The Magic of Borjomi

To be honest, this blog is a little boring.  It's almost entirely a recap of a weekend hiking, with little insight into my life or thoughts on Georgia.  I hope you like it, but if you're bored by it, I apologize.  I'm adding pictures, but words and images both fail in their attempts to capture the magic of Borjomi.

Now that it is spring, people are coming out of hiding.  Last Friday, when I went to catch my marshrutka to Tbilisi, I think I saw at least half of the male population of my village loitering around the main square.  Granted, they’re digging up main street and also building a new Public Service Hall, plus there were about 5 taxis in the center, but that still did not account for the excess of employable males who were there.  Now my daily walks include seeing several students.  When I walked by the park this evening, I saw several mothers with young children there, a sign that summer is surely just around the corner.

main street of Manglisi all torn up

 As a result of the lovely weather, I decided it was time for another adventure in Borjomi, or more accurately, Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park.  It takes up somewhere around 2% of Georgia’s land mass, is the site of my favorite sight in Georgia (the sunrise from the last time I went camping there), and has a decent tourist infrastructure for hiking.  This time around, however, I was more prepared.  One of my friends, who loves botany, was more or less the guide for the weekend.  On Friday night, he, I, and four other friends started our journey.  He gave us a few basic lessons along the way, like stinging nettles hurt but make good tea and sorrel is delicious.  We also stopped at the ruins of a 9th(?) century church along the way.

We made it to the base of the mountain we were going to climb on Saturday and made camp.  Since we had originally planned on making it to a shelter before time got clearly away from us, we decided no one wanted to carry a tent all weekend so figured the open stars were a good enough covering.  While this idea seems fitting for such a beautiful, magical place as Borjomi, it was perhaps not the most sensible idea in drizzly May.  Thankfully, it rained only enough to make us so thankful it did not rain more, and to get everything cold and damp.  We still got a roaring fire going that night and enjoyed a delicious dinner of cooked potatoes, onions, and cabbage.  Some of us also had some vodka to make sleeping on damp ground easier, and it worked like a charm, especially since I had optimistically left my jacket and anything warmer than a thin long-sleeve T at home in the village.  I only woke up once, realized my sleeping bag’s zipper didn’t work, inwardly grumbled about the cold for a few minutes, and then woke again several hours later, wondering who was shining their TLG phone (with an incredibly handy flashlight) at me until I realized that was the sun, and I had survived my first night sleeping under the stars.  Not all my friends were so “well-rested”, so one decided to head home instead of camping, and the rest grudgingly broke camp for our hike.

The first part of the climb was possibly the hardest-steep switchbacks that made us stop probably as much as we hiked for the first hour or two.  Still, it was hard not to marvel at the green beauty of it all.  We got to our night’s shelter around 2, and two of the girls decided they were done for the day, while two of my friends and I decided to finish our intended climb to the top of Mt. Lomi.  I was sore, but I was not about to be so close to climbing to the top of a mountain and backing down.  Shedding our bags, we started climbing along the green trail with more wildflowers around us.   

Two of us headed over to a small church that gave us a view of the valley around Marelisi and Kharagauli, two villages nestled into the park.  Then we walked back to our waiting friend and headed up to the top of the mountain.  My stubborn pride was the only thing that kept me going as my legs cried for rest after about every few feet.  I slowly, very slowly, made it to the top. 

But, that’s ok, because I made it; I CLIMBED A MOUNTAIN.  Yeah, that felt really good. 

Photo documentation of me at the top of Mt Lomi, not the beauty of the area

The view from the top was spectacular.  Mountains and valleys, forests and snow, surrounded me, topped by perfect clouds.  I took pictures but they can’t even begin to capture the beauty of Borjomi, which makes hiking the trails even more worth it.  Eventually we climbed down and chatted as we built a fire.  We went to bed soon after the sun, deciding to wake up at 6:30 to ensure we had time to hike down dreaded trail 6, which had spelled doom for me the last time I was here.

We were cold inside the tourist shelter and so lit the fire in the stove there, but one of my friends woke up in the middle of the night to smoke (inhalation), so she extinguished the fire and saved all of us girls from carbon monoxide poisoning.  We were cold, but alive the next morning.  After another feast including my remaining half jar of peanut butter and halva, we started down.  We were making great time and not feeling too exhausted as we mostly had to hike down, when I made a stupid decision.  Instead of letting us all slink back together at a turn, I thought my friend in the rear saw us turn and had us keep going.  Realizing we had lost her delayed us an hour and made the rest of us all feel very guilty.  Thankfully, we were able to reunite and face the dreaded downhill of trail 6 together.  This time my leg was acting fairly normal so I only fell once, instead of about 9 times, and made it down in one piece.  I was worried, as always on Sundays, about making my marshrutka home, so a friend and I split off early and headed to the exit without our friends.  It was strange, as it meant I had to say goodbye to a good friend in the middle of a forest, on a narrow switchback trail.  Still, the other friend and I were able to make good time through the easier part of the trail, despite the onslaught of rain.  She decided it was God’s way of giving her a shower so she could still make it to church in Tbilisi, since she had not been overly enthused about showing up to a church full of expats after a weekend of hiking and no shower.  The rain had abated by the time we made it to the road, but it and the ticking clock made me decline the 2 offers from cattle herders to share in their food and drink.  (Thankfully, the friends we had left behind were able to share in the herders’ bounty and ended their journey with a well-deserved shot of chacha.)  When we got to the main road, I tried to flag down the next marshrutka to Borjomi, but it sailed on by.  A car behind it stopped and agreed to take us to Borjomi.  I had not tried to hitch a ride; Georgians are just that nice, and I’m sure two wet backpackers looked in desperate need of ride.  The man turned out to be Turkish, so I couldn’t rely on my Russian and had to resort to my abysmal Georgian.  He got us where we needed to go, and we got the marshrutka back to Tbilisi I wanted, after cleaning up and returning our sleeping bags at the BKNP information center.  We had a bit of time to kill in Tbilisi, so my friend and I feasted at a Georgian restaurant, having deserved our khinkali and lobiani.  It was also a good chance to reflect on the weekend and chat one-on-one with my friend before she headed to church, and I headed to the train station for my marshrutka.

I considered it a great victory when I could walk home that night and could walk without wincing yesterday. While the original idea had been to go so we could see the rhododendrons in bloom, they were still not blooming.  Still, the adventure was a success, because many things were in bloom, we all had fun, and no one got severely injured.  I got to test my physical and mental endurance, gaze upon one of the prettiest places I know of, and get to spend some quality time with some good friends.  Here are a few pictures that begin to showcase the majesty of the park.

Speaking of good friends, I am getting two visitors in the next two weeks.  This weekend, a friend from Izhevsk, who is Korean and currently working in Baku, is coming to Tbilisi. I am a wee bit nervous about speaking to her only in Russian, but I’m also excited for the challenge, to see her again after three years, and to show her around one of my favorite cities in the world.  Then, a week from tomorrow, my best friend from America arrives in Georgia for five days!  I’m pretty pumped but also have a little trepidation as to how she will react to my life here in Georgia.  I’ve already realized that my host family’s toilet will require about a five-minute explanation alone.

Just When I Think I’ve Got Things Figured Out…

…Georgia is more than happy to remind me that I’m wrong.

When I taught in Russia, the other ETAs and I would frequently discuss, for lack of a better word, Russian karma.  If things had been going really smoothly for a while, we would start to get nervous, as we knew the other shoe was about to fall.  Things can only go so well in Russia for so long before a catastrophe happens to even things out.  In America, when things go well, we accept that as a reward for hard work or God smiling on us or something else supremely positive.  In Russia, it made me suspicious.  On the other hand, after a string of frustrations and problems, I began to await something good to happen.  You may scoff, but this philosophy of Russia’s vindictiveness and karma was surprisingly accurate.

I know Georgia is not nearly as vindictive, but it still seems to run on different rules.  Georgia isn’t so upset when things go well, especially since I am regularly overwhelmed by the generosity of Georgians.  Georgia more just likes to remind me I haven’t figured the system out, probably because there is no system.  Check your logic at the door.

I know this, and I try to plan for this or accept it when it happens.  But, sometimes it surprises me.  This happened at least twice this weekend.  The nice thing is that Georgia’s surprises always have a silver lining, and sometimes the change is better than the original plan.

The first time I was surprised was on our train to Borjomi.  We were going to take the marshrutka (van), but when we found out that the train was ¼ of the price, even if double the time, my love for Georgian trains combined with everyone’s love of saving money to make us all take the train.  5 hours on a train made us decide we needed supplies, so after buying them, I finally realized we had 6 minutes to check out, run up 3 flights of stairs, find our platform, run down those stairs, and get on the train.

Somehow, we made it, or at least, we jumped onto the train.  This is where my knowledge of Russian trains failed me.  I figured we could easily walk from whatever train carriage we were on to the one where the rest of our friends were.  Then I realized the train was PACKED.  All the seats were filled, as was all the space usually used for walking.  The area used generally just for entering and smoking had several people in it.  The train started moving, so we were stuck.  Having men flick the ashes off their cigarettes near my face made me immediately regret not taking the marshrutka.

However, my lesson about assumptions learned, Georgia made the situation better.  The man collecting tickets figured out I was American and eventually ordered me to follow him, into the main compartment of the carriage, and into what I thought would be a toilet.  Instead, it was a small room about the size of a train toilet with only 2 women in it…and a seat!  They gave me the seat, and I eventually struck up a conversation with one of the women in Russian.  I learned she was from Gori and asked her if she liked it, since she had only moved there after she had gotten married (albeit about 18 years ago).  She said she didn’t like it until the war (the brief 2008 war with Russia).  She’s a doctor and was working in either an ambulance or the emergency room.  They were bombed during the war, as Gori was a serious battleground, since it is Stalin’s hometown and close to South Ossetia.  She talked some about the war and said that it made her fall in love with Gori.  Since 2010, she’s worked for The Georgian Center for Psychosocial and Medical Rehabilitation of Torture Victims, an organization that helps rehabilitate people affected by the war.   She said she loves what she does, and listening to her talk about her life demonstrated that.

The conversation made me thankful for knowing Russian and for being in Georgia, as conversations like that are some of my favorite parts of being here, especially because they come as such unexpected treats.

When the doctor and other girl in my tiny compartment left, my friend joined me, and we enjoyed relative peace and quiet until the train cleared out enough for us to reunite with the other 13 friends on the train.  The rest of the journey was great.  We found our homestay and 2 other friends easily enough and then headed back to the train station for dinner, as a really great restaurant was there.  One of my friends ordered a bunch of things for us, so between the feasting, village drinks people had brought, Georgian birthday party filling the other half of the restaurant, we had a supra/dance party.

We were going to wake up early to take the 6:50am scenic train up to Bakuriani, the ski resort, but we all rethought that decision for various reasons.  After being treated to eggs for breakfast, we took a marshrutka to Bakuriani, a winter wonderland.  People go there to ski, but a couple friends and I opted to explore the village a bit and take advantage of the outdoor skating rink.  They don’t have zambonis, but rather men with giant metal sheets with handles who brush the ice to the side.  They did this before the rink opened and then continued, as we were skating in fairly heavy snowfall.  After an hour, we met up with the first casualty of skiing at a Ukrainian restaurant where she had already made friends with some Georgians.  More friends gave up on skiing and joined us, so I spent the rest of the day in the café and another 30 minutes on the ice.

I’ve never even tried to claim I was a good cook (although I do make a mean chocolate chip cookie and am proud of my various attempts at guacamole), but I dearly miss getting to make my own nutritious meals.  Thus, I suggested we utilize the homestay kitchen, cook something healthy, and enjoy the 6 liters of wine some friends had bought at the Poti bazaar for a whole 12 lari.  It was a huge success.  There were 18 of us in a tiny kitchen, eating, drinking, and talking.  It was like a slice of home with Georgia’s distinctive stamp on it.  We offered several toasts, had no problems making do with 18 in a small room with only small plates, and all enjoyed ourselves fully until the lure of bed, however cold, sent us away.  Getting to indulge in and share the joy of Russian food I missed made the night even better, as we had гречка and veggie икра.

We had a leisurely morning until we headed back to Tbilisi, where I got to introduce my friend to her first schwarma ever.  (On a side note, I am baffled as to why the US does not have schwarma stands/trucks all over major cities.  They’re great, cheap, and easy to eat on the go.)  We also got accosted by several beggars and a wino, which felt weird for Georgia. I think they were taking advantage of the sunny and warm weather like we were.  Well, warm really means not that cold.  I walked around with friends until I needed to head back for my 6pm marshrutka.

This is where Georgia taught me not to become complacent.  The last marshrutka should leave at 6pm and has countless times.  For a while, I was told it might leave earlier, so I would get there at 5 or close to it and slowly freeze until 6, when the marshrutka actually left.  The last few weekends, I had cut it close but made it in time for the 6pm departure. I arrived 10-15 minutes early only to be told I was about 5 minutes late.  I may have even seen my marshrutka leaving. 

Regardless, I was told I had no recourse but to wait until 10 or 11 the next morning to head back to my village.  I was frustrated, having missed the marshrutka not because I was late, but because I wasn’t extra early.  One of the men explaining to me I had no other choice but to wait until Monday to go home then walked with me out of our little marshrutka yard.  He chatted with me for several minutes and then took my information and gave me his number.  He said if I couldn’t stay with my friends, I could stay with him.  Before any of you flip out, this is Georgia, and this is just an example of Georgian hospitality.  He also assured me he had a wife and kids at home, and he looked to be at least my parents’ age, if not older, so I was not worried.

I still decided to stay at a friend’s apartment, after calling my host mom.  I asked her if I could go home in the morning with my host grandpa, who daily brings bread from Tbilisi to Manglisi.  She called him and then told me he was not sure he was coming since the road was closed and may not be open in the morning.  Being American, I tried to figure out if he would know in time to let me still go with him.  She told me my host sisters would simply tell my director that the road was closed so I couldn’t come back and told me not to worry.  I knew that this wouldn’t be that big of a problem in Georgia, but I still felt bad.

Her words worked their magic.  I decided to treat myself this morning to hot chocolate at one of the fancy cafes I have up to now avoided for fear of the cost.  It was not as painful as I thought, and I basked in the joy of good bread, delicious hot chocolate, fast WiFi, and lots of ambient English.  They even gave me a free gift of some dried bread (think large croutons that dip excellently into tea), which made my return certain.  I also bought myself a Russian spy novel called “Breakfast with Polonium” to help me work on my Russian.  I soaked up the sun and good weather until my feet told me I had to go home.

When I came home, I was informed that school had been called off after a few lessons because of the cold.  Although I still would have been able to teach most of my classes before school was canceled, I can definitely say that Georgia gave me a much better day than teaching in a freezing-cold school would have been.