Driving in the Caucuses

I never thought I'd find a place where cars matter more than people - but if you've ever crossed the street in Tiblisi or Yerevan, well, you'd think people are expendable and cars are not. After all, human limbs are replaceable, but front bumpers? Gotta keep those intact!

After arriving in Yerevan for my internship a few weeks ago, I noticed a lot of good socio-economic changes - more people starting their own businesses, new stores on every street corner, new high-rises going up and old buildings being renovated. Everything seems a lot more professional and systematic in Yerevan compared to 2001 when I was here last. But the driving culture still scares the shit out of me. Whether I'm riding in a cab, or trying to cross the street - there's never a time I'm more alert in my life, than when trying to avoid old speeding Russian Lada's and pricey Mercedes G-class sport utilities (although to the country's credit, you could also be hit by an increasing number of middle income cars such as Skoda Fabias or Ford Fusions).


It all started one night last week when I was coming home from the Malkhaz jazz club. Let me tell you that some of the best Jazz you'll hear in Yerevan is on Pushkin street at the Malkhaz Jazz club, or seeing Chico and Friends perform at the StopClub. But back to the driving part of things. I left the jazz club at about 1am - looked both ways before crossing the street and did my trademark light jog across about 6 lanes of traffic. By the time I had almost crossed over, this car started accelerating at me like there was no tomorrow. Before I knew it, he was within feet of hitting me. My heart was pounding but I looked away and kept going. It came down to the wire, and finally, mr. psycho swerves, goes around me and keeps driving. Without a doubt the driver was accelerating to hit me, maybe on a dare, or maybe because he was drunk or maybe because this is frigin' Armenia, but I narrowly escaped his wrath.

If I was careful before that incident, then you can imagine how careful I am now when crossing the street. Most people start crossing the street when before the crossing signal turns green - but me? Oh I wait, I wait patiently like a handicapped elderly woman transported here from another planet. Other people cross the first few lanes of traffic and then get caught in the median, and wait for cars in the opposite direction to pass and then wade out casually into traffic, their toddlers in hand, their shopping bags slung over their shoulders. Me? I watch them and pray to the traffic gods that I'm not going to witness a horrific accident that'll be aired sometime after 3am on FoxTV on "Worst Car Accidents" International Edition. Well finally, I watch an entire cluster of pedestrians make it over to the other side of the road. Now the light turns green and it's my turn.

Even with a green crossing signal in Armenia, cars that are making right and left turns can still come in your direction and they will NOT stop for you. Or rather, they'll stop for you when their bumper is a few centimeters from your kneecap. The kind of distance where your life flashes before your eyes just as you feel that homicidal tendency coming on - a desire to take the driver who's about to hit you and smash his head through his own windshield. Then, suddenly, you stop, or you let the driver pass and it's all over. You're across the street in one piece and now you don't feel like killing anyone, and no one feels like killing you. You just regroup and get ready for the next crossing.

So almost 3 weeks into my stay here, I'm just barely getting used to pedestrian/driving culture. I've almost mastered how to make it across the street and I've gotten rid of my "light jog" across lanes of traffic. Now I walk a bit more casually and dare I say, confidently across the roadways here. Well maybe the term confident is still a bit of a stretch. My pulse still jumps about 300 beats a minute as my right foot leaves the sidewalk. I start looking in every direction, sometimes even up into the sky, as if there's there's traffic up there too. I think I've refined my obstacle avoidance techniques to the point where I could probably walk into sniper fire and avoid getting hit for a few seconds. Ah. The skills you pick up in certain parts of the world. And to think I toyed with the idea of renting a car here:)

Day 1 in Croatia

“Areg, you must go sailing on the Croatian coast!” That’s right I said to my roommate Branko - and I should probably go sky diving soon or on a $5,000 safari in Kruger National park. That was back in 2000 when I could barely think about anything other than getting through my junior year in college and keeping enough money in my bank account for alcohol and bacon calzones after 4am.

Fast forward 7 years later to August 2007 and after 4 years of less than glamorous non-stop management consulting work, complaining about being in Boston for too long, and feeling stagnant; it was time to put my frequent flyers to good use and head out to the former Yugoslav Republic of Croatia! It would be my first time in Europe since 2002 and it turned out to be the most eventful and action packed trip I’d ever taken.

The trip for me actually really started of course, when I hung up my cell phone after booking my flights with American Airlines. You see, for those of you who know me well enough you know that my approach to extravagant vacations is a very procedural and intense phenomena; it’s also a little window into my slightly obsessive compulsive personality. It’s not the kind of obsessive compulsive disorder where I stalk old girlfriends or break the law. It’s more of a PG-13 tendency to Google the hell out of every new person I meet and to plan out each and every minute of my vacations like my life depended on it. But the first rule that really gets my vacation planning rolling of course, is to get mentally stimulated about a new location. I don’t like going to the same country twice, and I don’t like going to places that are typical vacation locales. So luckily Croatia didn’t violate either of those rules, nor was it on a US State Department list of places not to visit.

In its favor, it happened to have hundreds of miles of beautiful coastline, gorgeous Slavic women, incredible architecture, and years of history shaped by regional integration and disintegration. While many travelers would be heading out to Cancun for some dollar drafts and the chance to hookup with a promiscuous teeny bopper from Miami-Dade county, I would be heading to the sophisticated cultural paradise of Hrvatska (Croatia) - enriching myself on all levels, and trying to be as euro-chic as possible.

On my day of departure I was as pumped up as Hugo Chavez about to insult the President of the United States. This would not only be a vacation, it would the chance to liberate myself from the monotony of daily life. My route was from Boston to Raleigh-Durham, then to London, and then to Split Croatia – the second largest city in Croatia after the capital. Zagreb. As my British Airways flight approached the airport in Split, I gazed out my window and congratulated myself on a vacation spot well chosen; there were 10’s if not hundreds of islands below me each with some combination of lush vegetation and interesting rock formations. This trip would be like Greece without having to pay Euro prices, like the Bahamas with 10 times more culture but most of all, a chance to get my biweekly direct deposit while potentially being hungover and in bed on a Tuesday afternoon.

My flight finally arrived at Split Airport and we deplaned and went through customs. What an airport I thought to myself, it was extremely modern and tidy by any standard. I got my bags, darted into the gift shop and bought a quick $50 in phone cards before barely making it to a waiting bus that would take us into downtown Split. Why I felt the need to buy phone cards at that moment and risk the chance of missing the last shuttle bus into town was beyond me, yet very typical of the hyper multi-tasker I morph into during vacations.

I made it to the bus and grabbed one of the last seats left settling in for the short ride into town. Looking around, it was apparent that we were on a nearly new Mercedes passenger bus surrounded by elegantly dressed travelers about to depart one of the most charming airports I’d ever been in. This was Croatia? Take that gross domestic product and multiply it by ten – this place was nice! Soon however, I noticed an unfortunate teenage girl who began complaining in English that she didn’t have a seat on the bus and would have to stand in the aisle. Her complaining couldn’t have lasted more than 10 seconds. Almost immediately, the driver erupted into a full-on rage in Croatian, silencing the entire bus as he ripped this poor girl a new one. I wasn’t exactly sure if the punishment really fit the crime here but from what I could make out from the verbal onslaught, it amounted to, “shut the fuck up you stupid tourist brat-whore, you’re lucky enough to be on the bus, you can get off the bus if standing is too much of a problem, but shut the fuck up so I can start driving everyone else into town.”. I didn’t hear another word out of that girl. By the drivers standards, the little tourist brat probably deserved the reaming too. But the whole thing reminded me that were weren’t in Kansas anymore. In fact, experience has taught me that further east you go past a certain longitude, the shorter the tempers and the more fiery the people. From Italy to Crotia to Serbia, Greece, Turkey and Armenia and into Russia, people don’t hide their feelings and will come to a boil faster than Reverand Jeremiah Wright at a white power rally.

Back on the bus everything was status quo again and we continued to meander through the hills and valleys of this country which grew on me with every passing minute. The landscape whizzing by was interesting. It was one part southern California and 2 parts Croatia; whatever that means. Well, I couldn’t exactly label it but it was beautiful nonetheless and I was just happy that Croatian used the Latin alphabet so I could sound out words on the road signs and pretend to guess their meaning. Maybe I could have asked the bus driver what they meant and then try to guess the meaning of each of the swear words he would have used back at me as punishment for pestering him with silly questions.

About 20 minutes elapsed and we pulled into the bus main bus station in Split. It just kept getting better. The town was absolutely breathtaking with white marble bell towers in the distance and a cool promenade along the water with palm trees and tons of cafes bustling with people who seemed like they were really enjoying themselves. They were probably happy because they didn’t live to work, rather they worked to live and probably got more than 2 weeks vacation time a year. Or maybe they were just drunk and high, but hey I thought I would try to see psycho-analyze remotely.

Our short-fused bus driver was back to tourist-friendly mode and diligently helped everyone remove their bags from the bus. Before I could take in anymore scenery we encountered a small group of female entrepreneurs from Split. Well, they weren’t as entrepreneurial as they were direct. Each one of them, about 40 to 60 years in age, held a hand written advertisement on a piece of cardboard about rooms for rent in their homes. It was as if they had written the signs in front of a mirror, reversing and blending English and Croatian words and somehow managing to write out the symbol for “dollar” and “Euro” in so many different ways I thought each of them were offering alternate approaches to proving the Pythagorean Theorem and wanted to know if their answers were right or wrong. Well, let me just say they were wrong. Dead wrong in fact, if they thought that OCD Areg Bagdasarian would ever randomly stay at the home of a stranger offering them a room even if it was a harmless babushka shaped grandmother who probably had hosted hundreds of happy tourists summer after summer. No way – tonight was not the night to get mugged, drugged and or raped as I slept in some apartment in a city I’d never been in so I could save a few bucks. That night would in fact, come in another Croatian city, but I’d be spared most of the bad stuff that I thought would happen. No, I would avoid the babushka Holiday Inns and march straight to the hotel that I had booked weeks ago online. “Kastel Split” as it was called was what I had deemed to be the perfect blend of location and value after an exhaustive internet search of places to stay in the city. This place was so good in fact, that according to their website the hotel is

“at the most attractive location in town, southern part of 1700 years old Diocletian's palace with beautiful sea view, islands and the medieval square with the statue of famous writer Marko Marulic. Outstanding location, affordable prices and the thirty years old tradition will make your staying safe and pleasant.”

I was glad that my “staying” would be safe and pleasant, and that statue of famous writer Marko Marulic would be just outside the hotel. Actually, that statue would enhance the cultural quotient I was so desperately seeking. But even if the hotel proprietor’s had replaced Marko Marulic’s statue with one of Sadam Hussein performing a sex act, I’d still consider that culturally enriching as long as the hotel was close to all the bars and restaurants in Split.

I walked off the bus with my massive backpack and followed a map to my hotel Kastel Split. The city was soooo happening – I imagined this vacation to be the beginning of one perpetually long “Friday night” where I would start bar hopping immediately and stay up late each night either trying to drink more or so overcome with joy that I didn’t have to be sitting in front of a computer that I would completely lose it. Yes, this early desire ended up being a very close approximation to what I got during my 10 day stay, but with some nice added bonuses. Like the smell of sulfuric acid/mildly rotten eggs seeping from the ground all throughout the city. Or the fact that “finding your hotel in Split” means getting lost inside a labyrinth of a walled city that would make a lab rat cry and beg for directions. After an eternity I found my hotel and collapsed into bed.

Vacations are a lot of work I thought to myself, but totally worth it. It was time to think of the game plan for tomorrow, and to realize that I was probably much more deranged that a harmless Croatian babushka grandmother.

Bring the Ford Mondeo to America Please!

Another car blog by Areg. BLAHHH! But seriously, even if you're not into cars, you can appreciate this one. GM, Ford and DaimlerChrysler have been making big improvements lately in the sedans that they've been selling in the U.S. market. Look back just 5 years ago and you wouldn't have even a handful of cool fun to drive cars available today ranging from the Dodge Charger and Saturn Aura, to the restyled Cadillac CTS.
But the domestics (if you can still call them that) are yet to fully embrace the perfectly good and progressive sedans they have in their European and Asia-Pacific Markets and bring them here. I've said it before and I'll say it again - certain Fords, Opels (GM) / Vauxhall (GM) / Holden (GM) being built and sold abroad are much more desirable cars than what's being sold here in the same class and price segment. The Saturn Aura was a good step in the right direction, bringing the Opel platform over from Europe in the form of a Saturn. But now it's time for Ford to step up and start importing the Mondeo into the United States so that shoppers will have something other than the Ford 500 and redesigned Tauruses to choose from. Don't get me wrong , the 500 and Taurus are solid safe cars that boast class leading space and amenities. But they won't bring younger buyers to the brand and they're not particularly fun to drive or memorable. The redesigned Mondeo on the other hand is a headturner and will bring new buyers to the brand. More importantly, it will get Americans excited about a Ford SEDAN, something that hasn't happened in a long time despite what Ford may think internally. The Mondeo looks original, stays true to Ford's new styling theme, and would outsell the 500 and Taurus in a second. Give it a strong V6, make a hybrid model optional, and let people choose from a CVT or traditional manual transmission and I guarantee the car will sell.
You don't even need to follow the auto industry to realize that staking your entire reputation on sport utilities and and pickup trucks is a shortsighted strategy that will not be sustainable in the near future. So instead of allocating your resources differently and designing new sedans from scratch, just bring over what's already in Europe and watch your sedan sales skyrocket. Enough writing, time for me to call Dearborn:)

Saturn Aura Review by Areg Bagdasarian

Perception is reality, and reputations die hard. Often the past does predict the future but not always. On one hand, sure, you can count on a lot of overcast days in Seattle. Or the Big Dig taking longer than it should. Paris Hilton making another homemade porn? Well you can probably count on that too. But the Red Sox did shake off their curse and won the World Series recently, so it's possible, and even probably that General Motors' Saturn Division could build a fun to drive mid-sized affordable sedan from an American manufacturer and call it the Aura.
On a recent business trip to Washinton D.C., I had the choice of renting a Hyundai Sonata, or the Saturn Aura. Without hesitation, I jumped at the Aura, and spent the rest of my 3 days in disbelief that something with a Saturn badge could actually look deliver good road feel and precise handling. The six cylinder engine was smooth and torque-rich, and the steering was very volkswagen passat-like. This is a big complement in this price range where the camry's and accords of the world believe that road feel and properly weighted steering aren't an important part of the driving experience. After a lot of highway and backroad driving, and 8 hours driving time on the road each day, I had no doubt that if I was in the market for a mid-size sedean priced in the mid $20k's, the Aura would have to be on my list. The only major downfall I could think of with the car was the quality of the interior materials, which has usually been embarrassing in most GM products. That, and the orange backlighting of the controls just looked a bit staid and more at home in something from the late 80's than a car built in 2007. The layout, the ergonomics, the seat comfort, everything was pretty solid so with a few interior changes the Aura could really be an even stronger contender.
The car buffs know that the Aura wasn't engineered from scratch, but was instead is a built on the Opel Vectra / Epsilon platform from GM's German division. But guess what? That's ok! Actually it's more than ok, it's fantastic that someone, somewhere in that organization decided that it is a good short-term and even long-term strategy to bring over their European sedans, either the Opels from Germany or the Vauxhall's from the UK, or the Holden's from Australia and tweak them to American tastes and start seeing sales climb faster than ever before. Ford should do the same thing with it's European Focus, and Mondeo and get them here before the Fusions and 500s bore people to death. Anyway, it's refreshing to see GM taking on a product-driven approach to turning the company around instead of relying on rebates and rental fleet sales. The only hard part is getting people to realize that this car really is different not just for a Saturn, but is actually serious player and can go head to head with the Camrys, Accords, Altimas and Passats.
The fact that Saturn dealers are putting Accords and Camrys on their lots in a side-by-side comparison marketing campaign is a testament to how serious they are about the Aura and what a strong product offering it really is. It's time to unabashedly show people that American sedans have come a very, very long way; and that you might actually desire owning one more than the competition!