People of Georgia

Just one photo for now. This is of my great friend Dennis Holt, from California, USA, living with his family in Georgia (thus a fine candidate for my People of Georgia series) and involved in all sorts of humanitarian and spiritual work. Yesterday he managed to break his 2 lower leg bones in 3 places while playing soccer, and this is him today, about 18 hours and 1 operation later, 5 screws and a bunch of amazing stitches into the bargain. 5-7 more days in hospital, up to 3 months on crutches, they say. But still smiling - good pain drugs, maybe? Seriously, you can't keep a good man down, and this is one of those. Hang in there, bro.

People of Georgia

More from Tbilisi's monuments and other art, top to bottom:

St George killing the dragon, watched over by Mother Georgia and her sword/winebowl combination ("Drink this wine, dear guest, or I'll cut your throat!" goes the joke, though the sword is supposed to be for enemies...). This combination of two far-apart sculptures had to be lined up quite carefully from near Freedom Square

Chased copper icon of Jesus, from the doors of Anchiskhati Church

A huge stone woman's head with an enigmatic smile, outside another of the Old City's very many Orthodox churches

The muse of theatre, near the Philharmonia

Etim Gurgi, poet who wrote in Georgian, Azeri and Armenian

Kakheti, Georgia, continued

More from the supra (table) and grapevines of the east of the country - 'tis the season.

Kakheti, Georgia

Recent digital work from my new Canon machine, a couple of days in eastern Georgia. Grape season, and a supra (table) at which there were Georgians, Ossetians, Germans and a British-Canadian masquerading as a Svan, complete with his own miniature drinking horn from Ushguli, training-wheels size, which he happily lent to the tamada, or toastmaster.

A New Book about Georgia

Just in time, while the world's attention is focused on Georgia, comes a new book from it and about it. A love story... Georgian-Russian at that. Reissued on Sept. 21 by a good friend and fellow Svaneti fanatic, Peter Nasmyth. See details at http://www.mtapublications.co.uk/ and note, incidentally, the company logo design, which I contributed during my recent visit to Peter in London. The book is also on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Timeless-Nicholas-Tchkotoua/dp/0955914515/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1220842775&sr=1-2

I'm off to Kakheti again until Wednesday. More images to follow then, stay tuned.

People of Georgia

These people, from my archives, are all memorialised, long gone. From the top:

Kazbegi (Kazbek), writer, at his village just south of the Russian border
King David Aghmashenebeli (the Builder), who united Georgia for the first time, in Kutaisi
Unidentified figure from a church wall, Mtskheta
St Nino, who brought Christianity to Georgia in the early 4th century as a slave woman from Cappadocia, Turkey, from from the huge bell at Sveti-Tskhoveli Cathedral, Mtskheta
Stalin, Telavi (I found him like that; the bird's nest was there already!)

Gori and Beyond, Georgia, Sept. 5, 2008

Gori, Stalin's birthplace, has plenty of aid coming in after its pounding during the recent Russian invasion. Damaged apartment blocks are already halfway through renovation. Tent camps provided by UNHCR are sheltering 1500 people so far. Food, mostly cooked by Italian Red Cross staff, is being distributed. So, plenty of good being done, though much help is still needed. The 2nd frame here shows Koba Subeliani, far left, a Svan, MP in charge of human rights and protection of religious minorities(!), discussing humanitarian needs with some of the people with whom I had travelled to Gori. I was delighted to meet him. Below that, a look into the kitchen where food for the refugees' tent camp is being prepared.


The bottom 3 photos are from another village, Variani, which we entered by skirting the Russian checkpoint, going in on back roads to behind "occupied territory" lines. A bomb-damaged house and some of the wreckage in a wheelbarrow, along with a boy from the house holding up a bullet and bomb fragments; and a flag-marked example of UXO, or unexploded ordinance, about the size of a hand grenade. Plenty of bad stories here, fear and nightmares.

People of Georgia

Today was the first morning since August 8 when neither Georgia nor Russia was a featured story in Google News online. Not to say that there's no news about them, however. Things continue to develop on a daliy basis. As of today it's impossible for Georgian citizens to get Russian visas in Tbilisi, for example, and likely similar in Moscow for most Russians wanting to go to Georgia.

As for today's photos form my archive: I was at the funeral of the lady in the wheelchair in January this year, in Etseri, Svaneti; the fortress is that of the Dadeshkeliani family in Etseri, featuring the tallest watchtower in Svaneti, copied in Tbilisi's open-air architectural Ethnographic Museum; the headstone (of my great friend Nodar's father) uses a photograph of mine in typical Georgian style.

People of Georgia

Only one image today - but it's the first posting from my new digital camera, a Canon EOS slr. (Many thanks, NWB, for your help with this. You've finally achieved my switch to digital!)

This is from the Georgian "Peace Chain" which was formed around and across the country on September 1 - people holding hands to protest Russia's recent involvement in Georgia and to stand for the country's wholeness. I was in the Kakheti region with friends when this was happening. It was a brave front, but relations between the 2 countries continue to deteriorate. There's now no diplomatic contact between them, requiring intermediaries for them to talk; visa requirements have changed; and of course, the flights and postal service which were restored only this March after several years' absence are cut again since the war started. Day by day things change as we wait, watch and pray.

Off for a few days to Kakheti province in the east. Back soon, stay tuned.

People of Georgia

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.

People of Georgia

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.

People of Georgia

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.

Riga Layover

24 hours in Riga en route home to Georgia.

The Russian-language Latvian newspaper I picked up on my Air Baltic flight from London indicated that, in a poll, Latvians were exactly even for and against Russia's recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Surprising only until one realises that the population of Latvia includes more than 30% Russians.

18 hours or so to go... the waiting gets harder as my arrival approaches. Only love for this place could account for how I feel.

Going Home

Today. At last.

Once I'm there, I'll do my best to continue to deliver daily NEW pictures and writing, and video too, from the new Georgia. So stay tuned.

Meanwhile, for those of you who live in or near London, UK, here's a really good Georgian restaurant to try:

www.mimino.co.uk
197c Kensington High Street
London, W8 6BA
Tel. 020 7937 1551

I was there a few days ago with old Georgia friends. It tasted as if I was back in Tbilisi, sampling the unique, largely undiscovered cuisine of my adopted homeland.

Russia Takes 2 Big Bites out of Georgia

(Welcome, those from Guam & Belarus, to the blog for the first time.)

Today Russia moved very fast, after about 16 years of holding back, formally to recognise the independence of both Abkhazia and South Ossetia. A dark day for Georgia, a bright one - supposedly - for the two breakaways, who have wanted this for all these years. The new world order continues to make itself felt across the globe, day by day.
I'll be back in Georgia in 2 1/2 days, and I can only imagine what it'll be like: gloomy and resigned or furious and riotous. But it's home for all that, a place I have chosen to live in for better or worse.

People of Georgia

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.