An early morning flight from Abu Dhabi to Baku today (1) had a total of 40 passengers on a plane holding 222. The Ashtashgar Zoroastrian fire temple is near the airport, so a stop there on the way to the city seemed appropriate.
Zoroastrianism was the religion of Persia (2) in the pre-Islamic period. The dualistic nature of the soul, the constant conflict within people of good and evil, and heaven and hell are said to have originated with the Zoroastrians. The western Caspian region has abundant oil and gas reserves, so keeping flames in the fire temples going was not a problem (3) (4).
The Fire Temple was a gathering site for Zoroastrians, Hindus, and Sikhs. Calligraphy on the walls is in both Sanskrit and Arabic. Originally dating to the BCE period, and destroyed after the Islamic conquest, the temple was rebuilt in the 1800s.
Baku's Architecture seems to have avoided the brutalist fate of other Soviet cities. Outside the old city, which is reminscent of the Balkans, the buildings seemed to date from the Belle Epoque period, and almost every balcony in the main Boulevard sporting an Azerivaijan flag.
At dinner, I tried to order Borscht (5), but they were out. A woman directly hehind me said she had done the same. She asked if I would join her "I dont like to dine alone." Isabel is a digital nomad working for a Singapore PR firm. Rents are expensive there, so she just spent a month in Tblisi, and has recently come to spend a month in Baku, followed by a month in Uzbekistan. We had a convivial conversation comparing notes about the places we had been and how the trains work in Central Asia.
(1) I had flown from Giza to Abu Dhabi yesterday (a). The most interesting thing in Abu Dhabi was the life story of the reception clerk at the hotel. He's from Nepal, married and had his first daughter at age 15, then studied in Finland.
(a) Due to fog closing the roads leading to Sphinx Airport, the hotel shuttle tried to get around the delay, only to encounter road closures again. Bit of a scramble to make the flight.
(2) Known today as Iran, and Azerbaijan's neighbor to the south.
(3) Once known as the Land of Fire, petroleum production is still the biggest industry in Azerbaijan (b). Numerous bobbing oil derricks are visible just outside the temple walls, and oil platforms abounded in the Caspian Sea on the plane's descent to Baku.
(b) Hitler's drive south to the Caspian oil fields in late 1942 set up the Battle of Stalingrad, generally considered to be the turning point in Europe during World War 2.
(4) The flame today is fed with natural gas piped onto the site.
(5) This is the former Soviet Union.
Late season snow on the mountains of Central Iran
Fire temple entrance
Carving of a cat, c. 1300
The central fire chamber
Southeast wall
Tapestry depicting Zoroastrian rituals
Hindu God Shiva projected onto wall
Sanscrit and Arabic
Raised platform to feed horses
The Central Fire pavillion
Museum of Azerbijan Literature, Baku
Poster at the Shakespeare Café advertising a 1924 performance of Hamlet
The walls of old Baku
Fog rolled in off the Caspian after dark
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