07 OCtober

I suppose if I were to have a weekend like these past few days for the next few months, it will tally a sizable number of pretty ridiculous stories to bring back to the States. Friday was an exciting adventure into the bafflings that constitute a Georgian education.  It is the first time I had to walk the mile down the road in the rain, which was made even better by my lack of umbrella. Luckily, I only have one class on Fridays, so I have turned the last day of the week into a self-imposed casual day, and I didn’t’ get a nice dress shirt sopping wet. I walked into the school entrance, only to be stared at by students, teachers, and parents alike as I shook of a layer of rainwater. I had to explain to people three separate times that I was at school because I had a lesson before I finally discovered that, when it rains, most teachers and students don’t bother showing up. It was a strange idiosyncrasy of Americana that my observers added to their already impressive tally when I explained that, in America, school was not cancelled because of a small downpour. On the plus side, I got to play 3 hours of soccer before walking back into the storm for my mile walk home, the day made complete by being splashed by a passing car and having to step over the small pool of blood surrounding a pig that had been necked and gutted and left in the cold rain for rigamortis to take over.

I had an hour at home with the house to myself before Ollie came to pick me up, driven by his co-teacher and her father. That whole dynamic is an interesting story on its own, considering the fact that, last time I checked, Ollie was forbidden by his host family from speaking to his co-teacher, even if they were working on a lesson together. Anyhow, we jumped into the hotbed of Zugdidi, a city about 30 minutes south of my village, and spent hours wandering through the labyrinthine markets – small shacks with precarious stacks of merchandise ripe for unwary customer (read: me) to bump into and smash, the entire metropolis of retail squalor covered by an intricate network of tarp ceilings, which would occasionally burst or be dumped by the shop owners, merely an additional obstacle thrown at buyers and sellers alike. After too many stores looking for the ingredients for Ollie to make carrot cake, we were perched on a corner by the co-teacher, who went off to buy some illicit items that she felt too embarrassed to purchase in front of us. Her parting promise of a snappy return began to rang hollow after the first 45 minutes of waiting, and Ollie and I made the slow realization that a girl is a girl is a girl, and shopping will always take ungodly amounts of time regardless of what country you’re in.

Ollie’s co-teacher eventually returned to check that her charges were adequately watered and the windows were still cracked to stave off dehydration, and we were aptly rewarded for our patience by the only true stop after hours of shopping – the bar. When TLG began 3 years ago, a volunteer came with the first group and never left. After three months he married a Georgian woman and moved out of the states permanently to settle down and open an American bar, which has become a favorite ex-pat stop in by plenty of English speakers. This sounded like too good a prospect to pass up, and we were not disappointed. The beer was cheap and the burgers true ground beef, and I was pleasantly surprised to run into 3 people who were in my training group in Tbilisi, an American named Brent and a married couple from South Africa who were enjoying a few pints before catching the night train off to Tbilisi. I also met a girl who traded elementary education for teaching the police force English (much to my jealousy), and we shared communal stories of experiences in Mexico. Tally of people in Georgia who can speak Spanish: 3. The night came as quickly as the evening passed, and plans were soon hatched to catch rides to Kutaisi for a Saturday of cave exploring and spelunking.

They say fall is the rainy season in Georgia, and the steady stream of water that was Friday was merely a precursor to the gale that slammed the windows and corn fields Friday night into Saturday morning. As my alarm shook me out of my warm bed and into the cold rain at 6:30, it took a few minutes to actually stand against the chilly wind and the puddle that had formed overnight underneath the window. Finally, I stumbled into the bathroom to gauge the actual accumulation of rain (keep in mind, my bathroom is outside; a fact that is becoming more and more fun with the steady decrease of fall temperatures), and was splashed with a gust of wind and rain as I opened the back porch door. I stared in horror at the five lumps of humans occupying the outdoor beds, the covers that were thrown over their heads clearly ill prepared to keep the inhabitants dry and warm throughout the long night. Why these people still don’t sleep inside will be one of the great unfathomable that will trouble my imagination long after my time in Georgia is over. I sighed and paid my bag after splashing warm water through my hair and across my face. It was the first time I would be allowed to jump on a marshutka without my host father hailing the correct one, and I was not anxious for fifteen minutes at the end of the driveway sans umbrella.

The marshutka ride into Kutaisi was a non-event, and before we had time to fully inhale the uncomfortably nostalgic scent of McDonalds ‘french fries’ we were herded onto the next bus (my third of the day) and whisked to the entrance mouth to a mile jaunt throw stalactites, stalagmites, and stalagnites (and you had difficulty keeping track of the first two). The caves were amazing, great flashes of rock contorted over millennia, splashing water frozen in a picture of immoveable rock. I cheered for Aaron Rolston (the hiker depicted by James Franco, of 127 Hours fame), and everyone collectively stared at me wondering what the loud American was talking about. There were endless crevices and twists aching to be properly explored, but the small path with the impenetrable 4 inch rock barrier proved impenetrable, keeping everyone at a safe and lawsuit-free distance. My desire to climb anything and everything grew with each step, only kowtowed by the vivid images of prisoner abuse scandals in Tbilisi prisons (it’s bad enough that the guards sexually abuse prisoners, why did they feel they need to show the full video on the 6 o’clock news?).

After emerging back into the sun, hapless mole people blinking furitively against the sudden sun exposure, we were back on a two-marshutka ride back to the city center (2 marshutkas to Kutaisi, 2 marshutkas to the caves, 2 marshutkas back to the city. AKA, a Saturday in Georgia). As all good TLG-ers do when in a big city, we quickly overloaded the shaurma stand with 5 requests for the largest hand held delicacy they had, and retreated with a beer to what felt like would be one of the last bright sunny days of summer/ fall. Our group broke up after lunch, some people retreating back to another marshutka and village life, and the rest of us wandering without predisposition or intention around the city. After meandering through the park and realizing that all of the sights to be held were beholden over previous trips, the group issued a collective shrug and lemminged into the bar. The suspiciously low price of wine (3 Lari for a liter) proved a wise investment, as the red wine was dry and free of floating debris (unlike village wine) and the white wine was decent, but chilled for the first time since Georgia began, which improved the experience ten-fold. Soon, my favorite part of Georgia became the true entertainment for the evening, and the table of four men behind us invited us to pull our table alongside theirs, where we were treated with a mass of Georgian finger food, more wine, a few beers, and a shot or two of tchacha (tchacha for me at least, as I’m a guy and it’s socially uncouth for women to take shots in public. Although, in reality, I’m sure that their gracing me with a shot was to serve mainly as a distraction while they flirted with the two girls. I know my role in this social configuration). All in all, it was a relaxing hour or two where we were introduced to some of the locals, who proved to be incredibly nice, very welcoming, and truly grateful at America’s continued influence in their country.

It was here that the group took its last fraction, the girls catching a cab to their village and me off to a hostel, as all of the marshutkas had left by this time. I settled in with free wifi, a book, and the starry sky, complacent in the fact that, for the first time in nearly two months, I was alone. It was a startling realization when it first hit me, but I had escaped the typical housing structure that I am used to in America (plenty of visitors, parents, siblings, and other visitors coming and going, always offering someone to talk to), and was travelling without a cohort. It was a nice release to be able to sit and relax, to have no one to answer to, and the night slowly fizzled to a close.

I awoke Sunday morning without aid of an alarm or a day with drawn at plans, still relishing the autonomy of complete control over my schedule. It made for a lethargic start to the day over breakfast (coffee, bread, fruit, and an egg) and conversation with an affable Korean couple who had mistakenly bought tickets to Georgia and were making the best of a surprise vacation (Don’t worry, it confused me, too). When my body felt like it, I slowly packed my few belongings and started off at a slow walk, intent on finding a cup of real coffee and a bank on the 6 mile walk back to McDonald’s and my marshutka home. Trusting the locals over my ability to read Georgian scrawl on the cardboard destination plates in the windshield of marshutkas, I allowed myself to be shepherded onto a bus that set off in what felt like generally the right direction, and let the landscape pass through my inattentive eyes as FUN. blared in my iPod headphones. Slowly, I began to realize that I had been on the bus far too long and had not seen a single thing that resembled familiar territory, and so climbed off the bus to try and find someone who could generally tell me where I was going. I chanced into an English speaking 13 year old girl who was sitting outside of her family’s gas station, who rapidly switched from facial expressions of confusion, bemusement,  and genuine concern as she explained that the city I was looking for was about 45 kilometers in a far off direction (thank god I got off the marshutka), and there were no other marshutkas expected until the following morning. As she explained the situation to her confused Georgian parents, who were quick to begin laughing at me, I sighed and tightened my backpack, reaying myself for the sort of hike that I had certainly not anticipated at 2 o’clock on a Sunday afternoon. I got my general bearing from the girl, and set off along the cow-poop strewn, unpaved road. Despite TLG’s advice that hitchhiking is not a good idea, I soon flagged down two 20-something year old boys driving what I assumed to be their father’s BMW, who willingly picked me up as they sped past. They were an ecitable duo, thrilled at the prospect of having an American in their backseat, although their English was tenuous at best. They were slightly disheartened at my taste of music and baffled at my explanation that not everyone in America blasted Lady Gaga’s “Born That Way” on repeat during their road trips, but smiled nonetheless. This ride only got me a few kilometers down the road, but the boys were sympathetic to my plight and handed me a freezing cold beer, which they knew would occupy me for at least the first kilometer on my long hike home.

Reduced again to pedestrian status, I cracked the beer and savored the experience that was European travel for the 22 ounces while I covered the better part of two kilometers. Despite the friendly American flag velcroed to the back of my backpack, my hand in the air failed to hail any cars, and I began to wonder when I should tell my family that it would be a few hours until I made it home. Just as I was going to break down and call my host brother, a farmer came out of an access road amidst his flock of cows, and he was shocked to see an American pedestrian sipping a beer and singing along to his strange English music that was magically blasting from his pocket. After telling him that I was trying to walk back to Senake/ Chkhorotskkus, he smiled at the kilometers I had left on my journey, and said that he would be more than willing to give me a ride. At first I assumed that my Georgian was slipping and I did not properly understand what he was saying (considering the man’s lack of automobiles), until he took my bag and rested it on a cow, hoisting me up to take a semi-comfortable seat on the donkey that was at the head of his flock.

Just in case I did not do an accurate job painting that picture into your mind’s eye, I will recap. Having been ushered onto the wrong marshutka after mistakenly allowing a marshutka driver shepherd me onto his bus, I walked off into the middle of nowhere after being on the bus for too long and still not seeing anything familiar. A 13 year old and her gas station owning parents laughed at the fact that I had landed myself 45 kilometers away from home sans transportation, and offered me a beer for the tiring journey down a dirt road. Two twenty year old driving a way-too-nice- BMW were shocked at my admission that not everyone in America had dyed platinum-blonde hair and friends that they called Alejandro, and dropped me at the corner of the road 2 kilometers from a farmer who stuck my scrawny self on a donkey, and continued to whip said donkey as it sauntered down the road towards, I hoped, my village, fresh beer in hand (farmers come prepared). I hope that this comes to be the defining picture of my time in this strange, strange country.

Despite the fact that the donkey ride was fun, it was a very slow moving 5 kilometers, and I was beginning to feel bad for my donkey. And the farmer was out of beer. And so, with immense gratitude, I jumped off my steed, grabbed my pack, and set off at a slight jog, for no real reason than to mentally make up for some lost time. Soon enough, all problems were solved as I hailed a pickup truck that was moving in my direction, and the last 25 or 30 kilometers passed in a blur of a dust cloud, with my bouncing along in the bed of a truck that would certainly have not passed emissions or inspection back in Connecticut. I made it to the town center, about 5 kilometers from my house, and texted my family to let them know that I was alive, almost home, and stopping for something to eat. The Kinkali (doughy balls filled with seasoned ground beef) were delicious, topped off with a huge bottle of water and a cola, and accompanied by three Georgian men, very inebriated, singing classical Georgian songs and watching a small TV sitting on the corner of the bar (playing, of course, the first Twilight movie). The crowd occasionally peppered me with questions, but the lack of any English speakers and the continued intoning of the three not-quite-tenors kept most social interaction brief. That is, until the three men stopped singing and one left, stealing my phone and dialing his number, so that at some other point he can call me and we can get a beer together. I would have protested more, but the 65 year old was wasted, seemed good natured enough, and he had a total of 4 fingers on his two hands, and it was uncomfortable enough the first time he shook my hand. Finally the crowd of about 20 began to cheer again for the two main to continue their songs, who deflected to me, under the guise of wanting to hear me sing songs in English. At first I balked, sure that this was a terrible idea, but their insistences were echoed by the masses, 25 pairs of ears (including the staff who had stopped working to watch) suddenly desperate for Americana. Finally I shrugged, declined a shot of tchacha from the men for the umpteenth time, and stood to clapping and cheers. Too bad they did not realize I don’t have much in the way of a singing voice. Slightly panicked by what song I was going to sing, I smiled and thought of my brother Bobby and friend Dan Cruz, and broke into the first stanza of Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight.” I am sure no one knew anything that I was saying, but they still seemed quite thrilled to have English hurled at them in a rapid, onomatopoeic fashion, and I quickly realized how much I missed the song. Without really intending to, and certainly not being stopped by anyone else, I had soon performed all 8 minutes, and stood awkwardly as the crowd stared at me, unsure what to make of my song.

Finally I left, ready for the last few miles to my front door, hardly an aerobic even considering the 45 kilometer hike I was faced with just a few hours ago. Luck played into my hand again, and I was graced with another ride, to save my family an additional hour of worrying. This time, a large tractor left the construction site next to the restaurant, and I was allowed to climb into the enormous bucket, which carted me past the homes of my students and fellow teachers, staring at me in sudden recognition and wondering what the hell I was doing. I thanked the construction worker for my ride, and, 7 marshutka rides, one BMW, one donkey, one bed of a pickup truck, and one backhoe later, I was home.

TLG Blog 1

So I was accepted to write for the official TLG blog. I suppose even their internet is so bored that they are looking for more words to fill the insurmountable void. I figured I might as well do my part, and figured I'd throw them on here, although they are bound to not be as interesting because we have to follow prompts and the government of Georgia (supposedly) has a strong editorial hand. Enjoy

 

Tom Sheridan 23 September 2012

Georgia: Love, Live, and Chame

If you have not already heard, you will. It will be the main talking point for most of orientation training, and then will be proven over and over again when you arrive to your host family: Georgians are hospitable. Hospitable bordering on aggressive. The ‘freshman fifteen’ that everyone warns you about when you set off for college is a paltry physical undertaking to the amount of food that will be put before you at each meal, at every supra, and at random times in between feedings if your bebia finds you sitting and your hand or mouth is not occupied. Food is nearly as constant as oxygen, which is just as well, as most of the food offered by this country is delicious. “Chame” (EAT!) is one of the Georgian words that you will remember forever.

Georgia was not a land built for Dr. Atkins or the lactose intolerant, so prepare yourself for constant loaves of bread and endless amounts of cheese, much of which is made from the curds of fresh squeezed milk in the backyard. Fair warning, the cheese is often very salty. Highly addictive, but it can take some getting used to during your first few helpings. Much of the food offered to you, especially if you are placed in a village, is homemade, from the chickens and cows your host mom will slaughter, to the fruits and vegetables that are pulled right off the vine or out of a tree. Here is a small sampling of foods you will undoubtedly see in the beginning of your Georgian experience:

khatchapuri: On the surface, this sounds like a simple dish you could get anywhere in America: bread smothered with cheese and then baked. However, this is no late night Domino’s offering. There are three types; Adjaran, where the bread is formed into a boat with a pool of cheese sloshed into the middle, pulled together by an egg cracked on top. Simply rip the boat apart and dip, and the taste will distract you from the molten dairy product dripping all over your fingers and clothes. Magrule is a much more compact dish, the cheese baked in between two layers of bread, baked, and cut into slices like a pizza pie.

Kinkali: Another national dish of Georgia. This is a handmade dumpling formed into something resembling a giant, pasty Hershey’s Kiss, and then stuffed with a ball of ground beef and seasoning, and ounces of hot and delicious broth ready to bust through on your first bite. Typically, the plate of Kinkali comes with a pepper shaker to season to your personal liking, and I highly recommend going heavy.

Tsvadi: The Georgian version of baby back ribs, unfortunately minus the BBQ sauce. This dish comes in two offerings, pig and cow, and is served with slices of raw onion. The first time I had this dish was at some tiny roadside stand in the mountains leaving Tbilisi after orientation. The grill was a long, slim construction where logs were lit on fire on one end, and then the coals were scraped to the opposite side and skewers of meat (kabob-style) were laid across to sear.

The hardest thing for me to adjust to has been the coffee. There are two options for coffee, either Turkish or instant. The instant coffee is awful, not because the Georgian’s don’t make it as well as Americans, only because it is instant coffee, which shouldn’t even count, regardless of the country. The Turkish coffee is a bit like an espresso, hand ground coffee beans put into water and boiled, so that the last few sips of the chewy consistency of your mouth filling with spent grounds. The first cup is a bit weird, but you refine your technique for drinking it quite soon. If your family harvests hazelnuts in the beginning of the year, it adds quite the aromatic bump to your morning joe to take a nut, break it open, and toss it into the hand grinder with the coffee beans. The small shavings of hazelnut do not dissolve as nicely as the ground coffee, but steeped in the boiling water long enough will draw out enough scent and flavor that you might think you’re sitting in a café back home.

There are many more options for furthering your culinary experience as you continue to travel. If you take a trip to a big city, be sure to find a roadside stand where you can purchase shaurma, a gyro-style , pita pocket, handheld delicacy that is more than worth the 4 or 5 Lari that you will pay. Chile peppers are optional, but certainly complete the meal. There was one dish that my host parents ordered for me while in Kutaisi that was simply a 10x5x2 brick of solid, salty cheesed, baked in milk and covered in a pesto-ish thing. I don’t want to say that it is bad, but if a lump of cheese is the main entrée, you are bound to fill up quick as your blood slows to a faint trickle working its way through your arteries. For those who are truly adventurous, there is a pirate ship restaurant on the Black Sea in Batumi that will serve you cow brains. They were, in a word, squishy.

01 October

It was certainly a busy weekend. School came and went on Thursday with my new position as school soccer coach fully in place. I was even excused from my last lessons to go to the gym and kick a ball around with the kids, dividing the seething masses of youthful energy into two teams and pretending I was a giant amongst pygmies playing a game of keep away that led children to marvel at my ability and me to feel a bit like 18 year old hotshots who used to make themselves feel better by keeping the ball away from my 8 year old self. Friday I was even allowed to take the crew outside, and we played long sessions of keep away and small scrimmages before ending the day with a shoot out, of which I did terribly as I refuse to allow myself unleash as hard a kick as I can muster into the face of a second grade boy or girl. Afterwards, I was mobbed by 100 some-odd kids all screaming my name and thrusting pens and paper in my face, desperate for my autograph (I even signed the hands and forearms of kids who did not think ahead to bring paper). Between the autographs and the photos, I imagine this is how Justin Bieber feels like at all times – hordes of 14 year old girls screaming my name. It was exhausting.

Finally I escaped the paparazzi and jumped on a marshutka, as I was off to spend a weekend in Tbilisi with some other volunteers enjoying the maelstrom of election weekend. I met with Daylene in Senake and spent the few hours waiting for the night train hunting out a shwarma shack for dinner and a wine bar as the true Georgian past time while waiting for anything. In the end, we settled for a bottle of wine next to the train tracks, and were wildly entertained by the station manager Rezni (or something like that) who was wasted and, apparently, deeply troubled at the fact that he only spoke Georgian and Russian and we only spoke English and Spanish. All the same, language barriers did not prevent our recently married friend from trying to convince Daylene to come home with him. Welcome to Georgia. The night train came right on schedule, which I did not realize happened in this country, and 7 hours later we woke up in Tbilisi, only to jump on a marshutka and travel three hours north to Kazbegi Mountain.

The hike to up the mountain was incredible. In the distance there was a snow capped peak serving as the backdrop for an ancient monastery perched on top of our smaller mountain, and the winding trail took us stumbling up the loose rock that served as roads for the tiny village at the mountain base. People with more daring (or at least more money to burn) raced past us on horses, and my group took a communal inhalation to lament the general lack of planning in mountain climbing gear. Once we cleared the village, the woods took on a very New England feel; the leaves have begun their multicolored decay into fall, the yellows, greens, oranges, and reds dazzling our viewpoints and transported me to the woods of Tolland. The air was crisp, the looming shade had not shaken the morning chill, and the scent of fall roamed freely, nature’s Yankee Candle offering unfulfilled promises of apple pie, warm cider, and pumpkin beers at our journey’s end. While we were lost in our nostalgic gazes, the trail shook our complacency by jumping upward, demanding that we earn each step further up to the summit. The curves became sharper, separating each member of the group as the altitude and steep climbs began separating our closely knit pack. The path became more of a battle, and nature’s assault threatened to turn all those involved back around, until finally relenting just as the trees broke and we reached the top of the world, the ancient monastery sitting serenely on the side of the cliff as though asking us what took so long.

The Walk down was much simpler, gravity asking only our respect as it slowly sucked as downward, everyone careful of foot placement to save an embarrassing tumble into the dust (except, of course, for Daylene, who managed to fall twice, narrowly avoiding the booby traps of excrement piles that have come to truly define our experiences in this country). After burning through the descent (only 30 minutes compared to the 2 hours up), it was time to celebrate the only way how (universally, I believe, not just American or Georgian), with a beer and greasy meat. The only down side was jumping back onto the marshutka for the 3 hour ride back to Tbilisi, but even this turned into dinner and a show. As there were 9 of us on this hike and marshutkas come with 15 seats, we were in prime position to nearly fill the entire bus with just our group. This is a very good thing, if you are a marshutka driver. However, it resulted in massive juggling between different marshutkas, drivers kicking other people off of their busses to make room for us, which seemed to upset the apple cart in general. There was plenty of yelling and shoving, with 9 sets of American eyes staring unblinkingly from their seats, until the cops were called and everyone began to settle down. Finally an old grandmother, an octogenarian who had been the loudest of all shouters, walked on as though looking for a seat (still shouting), and finally collected all of the money from the 15 passengers and disappeared, without giving any of the money to the driver. Clearly, this woman is my hero.