T A B L E_T A L K Airline horror stories: Unload in the Wanderlust area of Table Talk R E C E N T L Y Letter from Jakarta By Jeff Pulice When all hell breaks loose, what's an expat to do? (05/22/98) Mondo Weirdo Oh, those tropical nights! Readers relate their nocturnal adventures in the wilds of Australia and Indonesia (05/21/98) "A Walk in the Woods" By Bill Bryson An almost-encounter with two big animals in the middle of the night (05/20/98) A talk with Bill Bryson By Don George On writing, hiking and other arduous pleasures (05/20/98) Student protests bloom By Rolf Potts Spring is here -- time to put on the riot gear! (05/19/98) Browse the Wanderlust Features archives		GETTING INTO CHECHNYA .-. PAGE 2 OF 2 "Don't worry," Isa had told me an hour before, as our communal taxi from Baku stopped at the shrine to the Khidhir Eleys, the Islamic equivalent of Elijah, patron saint of sailors, travelers and lost causes. "We have it wired. Wired! We are only crossing a bridge -- although a very special one. The name says it all -- Zalota Most, the 'Golden Bridge.'" "Why is that?" "Because everyone who works there gets rich on bribes." "Great." "Now give me some cash so that I can buy us through." I did not know Isa well, but the circumstances dictated that I had to trust him completely. We had met in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, the day before, introduced to each other as two men joined together by mutual need. I was a journalist who had run out of other options of getting into Chechnya, and I was desperate to find a guide. He was a quasi-refugee, desperate for some dough, although he framed his interest in my mission in more altruistic terms: He was doing something for his country. I wanted to believe that -- because I had entrusted him with not only my money but my life. Just in case he had a mind to threaten me with the loss of the latter in order to acquire the former, however, I was carrying a dummy wallet to give him (or anyone else who might put a gun in my gut) on demand. It contained an old passport, several out-of-date credit cards and enough dollars, pounds, marks, rubles, liras and even Azerbaijani manats to temporarily satisfy a thief. At least I hoped so. My real documents and cash stash were hidden elsewhere on my person. It was into the dummy that I now reached to pluck out a couple hundred dollars in $20 bills, slipping the roll to Isa. He took the wad of bills and stuffed it in his coat pocket, thought better, plucked one note from the roll and slipped it into the donation box for the upkeep of St. Khidhir's shrine. "Now we have Khidhir on our side," he said and lifted his hands to recite the Muslim Fatiha, or creed of faith. I did the same in case any of our companions were watching. "By the way, I think the driver wonders who you are," said Isa as we walked back to our communal taxi. "Be careful not to say a word." For security reasons, we had maintained radio silence in the car all the way from Baku. Isa had muttered something to the other passengers about my being one "Dr. Teymur," one of his distant relatives from the Chechen diaspora in Jordan. The problem with this cover was that while I looked like a Chechen, or at least might pass for one, I spoke virtually no Chechen at all. Happily, with the exception of Isa, no one else in the communal taxi did, either. To reduce potentially embarrassing contact, I sat in the front passenger seat and feigned sleep, eavesdropping on Isa's conversations in Russian with the two strangers who shared our taxi. One was a Lezgin merchant, returning from Istanbul, and the other an Avar or a local Russian; it was not clear. Either might have been an agent or informer for three or four different governments that would be interested in my identity and the purpose of my trip. The driver, I gathered, was an Azeri from Dagestan. I had a host of questions I could have asked about the security situation, the morale of the Chechen fighters and other things, too, but I thought it best to keep my lips locked and just suffer through the trip in silence. We passed the Azerbaijani frontier post around 11 o'clock; a guard stepped out of the fog and hailed us to stop. I was about to get out and somehow deal with the demand to see my passport when Isa wedged his way between the soldier and the car door and created enough confusion that the guard checked Isa's travel documents twice -- once for him and once for me. Perhaps some money was exchanged; I do not know. Then, as we entered the no man's land between Azerbaijan and Russian Dagestan, Isa began speaking to me in Russian from the back seat. "Dr. Teymur," said Isa, "we have just crossed the Samur River! Is it good to be home?" "Da," I said, according to our code, wondering why he was talking to me at all. Suddenly, a white Djiguli sedan darted out of the foggy darkness and blocked our path -- and things moved very quickly. "Wha--?" cried our driver, and hit the brakes. Mutterings of concern from the two other passengers ricocheted around the car. "Don't worry, friends, it's for us," hissed Isa, trying to reassure the others. Then he turned to me. "Get out, now!" "But my bags ..." "Get out!" hissed Isa. "Your stuff will rejoin us on the other side! Go!" Things were going too fast -- and I didn't like this new twist at all. Isa had not bothered to mention the fact that we were to change cars inside the frontier area. More to the point, I had several thousand dollars in lightweight camera gear tucked in the trunk of the first car and did not feel like kissing it goodbye before my mission had properly begun. But once again, I was in Isa's hands and there seemed only one thing to do -- go with the flow. I got out of the front seat of one car and into the back seat of the other, praying that I was not part of some wicked kidnapping or killing set-up, such as my own. "Dobri vecher, gentlemen!" said the driver of the new car, leaning back to wish us a good evening with a smile -- and revealing twin rows of gold-capped teeth. It rapidly became clear how he paid his dentist. "Here," said Isa, forking over a small wad of my $20 bills. "It is not enough!" said the man after making a quick count. "What do you mean?" said Isa. "It's 100 bucks each." "The price of transportation has risen," said the man in the passenger seat. "It is now 150 bucks." "Look, guys," Isa implored the pair. "We are really low on dough -- let's say an extra 50 for both and call it even." The driver and man in the passenger seat exchanged glances. "For the Muslim cause," entreated Isa, handing over some more money. The driver growled, took the cash and then hit the accelerator, roaring down the fog-shrouded road for less than a kilometer before screeching to a halt once the security gate came in view. "See you on the far side," said the driver -- and then the sedan was gone and Isa and I were standing alone in the middle of the road, facing the barrier and the Russian guards. It was all too confusing, and there was no time to ask any questions. "Really, my dear!" chortled Isa as we walked up to the zero-point barricade, manned by two young Russian soldiers and a very large German shepherd dog. "The very idea of Dima and Igor ... No -- can it be true?" "Da," I said. "It can't be so!" chortled Isa, clapping me on the shoulder. "Atlichna!" bellowed Isa. "Splendid! Hahaha!" "Hahaha," I joined him. "... and do you remember Igor and that other broad, Larisa?" "Da," I said. The pair of guards were now less than three feet away, and Isa tossed them a casual hello. "Rabonik, kak dyela?" he said, while flashing his passport. "Khorosho," said one of the pair. "Grrrr," growled the German shepherd the other was holding by a leash. "Papers," said one, sticking out his hand to demand our documents. "God, I never thought he would do a thing like that -- his wife, family, his kids ..." cackled Isa, nonchalantly passing his passport to the youth with a flick of the wrist. "Can you imagine? Hahaha!" "Da," I said and laughed a little. The border guards stared at us, feeling sorry for having missed a very good and no doubt very sordid joke. Then, while the guard turned Isa's passport over in his hands, a $50 bill fell out and slowly fluttered to the ground. One of the guards leaned forward, squatted as if to tie his boot laces and than quickly palmed the money on the ground. "Payyekheli," he muttered, avoiding my eyes that were also avoiding his. "Move it." "Paka," said Isa to the other guard. "See you." Then he put a hand on my shoulder and squeezed hard to let me know that it was time to move, now. We were through, and my heartbeat was starting to become somewhat more regular with each step beyond the barrier. "Russians!" hissed Isa as we strolled away. "They sell their sisters, their mothers, as well as their country to the highest bidder. You understand me?" "Da." This time Isa could not hold back a laugh. He positively cackled. "Da," chortled Isa. "Da, da, da ..." Myself, I was obsessed with two thoughts: The first was that I, an illegal alien, traveling incognito, had just walked through what should have been the most tightly controlled road in Russia, and maybe the world. I was in, which was good. I flattered myself by thinking that I had accomplished a trick that was regarded by most others as virtually impossible, or at least sufficiently insane a venture to rank with, say, bungee jumping from the Golden Gate Bridge. Sneaking into Russia! What a prank! The second thought mitigated the first one to some degree: My success was predicated on a level of corruption in Russia that was so far beyond anything I might have imagined it to be that logically I could not trust anyone, ever, anywhere, to do right out of general principle or even a vague sense of what "the law" required. Not the border guards, not the taxi drivers, not even Isa. In a word, I was in way over my head and, no matter which way you pitched the equation, utterly dependent on rank strangers, most of whom seemed to be smugglers and thieves. And someday, I would have to rely on them to get back out the way I had come. SALON | May 26, 1998 Thomas Goltz's book, "Azerbaijan Diary: A Rogue Reporter's Adventures in an Oil-rich, War-torn, Post-Soviet Republic," is being published this month by M.E. Sharpe. He is at work on a new book about war and oil in the Caucasus.