Yerevan these days seems like a reborn city. There is a lot of life on the streets. For those of us here in the winter, the long summer days and lively evenings, balmy air, and warm breeze offer a contrast.
The film festival this year seems to be gaining momentum. I've been able to catch a few films. The retrospective on the father and son Kiarostami of Iran has been a treat. I, too, saw 'Yes' and thought that it was a well done, albeit lengthy, film. The political undercurrent of the film was exciting, and didn't mind too much tht Simon Abkarian's character was playin a Lebanese Muslim, although admittedly, I didn't even catch where that was specificed, because there were references to Armenian music and dance. The music from the film was outstanding, and I must say that the musical arranger/director did an awesome job. The closing sequence had Buena Vista Social Club set against a light duduk mix. Just beautiful!
Mobile phones--regardless of which carrier it is--are nightmarish these days. The funny part, no one seems to want to do anything about it. On top of it in certain parts of town, there was no land line or internet access either. The main line into the central part of the city had been damaged.
Just unreal, when you think that in certain parts of the world, people take their laptop and sit in the middle of a public park and go online on a wireless network...
Life, nontheless, is good in Yerevan!
posted by Alex at 10:39 AM
11 Comments:
I was speaking to someone last night and he said that there is now a shortage of handsets available in Yerevan since VivaCell opened up shop.
However, in response to Der Hova's post about cellphones, it should be pointed out that mobile phone use should be taken in the context of the following.
Poverty does exist on huge scales in Armenia just as it does in Azerbaijan and Georgia where there are over 1.6 million and 1 million cellphone subscribers, respectively.
In April 2005, there were 200,000 subscribers in Armenia and with the launch of VivaCell, it might stand at 300,000 now.
Popularity of cellphones in the Caucasus has more to do with fashion and image as well as the fact that the landline service is poor and not so cheap as a properly functioning cellphone market. Even in Armenian villages in Javakheti in Georgia, almost everyone including pensioners had cellphones, for example.
Coverage in Armenia, is another issue, of course, although I'm sure that Viva Cell's appearance will rapidly change that situation for the better. All in all, a welcome development.
Onnik how did Azerbaijan get up to 1.6 million subscribers? That’s news to me.
Let us not forget that their population is 3-4 times ours, and they’ve had competition in their market with 2 cell companies.
Georgia’s population is about 1.7 million more than us, and they have 3 cell companies.
Our 2nd operator JUST entered the market 2.5 weeks ago and they claim to have almost 100,000 subscribers. (Armentel claims about 250,000 for their company.)
A little more time with this competition, prices (which have been dropping tremendously … weren’t black market SIM cards $200? Armentel now sells them for $10), run an oil pipeline through Armenia (similar to the Baku-Tbilisi- Ceyhan one), attract lots of “otar” investors like Georgia has, and look at how much faster this sphere will develop in Armenia.
As far as the fashion and image thing goes, Onnik you have to admit that this reality is quite sad. That was the point of my log. Like I said, you look at how people are dressed outside, along with their cell phones and fancy cars, then walk into their homes and you will see what I am talking about. Cleanliness and nutrition is secondary, and will always be till the people have quenched their hunger for “chtesutiun”.
For a country that is trying to develop its IT sphere, Armentel has completely ruined its progression. But believe it or not, as pathetic as internet connections and costs have been for us (ie. dial-up $50 US/month), we have a much higher percentage of internet users compared to Georgia and Azerbaijan. On my trip to Tiflis I remember having to walk a couple of kilometers trying to find one net café. Walk two steps here and VOILA!
Oops, Azerbaijan population 5 million more than us, not 3-4 times our population.
The 3-4 times I mentioned was meant for cell subscribers.
Der Hova, I think you just explained the situation very well and how bad the ArmenTel privatization was for Armenia. The numbers of cell phone subscribers in Armenia is disproportionately smaller than in Azerbaijan and Georgia.
As you point out, one of the reasons is simply because there is no mobile telephone monopoly in Azerbaijan and Georgia and now that Viva Cell has entered the market in Armenia, I'm sure the situation will change rapidly. Already I've heard that there is no a shortage of handsets for sale in Yerevan as a result.
Regarding Azerbaijan, I'm sorry, I got it wrong. There are not 1.6 million subscribers. In fact, there are 1.7 million.
http://www.today.az/news/business/19908.html
However, regarding internet use, you are right. Internet saturation in Armenia is 7.5 percent whereas in Georgia and Azerbaijan it is only 5 percent. These are the latest figures from a new survey on IT and the Internet in the CIS.
BTW: Taking into account the size of Azerbaijan's population compared to Armenia's, there should be around 650,000 cell phone subscribers in Armenia.
As I said, the ArmenTel privatization was a disaster and I'm so glad that Viva Cell have entered the market.
Probably, assuming the number of available handsets increases, we might even hit 400,000-500,000 subscribers by the end of the year assuming that the recent network problems are resolved.
BTW: Der Hova, you're involved in the music scene right? I'm doing a project and would like to speak to you about this. Can you drop me an email? Thanks.
shortage of handsets = me importing them from the uk...perhaps??
lol
Harmick you can make a lot of money. Cell phone prices in Armenia are very expensive.
I've heard the same about handsets over there. I had to send a cell phone to a friend in Yerevan which I bought here for €70 and apparently she would've paid at least €200 for the same model there. The fun part was that the cell phone itself cost 70 but I got 80 free call credit along with it!!! Fantastic loss making strategy from Vodafone!
just a little note - you can take your laptop and sit in the foreign ministry and access the web from the Wifi hotspot
so it can be done in yerevan too..
lol
In fact today in Azerbaijan there are some ~3.5 people living. The rest moved to other countries for different reasons, although this fact is not somehting Azeri officials like to present. Only in Moscow and surroundings in accordance with the official information of Russian state, there are some ~2 millions of Azeris residing for this moment.
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