Norway in Baku

Starting to feel the training. This week my performance in training has been up and down. Some sessions I have shown that I am still in progress, while in others I have been feeling that I have trained a lot in the last few weeks and haven’t been able to do anything. It’s normal in this period, but also very frustrating. Outside judo we have rode the carousel and gone for some sightseeing. This week has been similar to the last two. 7 sessions of judo, 4 strength and 2 cardio. I still have progress in the big picture and I work well with my assignments, but I have been more tired this week and my performance has shown more variety. When I am offensive and moving forward, few people can beat me. If I m doing the opposite and stand still, I am not very strong. The tactics are simple, I have to move all the time and be offensive in body and mind. I have also been invited to the Azerbaijan championships. This is a big honour and I would have been proud to compete if it were not on Christmas in Norway. But, this time I promised to talk less about training and more about daily life. Between trainings it is hard to do much, but during the weekends when I am only training once a day, we are trying to be more active. Last Sunday some of the athletes from Attilla took us out. Unfortunately I didn’t fell well but the evening was nice anyway. At first we were driven by a crazy driver, both Jessica and me were actually afraid that our days would end here. He drove like a computer game were you have more then one life. It went well and he calmed down after a while. After a nice walk on the boulevard we went to the carousels. Normally I don’t have any problem with carousels but I am from a country were security is more appreciated then here. The carousels were noisy and the seatbelts didn’t work. Sometimes we thought we were going to fly into the Caspian see. Our friends were very happy that we were green in our faces. Afterwards they took us to a very nice restaurant. Still, I didn’t feel well, but Jessica was served a good meal. Unfortunately the music was so loud that we couldn’t talk so much. After the dinner the restaurant transformed into a disco, not so normal for us Norwegians but very funny to watch. The nicest part of the night were when we went to a tea house. Here we could sit calmly and talk to our friends and get to know them better. Jessica is not only here as my wife and support, but is sent here from the Norwegian Judo Federation to learn how the system for kids and cadets in Azerbaijan work. Shortly told, it is not a coincident that they have many good competitors. They have a good system from a very young age. As early as 11-13 years old they are starting to train twice a day specific towards judo. Jessica got the honour of holding part of a kids training. The language problems gave her some challenges but it worked out fine. Apparently, they were not used to having a female teacher. They had a huge eager to train and also excellent control. It was funny to watch and a good experience. She has also been stopped twice by the police and seen a sheep being slaughtered in the back yard, but she will write more about this in her own report. We have spent this weekend Ali Davrishov, the coach, and Mr. Zia, a famous component in Azerbaijan. First they took us to tea at the burning mountain. It is a mountain that burns because of the gas. It has become a symbol of Azerbaijan, witch is known as the land of fire. After that we were supposed to go to a very good fish restaurant just outside Baku but, since Jessica is allergic, they took us to a nice little restaurant and gave us Borsh, the Ukraine national course, and an Azeri national course. The food here is great. When the night was closing in on us we went to a park. The park is a memorial of the fallen ones in the war against Armenia. Azerbaijan and Armenia has fought during many years and are still doing so. The park is very beautiful and is also a memorial of what happened in this park the 20th of January 1990. It was in the period of resolving of the Soviet Union and they wanted to make a statement to what happened to revolutionists. The Soviet army slaughtered many hundreds of people in this park in Baku almost 20 years ago. Every year, the 20th o January, people are gathered here to remember the fallen. It is a very sad and strong story when it is told by someone who has lived through the conflict. The old city in Baku is very beautiful. They have renovated big parts of it and have become something they can be proud of. After a hard session of lifting weights and cardio, and doing the rounds in the sauna with ice cold baths in between I took Jessica to see the old city. It was a very nice end of the week. This was all for this week. Keep following my blog for new exciting adventures from the land of fire next week. Martin Thiblin.