Last week Wednesday, I got up early in the morning to take a 7:30am marshrutka with Professor Derluguian from Yerevan to Tbilisi. We got to the avtokayan (bus station) a bit after 7am, and while Professor Derluguian was exchanging phone numbers with our cab driver, I went to find which marshrutka was ours. It turned out to be the first one sitting there--a new, bright red Ford van with Georgian plates (as I was later informed, it's much cheaper to register a foreign-made vehicle in Georgia than in Armenia...because Armenia wants to protect its domestic producers. Except there aren't any. So it's only protecting Russian producers.)
There ended up being a total of 5 passengers in the marshrutka--meaning I got an entire row to myself. (We did, however, pick up and drop off others along the way, but there were 5 of us starting in Yerevan and going all the way to Tbilisi.) This was my first trip further north than Aparan (which is about an hour north of Yerevan) so there was a lot to look at out the window! I have about half an hour of out-the-window footage that I have every intention of editing into a road trip video...
We drove through Spitak, which was the town near the epicenter of the devastating 1988 earthquake. You can see a few ruins, but there are also a lot of new buildings there. You can also see the prefab "temporary" housing that people are still living in over 20 years later, despite having been promised new apartments.
Not far outside of Spitak, we stopped for kebab. This was at about 9:30am, and presaged what was to become a theme of this trip--the incessant consumption of meat. But the kebab really was quite good...
We continued on our way north into what I'm fairly certain is copper mining country. At any rate, the rocks were the green color of oxidized copper, and you could see these long wooden slides coming down from the mountains ending above the river. Somehow I suspect the mining practices are not terribly environmentally friendly.
Then we got to the Georgian border and piled out of the marshrutka to get our passports stamped. Once out of Armenia, we passed through the no man's land (a short stretch of road) and came to the Georgian side of the border. It's immediately apparent how Georgians are modeling themselves after Americans. The border guards are all wearing uniforms that say Police on them in English, and except for the fact that they're speaking Georgian, they would not be out of place at any border crossing or airport in the US. After going through passport control (a fairly simple process given my American passport--no visa required) I had to go through customs and run all my stuff through an x-ray machine. The guy was confused by the umbrella in my bag, but other than that, no problems. Professor Derluguian had a bit more difficulty at passport control owing to his possessing a Russian passport in addition to his American one, but in the end they let him through as well.
Then we piled back into the marshrutka and drove off through Georgia. The first village you drive through after the border is not, in fact a Georgian village--it's Azeri. There used to be a big bustling market there but it's been clamped down on. The land you drive through on the way to Tbilisi is flatter than most of what we had driven through in Armenia (though of course there are mountains around). It's immediately apparent that the climate there is milder--everything was green and growing, whereas snow had covered a good deal of the Armenian territory we drove through.
When we arrived in Tbilisi, I got ahold of Dan, the Fulbrighter who I would be staying with. Professor Derluguian and I took a taxi, which dropped me off almost immediately near the old baths in the oldest part of town. Despite the short duration of the taxi ride (for me) we still nearly rear ended one vehicle while nearly sideswiping another. This was my introduction to Georgian traffic. You know...Armenian traffic is bad. Russian traffic is bad. Mongolian traffic is downright scary. But in all of those, there seems to be some slight amount of order in the disorder. Georgian traffic is something else. It is absolutely insane. I feared for my life.
Dan came and found me on the street corner where I was standing, and we headed off to his place to drop off my stuff. He has a nice apartment with a huge balcony/porch area with a fantastic view! He's also right in the heart of the old part of the city, so there's lots of cool stuff to see! Shortly thereafter we headed off to meet another of the Fulbrighters and to have some lunch. And thus started my whirlwind tour of Georgia.
We met the other Fulbrighter (an anthropology professor) in front of the opera and went to have lunch at, of all places, a Thai restaurant. But the food was really good! Afterwards we headed over to the university for Professor Derluguian's lecture. We got there early, and stood outside for a bit and I watched the students walk by. I was absolutely amazed at the fashion differences between Armenians and Georgians. Georgians look completely Americanized--the guys wear baggy jeans and sneakers or tennis shoes...nary a sign of ironed jeans or pointy-toed shoes. I saw a number of people with backpacks too. I didn't notice any girls sporting the super-shiny stiletto boots or shiny pleather bags, or coats or jeans covered in rhinestones either. It was rather astonishing. And I even saw two girls wearing Uggs! (Not, mind you, that I am advocating Uggs as an alternative to thigh-high shiny stiletto boots. Personally I dislike both.)
But yeah...the fashion surprised me.
After Professor Derluguian's lecture, there was a fair amount of confusion about who was going where and who was in charge of what...but eventually everyone but me went out to a restaurant, while I went with Kety, one of Professor Derluguian's friends from college to her mother's apartment. She and her mother were fasting for Lent (in the Armenian and Georgian churches this entails 40 days of a vegan diet), but nevertheless because there were guests coming, they had two kinds of fish and khachapuri (which is really one of the best foods on the face of the earth. cheese is the key ingredient.) (And thus we see one instance of the title of the post: the best excuse for anything? I have a guest! Didn't call someone back on time? I had a guest! Missed a meeting at work? I had a guest! You get the idea.) There were also vast amounts of fresh "greens" (herbs such as cilantro, dill, and tarragon, as well as green onions), as well as a salad with lettuce (and then your standard beet salad and pickled carrots, cabbage, and beets. There was also homemade wine from Kety's husband, and bread and cheese...and a rice pie which was also quite tasty. And fried potatoes. It was a big meal. As I was eating dessert (this thing made from wheat and raisins and I'm not sure what else, and keks with powdered sugar on top, and apricot preserves) Professor Derluguian and company arrived from the restaurant...and thus began a second round of dinner. Afterwards, Kety's mom played some Georgian songs on the piano and there was a bit of dancing....all in all, the event went late into the night, and it was a lot of fun!!
The next morning, Dan had to go deal with bureaucratic paperwork to get his Georgian residency, and so I was left to my own devices to wander around Tbilisi. Lonely Planet in hand, I had really only made it as far as the ATM when I heard my name being shouted and turned around to see Professor Derluguian and Beppe Karlsson (the Swedish anthropologist who had invited us) waving to me. Joining up with them, we wandered back towards old town (where I had just come from, but that's okay--there's a lot to see there!) to see the sights. It was interesting...there are Council of Europe and OSCE vehicles driving all around Tbilisi...the city is also plastered with posters bearing a question mark and the Georgian word for "Why?" (under one of which a clever person scribbled "because.") These posters are protesting the Saakashvili adminstration. But I'm not completely up on my Georgian politics so I can't give you all the details.
Outside of what was, if I recall correctly, the party headquarters, there was a sign stating "Our foreign policy priority is the integration into NATO." In English.
It was also interesting seeing how outwardly religious people are--if they pass a church they cross themselves. If they're standing at a bus stop near a church, they turn and cross themselves. And as there are a lot of churches all over the place (unlike in Armenia where a lot of the churches feel hidden to me), there are a lot of people crossing themselves, all the time. Also of note--the Georgians cross themselves right -> left, like Russians do. Armenians do it left -> right like Catholics.
Then we had lunch at Beppe's house and met his wife and baby daughter, after which we hurried off to the university because Professor Derluguian had another meeting and then spoke to a class of graduate students. (I sat in on both). Then we went off and grabbed some food (I finally learned that the green herb that burns my tongue if eaten raw is tarragon...and they make tarragon flavored soda too) And then wandered around for a bit before meeting Dan again. (We had contemplated going to the opera to hear Aida, but it's a really long opera and we were leaving early the next morning). So we headed back off towards old town, where we met up with Dan's roommate, and went to a restaurant where we had some food and some Georgian chacha. Which burns waay more than vodka as it goes down.
After that, we headed back to Dan's place, and drank some more chacha (toasting of course...I forget who exactly I'm quoting here, but "drinking without toasting is alcoholism". Yeah. that's kind of the philosophy at social gatherings in this part of the world.)
The next morning, I got up early, met up with Professor Derluguian, and got in the van that would take us (as well as a Czech girl named Mirka) back to Armenia...
And I will close this entry with the legend of how Georgians got their land...
God decided that he would give out his lands to all of the peoples of the world, and so he called them all to a meeting. The Georgians were so excited to be included that they immediately started feasting, and thus came to the meeting several hours late. When they arrive, God tells them that he has already given out all of the land, and asks them why they weren't on time. The Georgians reply, but we were feasting and celebrating in Your honor! God thinks for a minute, and then says, well, I do have this one little piece of land left...I was saving it for myself, but since you were feasting in my honor, I will give it to you. And thus the Georgian people were given the land of Georgia.
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