We have moved across three countries in six days. And at each border while we struggle with customs, immigration and conversion rates from lira to lari to manat, we are greeted with one constant refrain: "Jimmy, jimmy."

We are travelling through the Caucasus region. Whether it is Georgia or Azerbaijan, as soon as our hosts get to know we are Indians, they sing a snatch of this song from Bollywood film 'Disco Dancer', which seems to be a big hit in this region.

Whether it is Balash Magsudoghlu, our well-informed guide in Baku, the Azerbaijan capital, or the young lady serving us at a pub in Batumi in Georgia, or the officials at the Azeri side of the Iran-Azerbaijan border, we find ourselves involved in animated discussions on Hindi films.

At the pub in Batumi, our group gathers round the television showing a Hindi film dubbed in Russian. Balash tells us Azeri national television broadcasts a Hindi film every weekend.

We are now into the last leg of our expedition following the footsteps of 15th century Russian trader Afanasy Nikitin across Russia, the Caucasus region and Iran to India.

Trying to find a route through Russia and the Caucasus states of Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia to Iran has been a complex task and we get condensed lessons in regional politics.

We cannot cross the Russian region of Dagestan to Azerbaijan because of Islamist terrorism. So we cut across west to the Black Sea port of Sochi.

From Sochi, as the map goes, we should have been able to drive to Tblisi, capital of Georgia.

But that would mean travelling through the troubled region of Abkhazia, populated by ethnic Caucasians and claimed by Georgia.

Guram Chikovani, rector of Georgia State University, complains that the Russians are fomenting secessionist movement in Abkhazia.

"They have even issued Abkhazians Russian passports," he says bitterly.

So we take a circuitous route � sailing to the Turkish port of Trabzon on the Black Sea, then driving back along the coast to Tblisi.

We are now on a whistle-stop tour: barely half a day at each town and 500 to 600 km of driving every day.

Tblisi we see largely out of the car window, reaching it late at night and leaving early next morning. We promise Tea Trapaidze, the representative of the Indian mission in the Georgian capital, that we will visit her beautiful city again.

We are on the way to Azerbaijan. As we cross yet another no-man's land, a local Azeri makes elaborate gestures that we figure is an invitation to have lunch at his house near the border where he will slaughter a goat in our honour.

Unfortunately, we cannot take up his offer, thank him profusely and are waved goodbye with cries of "Jimmy, jimmy".

Maher Qahramanov of Azerbaijan's Ministry of Culture and Tourism is there to greet us at the border and we set off for Baku stopping on the way at a wonderful hilltop location overlooking a lake for an Azeri meal of grilled chops, sauces and the local wine. The vegetarians once again make do with potato chips and salad.

On the way to Baku, we encounter one of the most surreal experiences of this trip. It is dark and we can see barely 50 yards in dense fog when we stop at a town called Ganja, home of famous 12-13th century Azeri poet Nizami Aruzi Ganjami.

An animated lady tells us about Nizami as we walk around his tomb.

The poet never wanted to leave his beloved Ganja. He wrote five romantic poems, including one called Leila Majnu and Iskandernama based on the life of Alexander the Great.

The mist flows into the tomb and the stained glass windows throw muted patterns on the wall as our shadowy figures move around the tomb.

As we walk back up into the dense fog, the guide asks us: "And how did you like our beautiful town?" We look out on a sea of fog and don't quite know what to say in reply.

Baku is beautiful. With the blue Caspian on one side and the Caucasus range on the other, this ancient city was once a major stop along trade routes that ran west to east and north to south.

We visit the fire temple Atesgah, an ancient site restored by Indian merchants in the 18th century. The Sanskrit scriptures on the walls and lifelike models of Indian priests give us an eerie feeling.

Balash tells us of his grandfather's tales of Indian priests sitting cross-legged on the Caspian Sea.

Today Baku is highly cosmopolitan and the capital of a nation that, according to Qahramanov, is using its rich wealth of oil and gas for national development for the first time.

The Baku-Tblisi-Cehyan (in Turkey) pipeline, commissioned early this year and funded by global oil companies, is taking Azerbaijan's Caspian Sea oil straight to tankers on the Mediterranean Sea providing western countries easy access to Azeri oil.

Maintaining a balance in its relations with Russia and the US and Europe, and constant conflict with Armenia over the Nagorno Karrabakh region dominate Azeri foreign policy.

So we have to drop Armenia from our itinerary as there is no way we can cross to that country from Azerbaijan.

Besides, a month into the expedition, tiredness is setting in.

There's the stress of the long drives as well. Not only do we not have route maps, sometimes distances between towns vary greatly from estimates in our itinerary.

Tempers are fraying and the leader of the expedition Phalguni Matilal tells us in Baku that his funds are running out and he may have to curtail the expedition at Tehran.

--- IANS