Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Top 10 reasons I'm gaining weight in 2010

10. Bring on the grease...steamed veggies don't exist here, but extra butter, oil, and fat do.
9. No means Yes.
8. Katchapure...pan fried cheesy bread, a traditional Georgian dish eaten all the time
7. booze, all the time...are you kidding me?
6. Fried potatoes at every meal.
5. Weekly homemade cake...Paula Dean style
4. They LOVE their salt and sugar here. Also, I might mention everyone has a blood pressure monitor at the table...
3. Homemade apple jam...it's sooooo yummy!
2. Bread...70% of their diet. I'm turning into a loaf of french bread
1. Tchame tchame tchame!! Eat Eat Eat! Georgians don't know the word 'full'.


Bebua making me criss-cross, chug wine with the neighbor
This is an extremely loving and communal society. People here are extremely friendly, helpful, and hospitable. They absolutely love guests and they will stuff you FULL of food to show it. Actually all I hear is “Tchame! Tchame!”, which means “eat! eat!”….and they say that ALL. THE. TIME. I actually shed a tear the third morning I was here because they were feeding me so much. I thought I was going to be ill. Hahah But they honestly take offense if you don’t want to eat or you’re full.

Speaking of food, we eat a lot of the same things every day. They eat loaves of French style bread at every meal, homemade cheese, katchapuri (cheesey bread), salad (which is cucumbers, peppers, and tomatoes). They make a georgian style catsup situation, which is pureed tomato, garlic and peppers, which they eat with everything.



  Nino teaching me how to dance
They have this ‘feast’ thing that they call ‘supra’. It’s usually for special occasions (birthdays, weddings, guests, etc) but impromptu supras happen all the time. First off, at these supras there is an overabundance of food. The entire table is COVERED with food and drinks. The most important part of the supra is toasting with wine, tcha tcha, or vodka. –Really quickly let me give you a quick lesson on Georgian alchohol..most every family here produces their own wine, and they are VERY proud of it…‘Tcha tcha’ (said like cha cha) is homemade vodka that they make from the left over wine grapes. They are also very proud of their tcha tcha and they will drink it at any occasion, ANY time of day. Tcha tcha is absolutely TERIBLE…it tastes like 151 and it smells like rubbing alcohol, but they can take it down like water. Also, my family uses tcha tcha as a ‘fix all’. Anna’s foot has been hurting (I think she has a stress fracture) and they wrap her foot in tcha tcha soaked bandages…Lika had a pimple, and she put some tcha tcha on it…I’ve had a rash on my arm and bebua had me rub tcha tcha all over it…so apparently there is nothing that tcha tcha can’t do. OK back to supra… There is a ‘toastmaster’ who eloquently leads toasts and speaks about the reason that everyone is there getting together. Then each person follows suit to say a few words. This is followed by everyone chugging their drink…until it is finished. Rounds and rounds of this continue until the night is through. Usual toasts included toasting to parents, grandparents, kids, cousins, ancestors, to peace, to Georgia, to America, to friends….pretty much anything and everything. Most supras in my family usually end in traditional Georgian dancing and singing.

Bebua doing the split and chugging wine off the ground...amazing
One night Marissa came over to my house and a spontaneous supra broke out. My bebua starts toasting and having us chug one glass of wine after the other. Then he started making us criss cross arms and chug wine with different people at the table. After a while of this we were invited to the neighbor’s house for some more wine (of course) and a night of dancing. The girls in my family were teaching marissa and I some traditional Georgian dance moves, and we were doing our best to keep up. We tried to teach them some two step hahah But it was a terrible attempt. We also sang ‘deep in the heart of texas’ because they wanted to hear a ‘texan’ song. It was quite embarrassing but they loved it. This night was the first time I had seen this one particularly funny celebration dance. They put a glass of wine on the floor, dance around it, then bend over in the splits without using hands and grab the glass with your mouth and chug it. Again all of this is without hands. My 65 year old grandpa here (bebua) did this, while I watched in absolute shock. Needless to say, it was one of many fun nights here in Georgia.



A little bit of culture...


The culture here is quite strong and very interesting. Since Georgia has spent most of it’s life as a country being conquered/fought over by various empires, the people here are very proud to be Georgian. They love their language and are proud to have maintained it. Georgian language doesn’t stem from or isn’t tied to any other language in the world. Apparently there is some small people group in Spain (basque I think?) that have some similarities in the language, but other than that it’s totally unique. And I think that is in part why it’s realllly hard to learn. I struggling with all these new sounds that you have to make from your throat. Basically, it sounds like you’re trying to gargle water, without the water…needless to say,my host family spends a lot of time laughing at my attempts to pronounce certain words. Ohh I forgot to mention that there is another reason why this language is so difficult to learn. Turns out after 7 days of intensive Georgian language classes, I ended up living in specific region of Georgia called Magrelia. In this area people speak an entirely separate language (only spoken) called Magrelian. Neat. They mostly speak it in their homes and with friends, and then they speak in Georgian when they’re in town, etc. And on top of all that most people here (and especially my family) speak frequently Russian, and they are also trying to learn English. So in my house we have taken the term “spanglish” to a whole other level. There is hodge-podge of Georgian, Russian, Magrellian, and English being thrown around in the same conversation at any given time. It’s a big fat language mess and I am only 1 for 4. Eekk!

What else about Georgian people, hmmm , they all look very greek/Mediterranean-ish. Dark features, piercing eyes, LOADS of hair. This is a hairy culture that is for sure. It is not uncommon to see a woman with a stout beard going on, or at least some severe whiskers. Eek!

Monday, September 20, 2010

My Georgian Familia


Ok so let me give you the family breakdown: I live in a house with grandparents, Jemali and Sveta, and two of their grandkids, Ana (14 year old girl) and Lika (17 year old girl).

Maya, me, Lika, Ana
Jemali and Sveta have three grown kids, Lasha, Maya, and one more son who lives in Russia. Lasha is married to Sofia (everyone calls here Sopo) and they have two kids Nino (14 year old girl) and Niko (8 year old boy). They live in the city center in an apartment, but the whole family is typically hanging around the grandparent’s house. Nino has been my absolute lifesaver/translator because she speaks a little bit of English! Lasha is a police officer and Sofia is a dentist in a really nice clinic here in town.

Maya lives in a nearby village with her 6 year old daughter Nini. Her husband spends most of his time up in the Svaneti region working and he comes home when he has time off. 
Ana and Lika’s parents live in Moscow. They moved their about 12 years ago because of financial problems and the lack of jobs in Georgia. Ever since then, Ana and Lika have been living here with their grandparents during the school year, and they spend summer and school holidays back in Moscow with their parents. Pheww! Ok, we that is the general breakdown.   
Nini

Ana, Babua, Nini, Nino, Niko


Niko playing dress up with the girls
Nini, Nino, Ana, Niko

Bebia!

One of mannyyyy chandeliers in our house!


Lash and Sopo out at the park

We live in a neighborhood on the edge of town about 30 minutes (walking) from the city center. We have two story, grey cement house with a huge property behind it. Downstairs is where we spend most of our time and there is a large formal dining/living room, a good sized family room, kitchen, and the one bathroom. Upstairs there are a bunch of bedrooms and a balcony to the backyard. Oh ya, I forgot to mention that are chandeliers everywhere in this house. I mean EVERYWHERE. Basically most of what I’ll talk about (food, drinking, cultural attitudes, etc) is veryyyyy similar to my big fat greek wedding. If you’ve seen that, you’ve experienced a bit of what I’m living with. :) My room here is really nice! I have a huge bed, giant armoire spanning most of one wall, a vanity and some end tables. We have a huge garden in the backyard, fruit trees, grape vines, chickens, cows, corn fields, etc. Ninety percent of what we eat comes from the backyard, which is awesome. They even makes their own cheese, wine, and Georgian ‘vodka’ all here at home. It’s a lovely home that they have here and it’s really great to be a part of their family for a little while!

Zugdidi...my new home!



I have been placed in Zugdidi, a mid-sized city (roughly 80,000 people) located in the North West region of Georgia bordering Abkhazia. There are 17 other teachers located in and around the neighboring villages, which is great because we have a good support system here. Zugdidi is a cute little town with two main streets and a park running through the center of town. All of the buildings are less than about eight stories tall and most are about four. Most buildings are stone or cement, harsh looking structures, but are inviting and comfortable inside.

Ok so I mentioned before that splitting up from the group was really hard after bonding over the week of training. It was also especially hard because our departure from Kutaisi was somewhat dramatic. Haha So what happened was we were divided into three groups and put onto busses where we then drove to three centralized locations in the different regions to meet our new families. We stopped first in a town called Senaki in a school that looked very much like a prison. Picture a huge, disheveled cement building that looked like a bomb had gone off in it. VERY soviet looking. Anyway, I digress…basically we were all (our whole volunteer group and some Georgian families) sitting in a meeting room in the school and one by one people’s names would be called. They would walk to the front of the room to meet their families while everyone applauded. Hugs, kisses, and tears were exchanged as the families met their new ‘foreigner’. It looked a bit like an 5th grade graduation ceremony…except instead of a diploma you got a family. Then the families quickly swept our friends into cars and off to their respective towns and villages. It was really sad to see them go! But it built up a lot of excitement (and nerves!) for us to meet our families.

I was in group number two. We got to the educational resource center in Zugdidi, and were greeted by a room full of anxious Georgian families awaiting our arrival. Again, it was kind of dramatic and really nerve wrecking meeting these people for the first time. Three teachers from my school came with my host ‘grandfather’ to pick me up and they were so nice! They brought me back to their house where the rest of the family and some friends were waiting to meet me.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

7 Days in Kutaisi – Training Week

After our quick stints in Tbilisi and Batumi, we spent the next seven days in a dorm style, government training facility in Kutaisi. It was very much like summer camp, tiny beds, brightly colored walls, long days jam-packed full of activities, and bad cafeteria food. We spent 4 hours every morning in Georgian language classes, and then each afternoon in different trainings (methodology, curriculum/school structure, and intercultural). Our evenings were spent mostly in informative meetings talking about questions regarding everything from our contracts with the government to toilets. (super exciting, I know!)

Training was sort of organized chaos to present all the information, but in the end I think it was quite helpful in trying to prepare us for the ‘real world’ in Georgia. Since this program is brand new to Georgia, they are still working through lots of structural and logistical issues as they go. This is a bit frustrating at times, especially when working with a disorganized, non western government. I have to constantly remind myself to be flexible when problems arise because we all come from different working environments, attitudes, and customs when it comes to business and government.

I have to say that the best part of training was getting to know the other volunteers in my group. There are so many wonderful people here! Being in the second group was ideal because we didn’t have all the kinks of the first group, and we are about half the size of the third and fourth groups. We really lucked out because there are about 50 of us spanning a variety of ages and nationalities, and we all get along pretty well! By the end of training it was actually really sad seeing everyone split up and go to their separate towns, villages, and regions of Georgia. Our group is placed in the Guria and Samangrelo regions in the north/central western parts of the country.


My birthday fell on the last day we were in Kutaisi, so we had a nice celebration for the end of training/bdays. It included lots of singing, dancing, cake, food, wine, and friends. The whole night felt like we were at a wedding reception…we were all in a huge room with longgggg dinner tables filled with food and wine…Dance floor, live music and dj, toasting… And might I just say no birthday is complete without a huge, dramatic, fight between our program directors and some Georgian prostitutes that resulted in our quick departure (sort of expulsion) from the restaurant! Story to follow: Sooo there we all were, dancing and having a great old time. There were two big tables of Georgian parties in the restaurant also who were dancing alongside us. There was singing, traditional Georgian dancing, toasts, everything was going great! Two of the TLG training staff (Tatia and Nino) came to join the celebrations, and seemed to be having a great time. Then, all of the sudden Tatia started yelling at a group of Georgians. Arms were flailing, yelling, pointing…this is pretty common when talking to Georgians so it was hard to tell if something was actually wrong or if they were just talking about the weather. But turns out these Georgian girls were prostitutes with their sugar daddies/pimps(and we had NO idea!), and the dancing apparently got a little out of control. Nino quickly got on the microphone and announced we were leaving RIGHT NOW. Most of us didn’t even know what was going on, and it didn’t ruin the night whatsoever. After some yelling, confusion, and crying from our directors the night continued on without a hitch. We all headed back to the ‘dorm’ and continued on singing and dancing until the wee hours of our last night in Kutaisi.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Why hello Georgia, this is Cristen!

We arrived in Tbilisi, Georgia on Saturday evening, August 14th. Most everyone was super delirious from lack of sleep and 20+hours of plane travel. I was sooooo grouchy and painfully tired. When we got to the airport we were met by the Teach and Learn with Georgia staff, but unfortunately most of our luggage was not there to greet us... somehow I knew that was going to happen. I don't think Georgian Airways typically sees that much activity (or luggage). Most if our bags arrived about 4 days later while we were in training in Kutaisi.

[Me and Marissa at the Tbilisi Airport]

We spent one night in Tbilisi and then were summoned by the president himself (we’re kind of a big deal ;) to come down to Batumi on the coast of the Black Sea to meet with him. Batumi is an up and coming tourist town that is where lots of Georgians spend their summer vacations lounging on the pebble beach seaside. We drove about 6 hours in a sauna of a bus (no windows and very little a/c...absolutely miserable) to make it just in time to hear him speak. He met us in a Vegas style beach nightclub type place that was floor to ceiling in white decor and open to the seaside. Not the typical presidential meet and greet, but hey, this is Georgia!


After the quick mostly improvisational speech and some dinner, we drove up to Kutaisi where we would spend the next week in training.


[<--- Our police escort...no big deal]

[The Pres--->]