Tonight
Oh man, its kind-of late here, and as usual, I did not intend it to be that way, but I just have to write something about this evening.
I went to the banya as usual on Fridays. It was quite nice, except that I showed up a bit late – traffic was horrible (some Orthodox holiday or something), and when we got there it took a bit to get into our room.
Anyways, the banya was amazing as usual, as was the dinner afterwards. Someway through all this, I decided to call this number I found in my phone. I had a good idea that it was some Marine that I met at the Marine Ball last week, and calling, this turned out to be the case. They were a bit away from where I was, and although I wanted to see what these Marine dudes were up to (talking to them at the Marine Ball was really interesting), I went with my friends to this nice arty bar (which is kind-of rare in Tbilisi).
Almost immediately I peeled off of them. We got some beers and sat down. Then I thought I recognized this girl at a table just next to us, so I went over and asked if we had met (I forgot her name). It turned out to not be who I thought it was, but I did indeed know another person at the table, this Swedish girl who couchsurfed at my place a while ago. It turns out that she is back to study here. I met her friends. My other friends eventually joined us. We had all kinds of conversations, a lot of it was about LGBT issues actually, as well as British v. American humour and other topics.
Somehow, I managed to peel off of these friends as well eventually, I mean as they all went off home. My mom called and gave me my official GRE results. People have been asking if I “passed,” and I guess I can say “Yeah, I did pretty ok, I guess I passed.”
I started talking to some Norwegians. They are here for some kind of Court thing, they tried explaining it, but I’ve forgotten the details. By the end of the night, it was just me and some Norwegian dude in this bar, as well as the owner/bartender and his girlfriend.
Eventually the Norwegian decided to go. I had only stayed out of politeness and interest in the conversation, so I was good to go. I put on my hat and scarf and blazer and dug some clementines out of my bag and tossed them to the bartender, and left as well.
By the time I left and started walking home I saw this guy walking towards me. It turned out to be the Norwegian guy. I walked him to his hotel to make sure he could find it, and on the way we passed by a church. Our conversation turned to religion. I told him that I’m Jewish. Then he told me about his Grandfather.
Apparently 80% of the Norwegian Jewish population was killed during the Holocaust. His Grandfather was half Jewish and was lined up for a boat to head to a concentration camp/certain death. Then somehow, the German in charge pulled the Grandfather and his brother out of the line and told them to go home. And so I got to meet Tage. (I forget his Grandfather’s last name, but it was something like Judahstein, or something super, super Jewish)
It was a lot to think about walking home. I saw some people sitting on a curb. They seemed like clubbing kids. One of them was black with dreads and clearly foreign, but I’m pretty sure the others were Georgian. I pulled out my last clementine and tossed it to them.
I caught a cab not far from there. It was cracked and rattling, and went the wrong way once, but got me home for 4 lari.
I wish I had some more clementines at the moment, but I know I can buy some more tomorrow for a lari a kilo, so its ok.
P.S. looking over this I realized that I did not include some of the best stories I heard this evening, involving this character named E.J. Its probably better that I didn’t. But I can tell you if you ask.
Still Trying to Get My Mother to Write a Guest Blog Post
Another post coming soon – I’ll write up my travels from in America an on the way back to Georgia as well as the traveling etc. I’ve done since I’ve returned.
Also, my mom was recently in Georgia for a bit and she quite enjoyed herself. She took some notes, so I’m trying to convince her to write it up for me to post here.
In other news, apparently they are removing the large Stalin statue in Gori. Articles at Georgia Today and Art Club Caucasus.
Georgia has an interesting relationship with Stalin’s legacy. Many still look up to him as a Georgian who achieved a high position of power, and you can find portraits of Stalin in some homes and occasionally small statues scattered around the country. However, while I feel that Georgians on the whole don’t mind the Russian people, the August war polarized many Georgians against the threat of Russian imperialism and the former control of the Soviet Union.
There was a rumor that during the August war Saakashvili, jealous of the reverence that Stalin receives, wanted to bomb the sculpture and blame it on the Russians, leaving Saakashvili as the proud, strong leader of his own country, with no other idols to compete with.
Back to the Blog
So, I’m back in Tbilsi. And my Fulbright is over, so things are changing. One of those things is that I’ll be posting more here hopefully – keeping a record of this time of my life for myself and others.
I was just in America for a short stretch, where I got to visit my family a few friends, and help out with the Orientation for outbound Fulbright grantees.
Returning to America after about a year, I felt culture shock for the first time in my life. It wasn’t that much, and a lot of it could be explained by jetlag and flu like symptoms which hit as soon I got in (either food poisioning or something that was going around Tbilsi right before I left). The two things that struck me were the amount of cars in every driveway, and the grocery stores with all the produce – you had no idea where it was from, often it was shrink wrapped – I’m too used to people sharing rides or taking public transit and buying fresh vegetables off the street. In any case, it is nice to be back here, even though I still miss friends and family at home.
Anyways, I’m off again, I’ve had a bit of a trip here – some time in Turkey with my sister, then a bit of work here, then a weekend on the seaside – I’ll cover that later. Now I’m off for the mountains for a few days, will go to my friend’s granny’s place and then try out my tent for a night or two.
But I’ll be back soon enough.
Lack of Posts, Twitter, 10 khinkali in 10 minutes!
I’ve noticed I’ve been posting a lot less lately. I think there are a few reasons. First of all, I’ve been pretty busy at work, compiling and summarizing documents. It is now basically done, and it feels pretty rewarding. Other reasons probably include laziness, and the fact that I’ve gotten a book that I’ve started writing in.
Also, I’ve started using twitter, and have been updating that more often than my blog, just a few words as updates. Optimally, I’d like to expand upon on these in blog entries, cause some of them are pretty interesting.
A lot of stuff has been happening recently, and I have stuff I want to write about from more than 2 months ago, so I’m going to get this stuff out before more recent stuff erases it from my memory.
I’ll start with today. I went to work early-ish, partly because I’ve been sick and have been going to bed at times that are usually ridiculously early for me. So I get in and finish up that thing I’ve been working on, our staff meeting gets canceled, and so I head off to meet Stefano to do some Georgian homework before our lesson.
Lesson goes ok, we’re both a little sick and drink some cold powder in hot water during our lesson. Tim popped in and mentioned that neither of us have updated our blogs in a long time.
Afterwards, Stefo heads home, I go back to the office, check some stuff and realize my internet isn’t working and that I’m still sick, so I decide to head home too. I cross the street and wait for a bus. Busses home almost never come, but today I hardly had to wait for a 33 which I take to work often, so I presume it goes hack home too.
So, I sit on the bus for a while. After half an hour, I sortof lose track of where in the city we are, and after another half hour I realize we’ve gone past metro stops I’ve never even heard of. Sitting on the bus was nice, I was listening to jazz on Georgian radio (my new cellphone has a radio tuner), and I was getting nice and warm in my coat, but an hour was enough. I got off and walked about 10 minutes back to the last metro station we past. It was the second last station to the end of the line, almost in Gldani, this neighbourhood that I’ve only heard of in the context of a punch line of a joke making something that is incredibly far away from anything.
Boy, it looked pretty rough out there. Living in the center of the city, I’ve forgotten that pretty much every city I’ve been in gets pretty raggedy around the edges, and Tbilisi sure does. I suppose I’ve noticed it before, but it can be a little charming, with patchwork concrete buildings as each apartment does makeshift renovations. I guess I was just feeling a little down, and it looked pretty dismal.
While walking to the metro, I decided I was going to get something to eat, so I made some plans. When I got out of the metro near my house, I saw a 33 bus going by and wondered if it was the same one I had gotten off of 15 minutes before. I headed to one of the better khinkali restaurants in the city (some of my Georgian friends claim it sells the best).
I sat down and ordered 10 khinkali and a beer. Oh, yeah, khinkali, they are these dumplings, probably originally from Mongolia, they exist in some form or another all the way from Mongolia to here at least. They are the size of a small fist, with the dough coming together at the top like a nipple, filled with meat and essentially broth. You cover them with pepper and then grab the nipple and take a bit, sucking out most of the juice. 2 might be a small snack, I typically eat 6 for a meal, my record has been 13 of them at once, so 10 is a fair amount for me.
They came and I just ate 10 of them in 10 minutes, along with 2 beers. I kind of waddled home, feeling very proud of myself.
P.S. my twitter is http://twitter.com/sweenalicious
Orthodox Christmas Eve
Well, my last posts have been so upbeat, I really feel I should report on the dark side of Tbilisi. However, I have not yet encountered this dark side too much, maybe next time I’ll have some grim news or be depressed.
At the moment I am cat-sitting in Saburtalo (a neighbourhood of Tbilisi – it can be a bit rough, but I am in a posher part, near Hotel Adjara), but last night I went back to the apartment where I normally live to clean up a bit (from Christmas even!) for a dinner we had tonight with my roommate. We invited this wonderful lady Tsira who runs a guest house here. Both my roommate and I have stayed with her at one point. He was kicked out for some kind of hanky-panky, but Tsira doesn’t hold any ill feelings. I stayed with her just after I arrived here. She owns (with her husband Boris – who does hold ill feelings apparently) a house with a full courtyard and a number of bedrooms surrounding this yard. The courtyard is one of the most amazing places I’ve been, filled with plants and Boris’s ceramic art. Apparently I was the first American to stay with her. During Soviet times, the house was made communal, and families were given different bedrooms, and only recently did ownership revert to Boris and Tsira.
Anyways, we promised to invite her over to our place, along with some people I met who stay with her, and finally we got around to it. I got home about 2 hours before they were supposed to come and started peeling potatoes and cleaning. Somehow I managed to cook up kasha with chicken, some soup, and latkes (драйники in Russian), all without tasting it as I went along. I was so afraid that something would turn out wrong but everything went quite well. By the end I was so hungry that I would be satisfied with almost anything edible. I guess my cooking was on auto-pilot, but I’m still amazed that everything turned out pretty well.
I invited Tsira as well as Volf and his wife. Volf stays with Tsira, and was there when I lived there. He is German, and his wife, Mari is Georgian. He is in Georgia teaching German at a public school, while Mari is in Germany studying. It is great that they are back and together, and it was really great to have them together with Tsira at my place. When I was staying with Tsira and first met them, I just spoke Russian with them, that is just what we spoke there. Since then, it has been really interesting, seeing how we switch between common languages depending on the circumstances, even mid conversation depending on personal whims.
Luckily everyone turned up half an hour late for the dinner, so most of the stuff was prepared, I only had to fry up the latkes. It was a scene reminiscent of our Christmas brunch with our guest drinking in the living room and me standing over the stove frying up potato pancakes, swearing loudly at the inevitable cuts from grating potatoes and the oil burns from flipping the latkes. It is a little silly, just as my thumb regrew skin, and the burns on my other hand went away, I get the same injuries again. However, they are completely worth it – even just the few latkes I will eat are worth the whole process.
The dinner was amazing, such a nice meal, really Russian and Eastern European food (that is what I can cook I guess), along with s bit of Georgian touches, like some nice cheese, some wine from the corner store, and some pastries from the shop down the street. Shaman even showed up. I know I’ve mentioned him before and haven’t really told much about him, but I’ll give a fuller story later. That guy shows up every Sunday like clockwork, and will also come to every party we have even if we don’t invite him. Somehow, he just knows when there will be food and company.
The dinner ended with mint tea with honey (with a splash of cognac in it), and after Tsira left. Ian (my roommate), decided to get out a bottle of vodka, too ashamed to drink in front of her after the kerfuffle that led to him being evicted. Then most of us headed to this bar which I’ve been to a few times, enough to know the owners, and even though it has changed its name, we still call it Traffic. It used to be under renovation, but people would still go, buying drinks from the nearby grocery store. Even after it opened its doors as a real bar, people would come with non-sanctioned booze. It attracts mostly young expats, and the foreign community being small and tight enough, we all know one another.
I made a mistake a few nights ago, offering some of my non-bar purchased Ukrainian pepper vodka to one of the owners. He got a bit angry – “You are cool, but that is not cool – this is a bar, you can’t do that here. You are a guy like me, I would sneak alcohol into bars, just don’t show it.” It really cast a shadow on my evening – I was a bit stupid in doing that (I had been drinking a little), but I managed to avoid bad feeling (as Shaman would say).
A few days later (early in the evening when there weren’t any customers) I brought a bottle of cognac infused with chipotle peppers as a present for the owners, who are adventurous barmen. We each had a sip, fire running down our throats, and they approved. When I went back tonight, which is Orthodox Christmas Eve, Mark (one of the owners), mixed up a cocktail consisting of the chipotle cognac, some coke, a bit of tonic, and a slice of lemon. It was delicious and had a bit of a bite after you swallowed it. I forget the name of the cocktail that the barman made up, but it involved my name and then some SAT word. It was pretty good. I also gave them the idea of making cayenne salt for putting on the rims of drink glasses.
I gave my friend Aleko a call. He’s half British, half Georgian, very Orthodox apparently. Every time I call him, I start speaking in Georgian to see how long it takes him to realize its me, and to see how long I can hold up a conversation in Georgian. This time he was in Church, and not really in the mood for going to a bar.
Tano, a DJ and a good friend was there. He is now the bar’s Saturday DJ, and always a good guy to talk to. Apparently he has one of the largest collections of vinyl in Georgia. He came over to where we were and greeted the friends I brought, hugging Volf, who he had met before. We had some drinks and danced a bit, and I feel that’s about where the story wraps up, especially because I’m getting a little tired and I should get to bed. My right thumb has a pretty deep cut but, but I think it will be ok in the morning, and my left hand has a few big burns on it which I’m sure will be fine tomorrow as well.
I probably don’t have to go to work tomorrow seeing as how it is Christmas, so I’ll be able to sleep in. I still plan on tomorrow being productive – I’m working on creating an annotated bibliography of documents on IDPs (Internally Displaced Persons) which is quite interesting, and I’ll do some Georgian language work. We’ve gotten to verbs, and it is one of the most interesting patterns I’ve ever seen. Taking Georgian really is reigniting my love of language and linguistics, I just hope that I’ll be able to get a critical mass of vocabulary and grammar so I’ll be able to use it and learn from conversations with people.
The quickest way to my heart might just be Georgian food through my stomach
So, I’ve mentioned before the random feeling I get that I really love this place (or possibly just this world). I also get another similar feeling just as strong which I’ve noticed pops up from time to time. The fully formed thought comes into my head that I live really well, that my life is excellent judged by my standards, and compared to the lives of most other people on this world. This is a pretty humbling feeling, and I am incredibly grateful for what I have.
I’ve noticed a pattern with this particular feeling. Whenever I go out to a restaurant for food here I feel it. I sit down and eat at some place here and inevitably this feeling of complete satisfaction will come over me.
Almost every restaurant here has practically the same menu, which means I can go in and know exactly what I want without having to look at what they have. Well, then I get what I wanted, and it is a feast. Seriously, every meal I have had here is one of the best meals I have had in my life (and costs on average less than $10).
I only realized that there was this pattern a day or two ago, and I am still trying to figure out the exact reasons for the triggering of this emotion which is pretty strong and consistent. I suppose I really like food. As a quick aside to my sister who might be worrying, I’m not gaining much weight as far as I can tell.
About My Last Post
My last post seemed a little melodramatic. I don’t think that there is an impending risk of war here, it is just something we talk about a lot. Many of my expat friends lived through the last conflict here, and it was an incredible emotional burden for them. It turns out that they were in very little danger, but at the time, they had no idea what was going on. My Georgian friends also went through incredible emotional stress, with some even fighting in this August conflict. As a result of this, it is something that people are constantly worry about and it is a common subject of conversation, where people can air their conspiracy theories, or even rational thought out ideas, based on incomplete information and the unstable situation here.
I do think there will be some kind of conflict with Russia at some point. I am not sure when, or how big it will be, but I don’t think the conflict is completely resolved. There are reports of instability in the regions, notably between Ossetians or Abkhaz against Russians. The Abkhaz ran away from Georgia because they wanted to protect their culture and independence, but now they are afraid that Russia will absorb them and erase their uniqueness. Furthermore, it seems to me that neither the Russian nor the Georgian government are totally rational, in a way that their goals are directly opposed to each other.
One theory about war is as follows. Right now in Russia there is incredible instability in the North Caucasus , similar to the conflicts in Chechnya, but across a wider geographical swath. (Besides this, there are big fears that Russia is going to have widespread civil unrest because of the economic crisis.) Anyways, this theory on war is that the situation in the North Caucasus will keep heating up (as it looks like it will), and eventually the Russian supply lines to Tskinvali and South Ossetia will get blocked. At this point, Georgia, Russia, or the Ossetians might do something stupid and the conflict could explode again.
As I mentioned in the previous post, there are plenty of other theories of when this is going to happen. We’ll see. As much as I talk about it, I am not taking it too too seriously, and am not losing any sleep.
In Case of War
So, I was visiting a friend, Tomas, yesterday for coffee before this running/drinking club thing I joined (called the Hash House Harriers – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hash_House_Harriers). Taped to his fridge was a list of stuff to get before a war with Russia. He had all kinds of things on it, a lot of dried goods like rice, as well as a kerosene cooker, and all the cash from his bank account. He even put firearm (with a ? next to it) on the bottom of the list. He put Jan. 15 as the date by which to execute this list, his calculation is that there will be a war with Russia roughly corresponding with the Obama inauguration.
Meanwhile, I’ve been hearing a lot of rumours myself that there will be a war sometime around New Years, similar to the Russian attack on Chechnya a few years ago. Apparently Russian soldiers in Abkhazia have been intimidating Georgians on the border, reminding them about that attack. I know these are just rumours, but I still decided to make a list myself, entitled “In Case of War.”
I went out and bought about 20 candles, a bunch of matches, some cans of sweetened condensed milk, a few churchkhela (this Georgian food that keeps well and is high calorie but healthy-ish – nuts on a string dipped into condensed grape juice like candles, they are called Georgian Snickers sometimes), and some new socks.
I’m still going to go buy some buckwheat (grechka in Russian) and some pasta, and take out a bunch of dollars. I feel like all this stuff will come handy at some point, and I’ll use it, so I don’t feel bad for stocking up. Also, the electricity is going to get cut off at some point, even if there isn’t a war, it’s happened a few times already. About the dollars, the Georgian Lari seems pretty unstable and artificially propped up, so having USD could be handy.
I might have gotten some moonshine as well, but my freezer is already filled with it, because people keep adding to my stock faster than it would be humanly possible to drink it. Although, speaking of alcohol, I recently went out to probably the biggest grocery store in Tbilisi – Goodwill, where I got some more booze. We were just picking up supplies for the Hash event, and stumbled upon the liquor section. There were about 10 tasting booths staffed by attractive young Georgians giving out free samples of all kinds of wine, cognac, and vodka. They had some quite nice and very affordable cognacs so I bought 2 bottles to add to my cabinet. That will be nice for the cold winter days, sipping on some fine cognac, swapping rumours about when the Russians are going to come.
Tomas has a friend who also made a list of things to do in case of war. This list consists of only one thing: Go to Tomas’s house.
Love of Georgia
Today, walking out of the apartment where I am catsitting, I went past huge tables of fireworks and Christmasy decorations, old ladies selling arrays of nuts/seeds and single cigarettes. Then I noticed a guy with a few crates of soft drink bottles filled with homemade moonshine and wine, and my smile really just spread even wider across my face (I didn’t get any – my freezer at home is still full of moonshine).
So I got into the office this morning (actually closer to afternoon today), and sat down, started talking to Dan, the other Fulbright guy, also working out of my office.
“So, I had that feeling again, that I really like this country. I’m not sure why. Maybe I just like the world, well, I know I do, but I feel like I really like this place especially, but I can’t figure out why I do.”
“Well, maybe, that’s cause of all of the parties. There is always something to do, the social life here is pretty busy” he said.
This is true, and I have gotten a real great circle of friends, mostly expats, and we have a great time together, but I don’t think that is why I feel these things I feel about Georgia.
“Yeah, good point, hanging out with friends is awesome, but that’s not when I really feel I love Georgia.”
“Well, let me tell you about why I like it here. Last night, when I was taking a cab home…”
“With Pam and someone else, right?”
“Yeah, Pam and Stefano. Anyways our driver was an old guy wearing a Svan hat. When we got going I asked him [presumably in Georgia, Dan's Georgian is pretty good], ‘So, are you a Svan?’”
“The driver smiled and said, ‘No. my wife is Svan, but I’m from Racha. Have you ever been there?’”
“‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘I was in Saketsia.’”
“‘Oh!’ said the driver, ‘That is 5 kilometers from my village. Have you ever tried kvanchkhara [a type of Georgia wine]?’”
“‘Yeah I have, I liked it.’”
“‘Well, that is what my village is called – Kvanchkhara, the grapes for that wine come from my village.’”
“Then the driver promised to give me some of the wine. He is going back to his village after Easter and is going to stay there until the harvest, and when the wine is ready, he is going to bring some to me, he said that it is just incredibly delicious. I think I’ll get a trip to his village at some point.”
Well, that is what makes Dan love this place. I’m still trying to figure it out for myself.
Suprajacking: Georgian Hospitality
So, halfway through last night I had this incredibly strong feeling of really loving this country. I mean, there are things that bug me about this place, but I’m relaxed enough to forget about them, and often they are just the other side of the coin of reasons that make me love it here.
My biggest example is that when visiting Georgia you will get hit over the head with hospitality. All the time, in the most unexpected ways and places. I heard one of my favourite stories when I got back to my house to meet an electrician about a month ago. At the time, we had 3 Americans staying with us. They had gone to Gori for a day or two and had just gotten back at about 4:30 in the afternoon. One of them was sleeping in my room, one was throwing up in the bathroom, and another was about to go out for a bit to walk it off. Apparently, they wanted a drink before bed when they were in Gori but were disappointed with the night life there, so they decided to go to one of the casino/slot club places that are everywhere. Right after they get in some guy comes up to them and invites them back to his house. Meanwhile it is pretty late and they have already eaten, but are practically forced to eat another huge meal and drink enormous quantities of wine and moonshine. The next day, the guy comes and picks them up at the hotel at 9 or 10 in the morning and they go out for a breakfast of soup and cognac. Then they had a great day until they just crashed and headed back to my place.
I’ve started calling this “suprajacking.” Supra in Georgian apparently literally means ‘tablecloth,’ but gets used to mean meal or feast, which take on epic proportions here. Actually, almost every meal here I have had has been a feast. Anyways, the supra has been a bit fetishized by foreigners, perhaps because they keep getting suprajacked by aggressive Georgian hospitality.
So, yesterday after work, I went to dinner with Stefo, his parents and girlfriend Khatuna, and a friend of mine who joined us. Near the end of the meal, I got a call from Dan, the other Fulbrighter in Georgia, who is staying at our apartment now. He was at a restaurant with his real estate agent, who just found him an apartment and was spending most of his commission on a feast. The real estate agent sends his friend’s wife to pick me up.
We stopped to gas up the car, and there was a firetruck and about 7 police cars outside of the restaurant next to us. Apparently Misha, the president, was having dinner there. Our restaurant was a few doors down, this huge banquet hall with musicians at one end and all kinds of wall hangings and mirrors. It seemed a combination of nouveau riche and Soviet. The music was the same kind of mix, half soviet style songs, half popish stuff.
It was at this moment that I had the inexpressible feeling of love for Georgia. It got really weird really quickly though. I go in and meet my friend, who had been drinking (well everyone had been). He asked me if I had gotten his text which he just sent. I hadn’t gotten it yet, and he said “Well, too late.”
I went and sat down next to the real estate agent, Levan. He told me that his friend is the nephew of Ilya II, the Patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox church, and is going to be a priest in 3 months. The nephew of the Patriarch! That’s essentially the Pope of Georgia. The real estate agent himself almost became a priest once and worked in churches for a while. Around this point, my phone started to vibrate – it was the text message from Dan:
Message 11:
Bware religious
fanatics
From:+995 91 XX XX XX
The real estate agent then started saying how happy he was to have guests like me in Georgia, that “Jews have been guests in Georgia for…”
I had a moment of not knowing why he brought up Jews, but I finished his sentence “for twenty three hundred years.” Every time it comes up that I am Jewish I get this 10 minute speech on how Jews have been guests in Georgia for 2300 years, and that Georgia has some of the lowest rates of anti-Semitism, which is true as far as I can tell.
The message from Dan took on new significance, especially as Levan then asked me “So yeah, you guys killed our Saviour. What do you have to say to that?”
I supposed I should have been really shocked at this whole adventure, but I guess my life has gotten to a point that stuff like this, while not commonplace, is not unexpected. Living in Russia and traveling around the former Soviet Union I really got into a situation where I just have no expectations for what is going to happen. I bet traveling in general would do it, I don’t think it is at all unique to me, but I do think these regions are places where almost anything can happen. Maybe Russia more so than Georgia to me because Georgia has all these traditions and rituals. All of my suprajackings have had an almost routine to them, like the order of the toasts, and the praising of guests. I love them, but it becomes a bit tiresome, so maybe that’s why I was fine with the comparative novelty of being accused of killing Jesus.
I brought up points like the fact that it was the Romans who crucified him, to which Levan quoted the part where Pontius Pilate washed his hands of the killing. Then I brought up how, well, it was not all Jews who did it, maybe just a few bad apples a couple thousand years ago. This satisfied him, and he raised his glass in a toast. The first toast is to guests, so this first toast was to me, and to Israel and to Jews. Every toast afterwards seemed exactly like that as well. They respected that I am Jewish, they thought that orthodox religions could get along fine. They did not know that I am not orthodox, and I don’t think they even noticed that I ate the piles of (delicious, delicious) pork they ordered specifically for me, because they were in the middle of a huge Orthodox fast (although they were drinking and smoking which they aren’t supposed to do – their reasons for them not supposed to be smoking were pretty ridiculous).
I had some more tests on my religious education. For example: why wasn’t Moses allowed into the Holy Land after 40 years of wandering. I started in on the philosophical response about how the Jews who had been slaves in Egypt would not be able to form a healthy society in Israel. Wrong. Levan’s version of religion was based on extremely literal interpretations of the bible, which is what I’ve noticed about a lot of believers here. The soon to be priest, Dato, seemed much more moderate though, in both his drinking and the religious stuff he had, although he had some quirks of his own. Dan said how he had a girlfriend, but that I didn’t, so they started right away promising to find me a good Georgian girl. When Dato found out that one of our friends (Stefo) has a Georgian girlfriend, he immediately offered to bridenap her for him. Bridenaping apparently still takes place, usually with the consent of the girl, but still it seems a bit weird, a bit too Georgian to be true.
Well, after a few hours of drinking and toasting and talking about religion, Levan realized that he had to give his elderly mom some heart medicine. He invited us all back to meet his mom and then we were going to go to Dato’s house for more food and drinking. Apparently it is not ridiculous here to wake up one’s elderly mother and children at midnight for impromptu champagne (which Levan picked up on the way). The mom was pretty amazing, woke up, took her medicine and even had a bit of champagne. She was so thrilled to be talking to Americans (even though they considered me a Jew, not an American) in Russian and Georgian. It was pretty amazing, I could understand the vast majority of what she was talking about, understanding the Georgian from the Russian context.
She pulled out a newspaper clipping which had a picture of her from ages ago, when she was coal miner, taken with Georgia’s most famous modern poet – Galaktion Tabidze. Then she pulled out an article about how Saddam Hussein was Stalin’s grandson.
Eventually we left, we’d been there for a while, and had left the soon to be priest’s pregnant (but still drinking and smoking) wife, daughter, and wife’s friend in the car. We managed to convince Levan to stay home, and just told Dato to take us home.
I went to bed, but woke up early cause of some guy who kept calling for a Levan (it is one of the most common names here), and didn’t realize that not only was there no Levan with me but that I don’t speak much more Georgian above the level of “There is no Levan here, leave me alone!”
In the office today, Dan got a call from Levan the real estate agent. Apparently he is not supposed to drink and has blood pressure issues, although it seems like the necessity for hospitality is a higher responsibility then one’s health.
Hopefully I’ll have a post soon about my traveling, my birthday celebrations, and what I’m up to for the holidays (besides watching Pineapple Express a few more times). I do know already that I’m going to be hosting a Christmas brunch on the 25th although there is orthodox Christmas here as well. I also know that I will be cat sitting in an apartment that has heating, satellite TV, the internet, and well a cat, 4 things that my apartment is lacking. Actually 2 rooms in our house don’t have lights, so I really should go out and get light bulbs, see if I can fix that.
