My flight from Riga to Tbilisi last night was just over 1/3 full, which would have been really nice for sleeping arrangements if it was longer than a few hours' duration. The suitcase which I had asked London to send all the way to Tbilisi, bypassing a bit of hassle for me in Riga, was there. Someone was waiting for me. It was 24 degrees C, early in the fairly quiet morning dark. I was home at last.
This morning, some confusion over what time it was - an hour later than I'd been told. 8 or so Americans came to the guesthouse where I stay in Tbilisi shortly after I arrived, in the early morning, but I wasn't asleep yet. (They're here to get involved in cooking and food aid for refugees in Gori.) A car alarm ringing its changes before 9 this morning made me think for the umpteenth time of the song "If I had a rocket launcher..." So, up too early, but life goes on with that.
I hope to start posting new images of the new Georgia as soon as possible, instead of the ones from my large back catalogue which were all I had to post from the UK when the war began.
All from Svaneti today. I hope to visit it next month. Waiting for concrete news on the road between Zugdidi & Mestia, which at one point comes very close to the Abkhaz border and has had a Russian peacekeeping checkpoint on it ever since the civil war in the early 1990s.
My flight from Riga to Tbilisi last night was just over 1/3 full, which would have been really nice for sleeping arrangements if it was longer than a few hours' duration. The suitcase which I had asked London to send all the way to Tbilisi, bypassing a bit of hassle for me in Riga, was there. Someone was waiting for me. It was 24 degrees C, early in the fairly quiet morning dark. I was home at last.
All but the 2nd one (Tqibuli, Imereti) are in Svaneti. The 3rd one is at a mineral water spring near Etseri, of which there are about 1800 in Georgia (including the breakaways!). The last one's me in the village of Dizi about 5 years ago.
Soon, so soon, I return to a country which I call home but where almost everything has changed since my departure 2 1/2 months earlier. Mixed feelings about that, but mostly just a longing to be with my people again.
I know, most of these people pictures have been of Svans; but they're Georgians too. Sandwiched nicely between Abkhazia and South Ossetia, just to keep things interesting, and traditionally the most inaccessible part of the country. But for all that, well visited by tourists even up until today. I'll be back up to YOU soon as well.
What have you endured?
