Горизонт N45/826

RUSSIAN DENVER
Benjamin Cook Lourie,
Colorado
When people find out that
I have studied in Russia, they often
want to hear about my most
memorable experiences. While I
have plenty to say about my time
in St. Petersburg and it was probably
the best time of my life, when
I really want to tell somebody a
wild story, I tell them about my
time in Tbilisi, Georgia…
Our Caucasian adventure began
in Moscow. When Jack and
I first talked about going to the
Caucasus, it was sort of a joke.
To our parents, this was a trip to
a region known for frozen conflict
and kidnapping. Both of us
had always been interested in the
Caucasus, however, and before
we knew it, we were booking accommodations.
With hotel reviews
from “Dark and spooky” to
“odd location with bad Wifi,” we
weren’t sure what we were getting
ourselves into. Jumping forward,
I must say the hotel we ended up
picking, “Boutique Hotel Elegant,”
was very decent, except for there
being no windows. And it was a
bit dark, but not too spooky. The
only other guest we saw was an
Arab, which we assumed based
on his outfit. We only talked to
him on the last night when him
and his entourage, upon hearing
we were from America, asked if
we knew where to get some weed.
Our hotel was not the only one in
Tbilisi which had a name that was
a random combination of appealing
words. My personal favorite
was “Bonus Hotel.”
Before leaving, we tried to
learn some last minute Georgian.
We learned one phrase: me mesmis,
which was utterly useless as
it means “I understand” in a language
that we don’t understand. It
took us the whole trip to be able to
say gamardjoba, Georgian for hello.
We waited until the last minute
to figure out how to get to the airport
in Moscow and we ended up
with one hour from the time we
arrived at the airport to make our
flight, half of the American convention
of leaving two hours, but
somehow we made it. The whole
trip was full of these moments,
where looking back I don’t quite
understand how we got by, but
somehow we did.
As our plane descended and
the rolling green hills of Georgia
came into view, a Caucasian tune
Colorado Russian Newspaper published in English 720-436-7613 www.gorizont.com/rd
from the opening credits of Segei
Bodrov’s “Кавказский Пленник”
popped into my head. Waiting
in line for customs, we began to
understand how unprepared we
were. My bank had told me my
credit card may not work in Georgia
due to high fraud risk, so there
was a chance I would have no
money. We also weren’t sure how
to get to our hotel, or whether to
use Russian or English. At this
point, we had fully embraced the
idea of “авось”. I put my debit
card into an ATM hoping that
I could get some money, and everything
worked fine. I was surprised
to find I could even withdraw
US dollars. Just like home!
I had no idea about the price of
things in Georgia, like a taxi ride
to a hotel that may or may not be
an internet scam. Since we didn’t
know the name for the Georgian
currency (the lari) until later, we
began calling it “bork.” It sounded
Georgian to us.
When getting a taxi, we found
out that Russian would be more
useful than English here. We told
the taxi drivers where we were going,
and they began to debate with
each other in Georgian. We were
quoted a price, but I was expecting
to be ripped off. Fortunately
my fears were unfounded. When
American in the Caucasus
our driver began talking on the
phone, pulled off the highway to
a gas station without warning,
and got out and started talking
to someone, my irrational fears
crept up again. Big surprise: he
just needed gas. We explained that
despite speaking Russian we are
Americans, and our driver told us
through a thick Georgian accent
that the highway we were on was
named after George W Bush. Jack
and I were amused to find out that
one of our least popular presidents
had a highway named after
him in this small Caucasian country.
In addition, there was a large
picture of Bush greeting everyone
coming into the city. For the first
time in a while, we were happy to
be Americans.
7
Jack and I arrived at our hotel
and were surprised to find that
the hotel looked as it did in pictures
online – with gaudy decorations
and all. Our expectation
that something would go wrong
proved to be unfounded once
again. We dropped off our bags
and set out. We set out to explore
the city and ended up on the colorful
Rustaveli Avenue, Georgia’s
version of Nevski Prospect.
Among beautiful buildings, cafes,
hotels, churches with their signature
cone cupolas, and shops,
one of the most noticeable things
was the anti-Saakashvili posters
all over the place. Although we
couldn’t read them, the disturbing
ones made us uncomfortable, and
we got the point. We quickly fell
in love with Tbilisi, “the city that
loves you,” as signs reminded us.
Tbilisi reminded me of a Mediterranean
city, the Middle East, and
Europe, all at once, which makes
sense as it lies at the cross roads
of all these regions There were
also several “quirks” particular to
Tbilisi. For example, there were
popcorn vendors everywhere you
turn. There is no way they can eat
all that popcorn. There was also
what Jack and I referred to as “lavash
holes,” where there would be
a little window low in the side of
a building, which lead down into
a basement with a baker poking
out trying to sell lavash. Or maybe
they were just yelling at us; we
wouldn’t know the difference. It
is hard to come up with words
to describe Tbilisi – there really is
nowhere else like it in the world.
You can find every single type of
architecture imaginable there –
from art nouveau to modern, all
built into the rolling hills of Georgia.
When an old man in ragged
clothes approached us asking for
bread money in Russian, we realized
that people must be assuming
that we are Russian. This was
a theme of the trip – we seemed
to speak Russian too well to be
Americans, but we also spoke
English well. No one seemed to
believe us when we claimed to
be Americans, and no one knew
which menu to give us. As we
continued back to the hotel, we
passed by a sign that said “The
American Corner.” That seems
interesting and like a potential
trap, we thought, so we decided
to investigate. We found our way
in and ended up in a shrine to everything
American. There were
pictures of Obama, Bush, and Regan
on the walls and pictures of
US forces in Iraq. We explained to
a woman working there who we
were, and she seemed to care less.
A boy behind a computer abruptly
turned to look at us, and just as
abruptly lost interest. At the time,
we thought Americans must be
pretty rare in Tbilisi, considering
most Americans don’t even know
Georgia is not just the name of a
state, and were confused by their
indifference to American visitors.
Later we found out we were neither
uncommon nor special here.
Back in the US, Jack had a
habit of dating girls from Georgia,
which meant he had many people
he could ask where to go and what
to do in Tbilisi. Based on their recommendations,
we picked a restaurant
for dinner. We knew that
we wouldn’t have Wi-Fi once we
left the hotel, so we took screenshots
on our smartphones of the
map. Once we set out, we would
be without the comforting support
of Google in case we got lost.
As we crossed over the Mtkvari
River that cuts through Tbilisi, we
agreed that the US should be supporting
Georgia. From our five
hours of experience in the country,
we had determined that this
country genuinely wants democracy.
The way that every taxi driver
tried to convince us to repeat
business with them reminded us
of the “western entrepreneurial
spirit.” Using our screenshots, we
came to where we believed the
restaurant was supposed to be, but
it wasn’t there. We searched for a
while, but this was difficult given
that Tbilisi is inexplicably dark at
night. There was little to no lighting
on the streets, and after passing
through several creepy, unlit
allies, we decided to abandon
looking for this non-existent restaurant.
Eventually, we found a promis-