…while also enriching himself and ushering in world-class croneyism. He died, and his son Ilham Aliyez was ‘elected’ in a fraudulent election (and has been sustained by them ever since), and sonny boy has since remained in power for two decades. His achievements are caviar diplomacy, laundering nearly $3,000,000,000, and paying to whitewash Azerbaijan’s reputation as he and his country imprison human rights activists, opposition politicians, and journalists. What else? Well, the place is notoriously anti-LGBT, an unrepentant axe murderer ethnonationalist is a celebrated / remunerated state hero, Baku was into ethnic cleansing like not too long ago, and the whole shit show is propped up by a cult of personality. Anecdotally, this place is also teeming with ‘no bullshit’ cops, and you gotta be on your best behaviour (because I saw people getting carted off for jaywalking).

Anyhoo, I naively went to see what an autocracy feels like…and I feel like a total piece of shit for feeding it (with my time and money).

Azerbaijan has long had beef with neighbouring Armenia, and vice versa…because of ethnic differences and associated territorial claims. The two countries were at war with one another three years ago, and smack-dab in the middle of Baku is this propagandistic park full of destroyed Armenian military equipment as well as tanks and planes presented as war trophies. It is one of the strangest, most Orwellian things I have ever observed.

And even if you don’t go to the park, you won’t be able to escape Azerbaijan’s militaristic nationalism because there are immortalizations of recent war dead everywhere; like on neighbourhood signs, storefronts, and even on people’s vehicles. It is fucking weird.

Basically, Azerbaijan is a petrostate and because of the world’s dependence on gas…it is flush with moolah and can do whatever the hell it wants. Furthermore, recent Russian gas sanctions by the EU have been a blessing for the country, and will just further prop-up its terribleness. Actually, Azerbaijan is so full of gas that it is literally farting out of the ground and has been blue angel’ing outta rocks for decades in some places. I’m not kidding…Azerbaijan has long been known as the land of fire, and I can only imagine how puzzling / seemingly supernatural these fires would’ve been to people roaming these lands hundreds of years ago.

Anyhoo, I marathoned through tens and tens of kilometres of barren gas lands — being petrol lands patrolled by those with stakes in it — and there’s no trees and lots of security and surveillance…and I couldn’t find a washroom so I elected to piss myself…because everything about Azerbaijan told me that it wasn’t the type of place that’d tolerate someone peeing in public.

FIELD NOTES: WARSAW, POLAND

Still criminally underrated…says me, again

I love Warsaw, and hated how my gong show single marathon played out there. Firstly, I marathoned straight out the airport…and legit pissed my pants about four kilometres into it, and about 100 metres shy of reaching a portable toilet on the edge of a public park. I just couldn’t make it, I bursted, and then I had to change my pants in broad daylight looking like a total imbecile. Secondly, Ryanair cancelled my next day’s flight to Italy…and this induced terror and panic ‘cause I was meeting my wife in Rome…and such necessitated that I try and marathon while also trying to sort out a new flight on my smartphone. Thirdly, I had to pull over and field a call from a radio reporter…the interest of which I am supremely grateful for…but it just further contributed to a day where I marathoned with so little presence, and failed us all.

The upside is that I did get to marathon Warsaw back in 2021, and I was just totally blown away by it then. And I can confirm that the place is still sick…and I remain confused as to why it isn’t celebrated the way Berlin is, which it is sorta like (Warsaw’s just easier to navigate, and full of incredible pedestrian paths one can stroll or cycle).

Basically, Warsaw has a picturesque Old Town, a wicked promenade beside the Vistula River, a rad Neon Museum, a groovy church with Chopin’s heart in it, a monument to kids who fought Nazis in WWII, and the nicest hotel I’ve ever stayed in…and I stayed there for pennies when it first opened…and there’s like so many awesome restaurants on nearby Krucza Street and Bracka Street.

Warsaw is vibrant and happening and cosmopolitan, and more people need to experience it! So don’t sleep on this place!

Due to peeing my pants and then nothing else going to plan thereafter, this marathon was unfortunately the biggest bust of all the marathons I’ve done this year…and a shame because all the curveballs prevented me from exploring Warsaw the way I was hoping to.

That said, I did get to explore the park-y grounds of Fort Bema, and it was incredible. Now, I’m rushing to get this issue of the newsletter done ‘cause my missus says, “Publish or perish”…so I haven’t been able to do as much research on the Fort as I wanted to…so I can’t tell you why it was built or what it was used for or whether it is significant or not. But what I can tell you is that it felt like something right outta Netflix’s Dark. And it gave me playful heebie-jeebies!

I was kicking myself for not having a headlamp on me (ironically my missus brought it to me the next day…when I was in an altogether different country), but the abandoned, sorta subterranean Fort is marvellous to explore…and I could only go as deep as the sunlight — through the missing front doors and windows — would allow…and the thing is just filled with so many spooky corridors and so much graffiti, and it begs to be wandered with a camera in hand.

I don’t know if entering Fort Bema is technically trespassing…but I can say it’s sorta worth it…like if one can even say that! So if you’re an adventurous type, do explore it should you ever visit Warsaw.

BEST LOCAL THING-Y

Three things to know about me: I generally hate soup (like, I prefer to eat a meal rather than drink it), I don’t really like booze (there’s so many other, better vices), and I consider anything above 0.4 millimetres of hourly rainfall on a marathon to be a fucking soaker.

So, when I found myself shivering at the end of a soaking marathon in Tbilisi where I endured 2.0 millimetres of hourly rainfall for hours and hours…I craved a warm bowl of soup, and some delicious Georgian wine to take the edge off. Yes, I’m a contradiction…and that’ll become even more evident if you read the whole issue of this newsletter.

Anyhoo, I hit the beautiful dining room of Living Vino housed in some crumble-y building to enjoy a vegan take on Kharcho (which is a traditional Georgian soup). Essentially, it’s akin to a thick beef bourguignon soup…where the beef in this instance was swapped for a soy substitute which swam in the brown waters of the bowl alongside some mushrooms, tomatoes, and rice. It was hearty, savoury, delicious, and topped with fresh parsley and raw red onion…and I never thought to use the latter like how it was used, and I’m definitely gonna steal the technique ahead since it added a sharp hit of flavour and a nice crunch to something inherently soggy and stew-y.

And straight up, Georgian wine is primo (which is something I knew before visiting)…and much of it is natural and orange and farm-y in taste, and I’ll take it over more celebrated French, Italian, Argentinian or Australian wine any day of the week…which for me is like the handful of times I drink in a year, ha ha

POBJOY'S GLOBAL PRICE INDEX

This is an on-going documentation of how much things cost in different places around the world. Here are some of the things I bought in Tbilisi, Baku, and Warsaw (all prices converted to USD):

• Six bananas from a grocery store in Tbilisi: $2.21

• Two ginormous falafel sandwiches from a restaurant in Baku: $5.29

• Two 50 gram bars of vanilla halva from a grocery store in Warsaw: $1.79

MARATHON MUSINGS

Everyone has a price, myself included

Azerbaijan made me confront how little integrity I have. Specifically, as I stared at Zaha Hadid’s architectural commission in Baku. Initially, I reacted to it in a very dismissive way; finding it to be a major blemish on the famed architect’s incredible body of work, and at the tail end of her very illustrious career — and in this instance — one that was paid for by very dirty money (which Formula One just helped itself to again in Baku in April 2023 courtesy of sportswashing).

Then I immediately found myself reeling in my judgment. And not because of forgiveness, but because people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. And ultimately, because what we ultimately hate about others…is often what we most secretly hate about ourselves. And while the payouts greatly differ (Hadid died a millionaire, and I’m not…but I’m living good compared to most other people), both Hadid and myself are sellouts.

How so? Well, I worked in the marketing and advertising industry for decades, and signed so many NDAs that I’ll never be able to really speak about it. However, this little thing slaps as much as it stings, and, um, I know those monopolies and oligopolies well because I…

…I took their money in exchange for my creative services. And it is / was unconscionable, and anti-consumer, and anti-Canadian. and why I ultimately left that industry…because it is absolutely void of ethics and morality, and because it personally sucks to earn a living when you’re working as a piece of shit (which is rich for me to type…since said work enriched me).

Others from the industry can spin it other ways, but I promise it’s all bullshit…because anyone in the marketing and advertising industry will do near-anything if the money’s right, even when we know it to be wrong. Me? I worked on alcohol campaigns as alcoholism ravaged some of my closest relationships. And I marketed animal-based foods…even though I’ve eaten a plant-based diet for nearly 30 years…because I believe that cruel, industrialized, environmentally-unfriendly food isn’t friendly (as I simultaneously cashed paycheques from work I disagreed with…because apparently my greed is greater than my sense of good).

So I left…and did so after I made good money…but did so with the honest hope that I can maybe do something purer and more positive with my creativity moving forward. Like, my Marathon Earth Challenge is a sunk cost thing…where I’m marathoning…but also writing and photographing to ‘make for the sake of making’, and offering this up for free to anyone that’s interested. And no, I’m not daft enough to think that it’s some grand gesture of absolution…I ‘make’ simply because I’m wired that way, and know no other way.

However, this project doesn’t bring in money…so it’s more sabbatical than sustainable. And I know that whatever I make this year has to be leveraged or parlayed into some new opportunity that pays something in 2024. I don’t yet know what that will be, but I know it has to be something ‘cause living ain’t free.

Anyway, wrestling with Hadid and myself in Baku was a good thing…because we all know it’s important to occasionally take stock of one’s shortcomings as well as one’s contradictions from time to time, and then course correct and iron ourselves out straighter if we care to (which I do).

And Baku was just a good kick in the ass for me that way…like, just to try as hard as I can to best use my creative skills on my Marathon Earth Challenge, juice the hell outta this incredible opportunity, and document the human condition, to — I dunno — just give us humans something different to think about or be inspired by or maybe just to believe in ourselves — and our dreams — a lil more…

But Grey Wolves in Azerbaijan kept greeting me — again and again — with their ultra-nationalist, neo-fascist, and Islamonationalist hand salute…and look, I’ve sure had a price at times (embarrassingly stated herein), but I’m also starting to wonder what’s in the cash register of my idealism.

Fool’s gold?

Only time will tell…as well as where I — and this project — end up, and on who’s dime.

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