Country Mouse in the City

When I was here before, another friend and I who lived in villages used to joke about being country mice, especially when we would visit our “city mouse” friend.  After living in the village, living in Tbilisi has been a bit of an adjustment, but generally a very positive one.  I had to get used to Georgians who had nice things and weren’t uber rich.  I found out that it was possible to have a car in Tbilisi without a cracked windshield.  People on the marshrutkas frequently have fancy smartphones, although I’m still not sure how they afford them.

Tbilisi at night-I love this city a little more every day.  The city is beautiful at night, made even more so by the fact that not that long ago, there wasn't electricity to keep it lit at night.

Public transportation in general was something I had to learn.  Before, I would basically stick to the metro (subway) since it got me most places I needed to go and it was easy to understand.  A few months before I left, they installed digital signs at bus stops showing approaching bus numbers and their general destination, as well as approximate arrival times at said bus stop. The signs are in Georgian and English. It revolutionized the bus system for me, making it possible to use them.  Thanks to a handy website, I now know which marshrutkas run along paths I frequent, so I’ve started to use them too, as they are faster and more comfortable than buses.  It also requires me to use a bit of Georgian, but after the first few times, it got pretty easy, so now I feel like I’ve mastered public transportation in Tbilisi. That means, of course, that I’ve only gotten on the wrong bus or marshrutka a few times, but I’ve always figured out where I was.

The problem with public transportation is that it actually takes me a while to get places.  I used to think everywhere in Tbilisi was close, but then I realized that I stayed in one section of Tbilisi.  Now I live at one end and several places I like to go are at the other.  This is city life, I suppose, spending hours in transit.  It never took that long to get anywhere in the village.

I actually went back to my village for a visit soon after I arrived.  It was wonderful and terrible at once.  It was wonderful to see my old host family again, to walk the same streets, to breathe in the cool mountain air.  Walking around the village, I got to see a few former students and several colleagues, which was great.  I loved being able to show off my new Georgian skills, although they did not last very long.  I also loved hearing that the volunteer who replaced me was not liked nearly as much as I was.  Since he didn’t even know Russian, he did not really communicate.  I never met him, but I both pity him and am more than a little glad he wasn’t a better volunteer than I was.  The problem with going back to visit was that after a few minutes, I did not have much to say.  I exhausted my applicable Georgian quickly.  I didn’t get married in the last year and my brother still doesn’t have a kid, so basically they decided nothing new happened in my life.  I got fed a lot, quickly remembering how I had gained 25 pounds in a year, but you can eat only so much.  So it was boring.  And then, it suddenly wasn’t boring because my host dad decides we should have a mini supra to celebrate me coming home.  I actually got roped into two in the weekend I was there, even though I almost never experienced supras that weren’t connected to birthdays in the year I was there.  While it is in some ways so nice that they toasted me and told me I was their fifth child and always welcome, it was also uncomfortable because I rarely drank with my host dad and his friends in the year I lived there.  Also, trying to navigate the world of drunk drivers without offending people who treat you like their own child is awkward.

With my former host sisters

 I had forgotten what it meant to have someone else be responsible for me.  In many ways, it was great and made my life in the village easier.  However, I like my autonomy more than most people, and I had forgotten how much I give that up in the village.  Someone else decided when I would eat and where I would go.  Sure, I could have thrown a fit, but I was a guest, and these people had cared for me for a year.  I’m definitely glad I went back to see them, but the country mouse no longer prefers the country.  In Tbilisi, I have more control.  I can relate to the people I meet more.  I have an existence closer to the one I’m used to living than the one I had in the village.  And I like it.  If only it wasn’t going so quickly.

With my former host parents.  I'm pretty sure in a year of living with them, I never got a picture with both of them.