What do people here think of Armenia?

[Jackfruits]

Armenia is very closed of surrounded by muslim countries, almost no one speaks English (I was there this year with my Armenian friend visiting his family and seeing his birth village). I do find them not very attractive on average, but ofc there are always more pretty girls as well. How do you guys think of it? Mostly is more family oriented then most in the world

[gsjackson]

It's gotten surprisingly little -- next to none -- attention here. We had an Armenian-American poster, Jester, but he stopped posting in 2016, and recently met his Maker 12 hours after getting jabbed.

From spending eight days in Tbilisi, Georgia I would say that I'm not terribly interested in revisiting that part of the world, though it is beautiful. As you say, not enough English spoken, and I didn't spot any lookers in Tbilisi.

[Lucas88]

It's gotten surprisingly little -- next to none -- attention here. We had an Armenian-American poster, Jester, but he stopped posting in 2016, and recently met his Maker 12 hours after getting jabbed.

Wow, that's brutal! When PublicDuende posted the obituary for Jester nobody seemed to know how he left this world but now that it's come out that the guy had a heart attack just 12 hours after receiving the nefarious vaccine his untimely departure is even more tragic.

From spending eight days in Tbilisi, Georgia I would say that I'm not terribly interested in revisiting that part of the world, though it is beautiful. As you say, not enough English spoken, and I didn't spot any lookers in Tbilisi.

It's curious that the topic of the various obscure countries of the Caucasus has been brought up since, as you've already said, there has been surprisingly little discussion on the region. I found a few old posts about Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan and some valuable information about those countries by Contrarian Expat but apart from that there seems to be little interest.

I now have interest in Russian as my next foreign language and have been thinking about which parts of the Russian language sphere I would like to visit or reside in on a short-term basis for the purpose of language immersion. I am leaning more towards the Russian cities in the Northern Caucasus or the area of Southern Russia between the Crimean and Caspian seas. The primary reason for this is climatological. The low temperatures throughout the more northern cities and especially Siberia during the winter months are too brutal for me whereas certain parts of the Caucasus and Southern Russia resemble the Mediterranean albeit a little cooler. I remember reading that Georgia for example is much more reminiscent of Sicily than the icy lands and drab greyish cities of much of Russia. I've been looking at possible destinations such as Sochi, Krasnodar, Pyatigorsk, Vladikavkaz and Makhachkala. The south of Russia seems by far the most hospitable part of the country for a warm-blooded soul like myself.

I've also looked into the former USSR countries of the Caucasus including Georgia and Armenia. From what I understand the Russian language is no longer as dominant a force in Georgia as it was in the Soviet era and that is especially the case today in light of Georgia's strained relationship with Russia. However, I heard from a Russian-speaking American expat that the coastal city of Batumi is an exception with Russian tourism forming the backbone of the local economy and almost everybody speaking Russian as a result. I wonder if anybody could confirm this. As for Armenia, I read that Russian is still a dominant force among educated people and one source gave 53% as the percentage of Armenians that can speak it. Is that true? If so, Russian still might be a good tool for travelling through the Caucasus.

I also have to take into consideration the pulchritude of the females and what type of girls I would go for. I know that you said that you weren't impressed by the pulchritude of the girls in Tbilisi but I think that by now everybody knows that when it comes to women I overwhelming like brownies. I've read that in certain cities in the south of Russia there are ethnic minorities integrated into Russian society such as Azerbaijanis. I know that most Azerbaijanis are Muslims but I've heard that, like their Turkish cousins to the west, they are actually quite liberal. I think that Georgian women are attractive too. They have nice olive skin and exotic facial features. I've heard however that they are much more conservative. I have no idea what Armenian women are like. Do many of them have big butts like Kim Kardashian? If I go to the south of Russia or the Caucasus I'll be going after the browner girls!

I know that you said that Tbilisi was nice but you probably wouldn't go back there. Do you have any experience of travelling around the southern parts of Russia?

[gsjackson]

I wanted to go to Batumi when I was in Georgia, but the train from Tbilisi was either overnight or leaving at some ungodly hour in the early morning, neither of which appealed. I've read quite a bit about Batumi. Yes, it is a big hotspot for Russian tourists in the summer, even though the beaches are rock, not sand. That doesn't seem to bother people in that part of the world. It looks like a real garden spot, aside from the rock beaches. Lot of interesting postmodern architecture. Sakashvilli put a lot of money into it to be a national showcase. As of two years ago, you could buy some very cheap condos there, or get a really cheap price on rentals. It has a fairly large number of Muslims, being just a few miles from Turkey. It does have a temperate climate, though it gets a pretty good amount of rain and is rather humid in the summers.

I've never been to Russia, but I suppose right now if you told me I could live anywhere in the world -- and taking the world's current Manichean struggle into account -- I would say Sochi or Crimea. Once the West has spent the last of its Ukie cannon fodder, that is.