Georgia (Sam)

(Sam) Our bus from Yusufeli to Hopa was uneventful, as was our taxi from Hopa to the Georgian border. Upon arrival at the border we lined up to be stamped out of Turkey, with that finished we walked 500 metres to get stamped into Georgia. We were stamped in no problem, check our passport, compare our photo, stamp the passport and “Welcome to Georgia”. The first thing I noticed once across the border was the soviet built Lada cars parked on the side of the road, the second thing was the weird Georgian script that I would be learning and third were the cows that roamed free like in India. Georgia is an interesting country. It does not feel as modern as Turkey, and it's Soviet history is very apparent, whether it's the Lada cars, the apartment blocks, the statues of Josef Stalin on many street corners or the 5 dollar a litre Vodka. The reason that the Stalin statues remain (even when the country bears no trace of statues of Lenin) is that Stalin was a local lad, who became the leader of one of the most powerful country’s on the planet. When we arrived in Batumi the first thing we did was go to a restaurant to look at the map of our Batumi on the computer. When we walked in with our big bags everybody stopped and stared at us, not used to backpackers in the part of the world. When we sat down they all returned to their food and the man at the table beside us said “Welcome to Georgia”. We talked a bit and found out that he was from Iran and here on holiday.

June 5^th and 6^th 2011

Our 7 hour ride in a “Marshutka”(15 seat minibus) was uncomfortable but it worked, as we are now in Tbilisi. Our bus driver was a bit of a speed demon and driving in Georgia was the same as in India but twice as fast. Anyhow, Tbilisi is an interesting city, the old town is very nice, but not very upmarket, it looks like it's all falling apart. The cliffs along the river are littered with nice old churches. We wandered up onto the east bank to visit the massive cathedral, home of the Georgian orthodox Patriarch. The cathedral was very big, the floor space was not very large but the ceiling was incredibly high, it looked bigger from outside though.

June 8^th

We woke up early today, had muesli for breakfast and politely declined the slurring Russian's offer of “Do you van' drinkin'?”. We walked down to the metro, went 3 or 4 stops to Didube bus station. Upon arrival we were questioned about our destination by a taxi driver, we told him we were going to Gori, but not by taxi. He said that was fine and that he would show us to our Marshutka. He took us there and told us that the cost would be 10 Lari each, knowing that that price was insane we walked away, however the bus driver came running after us yelling “5 Lari! 5 Lari!”, so we went back, confirmed with a few other passengers that this was indeed the right price and started on our way to Gori. In case you didn't know, Gori is famed for being the birthplace of Josef Stalin, feared dictator of the USSR for over a quarter of a century. Our reason for visiting Gori was to see the Stalin Museum which is beside Stalin's birthplace, a small mud brick house, protected by a temple like structure in a park where all the other houses were demolished. It was fairly expensive to visit the museum, 15 lari each including mandatory guide. The best way to describe the museum was “Weird”; it told the tale of a poor local boy who helped defeat the tsar and was one of the key figures of 20^th century politics. Not that of a repressive dictator who sent millions of people to their deaths. The tour went a bit like this - “ThisisapictureofyoungStalinthisisapictureofStalinwithLenintheseareStalinsschoolbooks etc.”.One weird room was the room that contained gifts to Stalin from foreign countries, Stalin's coat, boots and the furniture from his office in the Kremlin. At one point I accidentally lent on one of the chairs, it gave me the chills thinking that Stalin and countless other famous politicians had sat in that exact same chair. The creepiest room is empty other than a circle of columns surrounding a pedestal on which sits one of Stalin's nine death masks. A more realistic room was the “Room of Repression” It talked a bit about the Gulag but it never blamed Stalin directly, just the Bureaucrats who directly sentenced the “Spies”. After our dose of reality we left the museum building and visited Stalin’s birthplace and childhood home, which was fairly humble considering his future. The most interesting part of the museum was probably Stalin's train carriage. We took a photo of Stalin's toilet and I got to sit on his bed. It was amazing to think that this carriage brought him to the Yalta conference and many other conferences and key occasions in 20^th century politics. With our museum tour finished we went for a walk around town. On our walk we noticed the square apartment blocks,wide streets and old cars. It was exactly what we would have imagined the soviet union to have looked like. We also noticed the bullet holes in all the buildings, left over from the 2008 Russian invasion.

Yalta Conference

Kremlin furniture

Entry hall

Stalin's house

Stalin's toilet