It's pouring down rain as he heads to catch my minibus to the next town up the road--but it's still an enjoyable atmosphere as they wait for the minibus to fill up.
In Masalli, he's dropped off right in the middle of a bustling, muddy market area . This feels a bit more like your standard Azerbaijani city. Beyond the market he finds a plaza and a a stately government building, then heads on to wander the residential neighborhoods.  
Here the houses are typically quite large with metal roofs and, as in Georgia, many have a little garden next to it. If there's a car parked in front it will more likely be an antique Soviet Lada... and the roads are mainly dirt.  
What does look very much out of place in all these towns is a large, brand new "Olympic Complex" at the edge of pretty much every large town. It seems the government had the ambition of have Azerbaijan host the Olympic games--and I guess they thought that by building an Olympic complex in each town this would impress the IOC... just as long as they don't actually visit these towns and find that most of them have no hotels--hardly any restaurants and mostly dirt roads!
Seems like misplaced priorities here, if you ask me.
he notices somewhat of a rarity here in Azerbiajan: a mosque being built. Much different from Middle Eastern mosques, it has a very short minaret, a large porch and tiled roof.   
A lot of big mosques are being built around Africa, the Balkans etc and wonder, why not here?
One clue might be in the fact that much mosque building around the world is funded by Saudi Arabia... an Azerbaijan is Shi'a Muslim country... Saudi Arabia definitely has no interest in sponsoring a Shi'a mosque!
he finally finds a nice place to grab a pizza, then continue on my way.