An Iranian gas lamp and a German vacuum walk into a room…

One of the perks of being a TLGer is getting a free phone from the government. Sure, the phones are old school Nokia blocks (you know- those phones that don’t really have any special features but retain an incredible battery life of five days) but they’re free.

I got bored with my phone last week so I used a set of permanent markers to color all over the keys. Nini fell head over heels in love with my rainbow phone and asked if we could trade. With pleasure I traded my simple Nokia for Nini’s 4G Samsung with a camera, MP3 player and various other functions.

Having the phone was one thing; using it was another story. Even after three days I still couldn’t figure out how to answer a phone call without first hanging up on people twice in a row. Plus, responding to text messages was such a hassle that I basically just stopped talking to people in mid conversation.

The funny thing was that Nini had no problem with my phone. I thought I might have to show her how to turn off T9 word or set an alarm, but no sir. In fact, Nini practically showed me how to use my own phone.

As Nini played with my phone and deleted the Georgian-Ebonics (seriously it might be a new language) text messages from her boyfriend on her own phone, I became amazed at how quickly she could navigate a cell phone in a foreign language. I never realized how important ‘English cell phone’ jargon is to teenagers until I watched Nini plunder through her Samsung and add locks to this, and change the ring tone to that.

All of the cell phones in Georgia are programmed in either Russian or English, so basically in order to operate a cell phone here every person needs to know a bit of a foreign language. Take texting for example: if your phone only comes in English you need to text in Georgian using English letters (or is it more correct to say Latin letters?).

I have a Georgian friend in Tbilisi who doesn’t speak any English and he always sends me these long text messages that are written in Russian using English letters. The only way I can understand what he writes to me is if I read aloud his text messages. Not only does this ensure that I look crazy on the marshutka, but it also takes me twelve years to reply. I can’t imagine having to text like this every time I might want to tell something funny to a friend, yet this is what everyone in Georgia is just used to doing.

Sometimes it feels like every object in my host family's house is in a different language. The washing machine is in Russian (I’m still in awe every time I open the machine door and realize I washed my clothes on the correct setting), the gas lamp knobs in the kitchen are in Farsi (an import from Iran) and the vacuum (or should I say vakuum) is an import from the Deutschland.

It’s a little crazy when you think about, but every other item in the house seems to be from another part of the world. Eka is always very curious and very aware of where all her products come from. She knows which country every plate she has is from (mostly China and the Czech Republic) and the exact city where her dining room table and cupboards were crafted.

I love the amount of pride my family takes in all their multinational goods. Both before I left for Israel and before I left for Armenia, they checked the almanac to see what the countries’ main exports were. So far I’ve always been able to bring back at least one of the exports mentioned in the almanac and those are always the gifts my family seems to be most curious about. In the United States I feel like most people don’t really care where their goods come from; usually whatever is cheapest at the store will do.

It amazes me that while I can barely use a cell phone in my native tongue or fix internet ‘connectivity’ issues on the computer, my fourteen year old sister who doesn’t even know what ‘connectivity’ means has no problem clicking around on the desktop and solving the issue all the while texting in Georgian using an English alphabet.

1,745,390

Brennen looking at one of the Genocide memorials

There was one thing I saw in Yerevan that really shook me. The Museum of the Armenian Genocide was by far the most eye opening museum I’ve ever ventured inside of.

I feel incredibly ignorant saying I didn’t know very many details about the 1915 Armenian Genocide before coming to Yerevan but unfortunately, this is the truth.

In all my years of schooling I don’t ever remember the genocide being brought up. Through all my time researching the Holocaust, I never remember reflecting upon the Armenian genocide. Even while protests over the genocide in Darfur frequented my college campus, I can’t recall ever hearing about the Armenian genocide.

Sure, I suppose it’s possible I read something and simply didn’t process it but it shocked me to my core that this utterly horrible, callous event occurred in history- an event that resulted in the death of 1.7 million Armenians- and practically everything I knew about this genocide was written in a one paragraph blurb in the ‘Lonely Planet Guide to Armenia’.

I cried a lot that day at the museum. I cried because 1.7 million people were killed for having a religion that others weren’t comfortable with. I cried because 1.7 million people were killed for being themselves. I cried for my own ignorance. I cried for the world’s ignorance. I cried because genocides are happening right now, in several countries, and I feel like there is nothing I can do to help.

 I cried and I cried. From 11am to about 7pm I was pretty much just crying.

The Holocaust inflicted upon the Jews and all the others who did not fit the mold of Hitler’s “Perfect Race” is a well-known event in world history. There is significant proof it occurred, from photographs and videos to a plethora of still-standing concentration camps that can be visited to this day.

The same cannot be said about the Armenian genocide. “Proof” that it occurred is not as accessible. There are no concentration camps to look at, few photos that lay any blame. There is evidence in the photos of dead starved children rotting on the streets, and in the written accounts of the brutal, sadistic acts inflicted upon the Armenians but somehow this is not enough.

Even now, the genocide is denied by thousands. Forty matching written accounts that say that cattle cars full of women and children were driven into a lake to drown Armenians is apparently not “enough proof”.

Many non-believers attribute the genocide to a simple casualty of war. A war occurred, people died.

Reading about views like this really messed with my head. My entire family was killed as a result of the Holocaust. My grandparents on both sides of my family were basically the sole survivors of their families. The combination of me barely knowing a single fact about the Armenian genocide prior to walking into the museum and the similarities between the Armenian Genocide and that of the Holocaust put something like a real hole into my soul.

The best thing I can think to do is to inform others who similarly feel like they know barely information about the Armenian genocide. There are four people I read about at the museum that I don’t think enough people in the world know anything about. I encourage you to read about these four amazing souls if even for a moment to just say their names out loud and acknowledge them.

-          Maria Jacobsen, a Danish Missionary, who kept a detailed accord of the events of the genocide and saved hundreds of Armenian children from extermination

-          Armin Theopil Wegner, a human rights activist who took photos (proof) of the horror occurring during the genocide 

-          Ruben Heryan, responsible for saving hundreds of Armenian orphans while risking his own life

-          Aurora Mardiganian, author of “Ravished Armenia” a personal account of the Armenian genocide 

The other genocide memorial in Yerevan

A plaque of condolences from Georgian President Saakashvili

True Beauty

My real mom has a theory that every place is beautiful. Whenever I would tell her that I want to travel to this place or that place because it looked beautiful in photos she would ask me to name a place that’s not beautiful. I definitely think my mom is right (I even find garbage dumps beautiful because of all the different colors present in one place) and Armenia is no exception.

Armenia has breathtaking physical beauty; the mountain towns and stone churches are so striking they seem magical and the capital has a real cosmopolitan feel to it. I only spent about six days in the country but I was able to learn a lot about myself and what makes a trip worthwhile to me.

One thing that I learned was that even if a country can have gorgeous things to see, that does not necessarily make a trip worthwhile.

See, there was something missing from my trip: I only met two Armenians. Sure, the two Armenians I met were wonderful human beings, but getting to know just two locals on a week long trip seems laughable.

In fact, I think it was impossible for me to fully immerse myself into Armenia because I basically only perceived the country through the eyes of tourists; none of the people I was traveling with had much of a connection to anything we saw. Yes Roman our taxi driver-turned-tour guide was great (he even took us to his home in Garni to meet his family and bought me a bouquet of flowers after one of our long chats) but there was just something missing from every sight we looked at.

I would have loved to travel around the country with more Armenians. After being in Georgia for six months I really think that people are what make a country great.

I CouchSurfed with one Armenian guy in Yerevan who told me that the spirit and charisma of the Armenian people are what gives the country such heart. Artak, my host, was by far one of the most hospitable and altruistic beings I’ve ever met. Even though he and his huge family live in a small apartment, they still wholeheartedly gave up three beds for me and my two friends and the entire family just slept in one room together. Artak even insisted on getting us coffee, tea and drinks and paid for every cab we needed to take.

Both the kindness of Artak and Roman seem almost unbelievable. Sometimes it shocks me how above and beyond people go to make strangers feel welcome. I mean, asides from Mamuka in Telavi, who’s ever heard of a cab driver taking clients to his home for coffee and compote?

I plan on doing a lot more traveling while I’m in Georgia. There are still lots of cities and towns right here in Saqartvelo that I want to see, and I’m venturing into Turkey and Azerbaijan before I fly home at the end of June. Despite the many sights I want to see, I’m going to make it a point to meet many people. Tourist attractions and landmarks are great, but meeting people and having stories is what makes a trip memorable.

Addicted to Love

Even the cows stare at us funny.

Just yesterday I was buying a loaf of bread from a bakery in town I’ve never been to before. The bakery was quite crowded and just as I was about to receive my loaf the baker turned to me and said, “kartuli khar? G’khavs accenti” (Are you Georgian? You have an accent).

I took a small breath anticipating the aftermath of saying I was American and replied “Ara… Amerikidan”.

Now, I kid you not- the entire bakery broke out into song and dance. The baker began singing to me about America and beautiful girls; meanwhile all the customers at the shop began to whisper to themselves as if questioning whether or not I was a celebrity. Even as I walked away from the shop many customers yelled, “Goodbye America!”

My problem is that I’m getting used to all this attention and love and don’t know how I’ll cope back in the states when I’m just another human on the street. I’m now used to random strangers breaking out into song when they meet me, to children I’ve never met personally addressing me on the street. I’m used to getting free vegetables at the bazaar simply for having an accent and smiling too much and to getting text messages from Georgians I haven’t seen since September who just want to know how I’m doing and if I’ll visit them soon.

Of course, the most love I get is from the students at my own school. (I’ve even dedicated a drawer in my bedroom to love notes from my students). This semester I’ve taken more of an effort to get to know the students that aren’t in my classes. I’d like to meet every child at my school, regardless of whether or not they’re studying English.

Thus, when the bell rings and school’s over I try to chat with a student I’ve never met before even with my limited Georgian. The conversations never really delves any deeper than, “romeli simraera gikvars?” (which song do you like) but I like meeting more kids, especially when they’re all so excited to have me in their school.

After school today I walked home with two tenth grade girls I’d never met before named Naniko and Khatia. The three of us were headed in the same direction so for fifteen minutes we talked about our siblings, the music we like, who our friends are and our favorite kinds of Georgian food. Granted, none of this is brain stimulating stuff but cut me some slack, that’s fifteen minutes of listening and chatting in Georgian! In New York, if I just walked up to someone I’ve never met before and started asking them if they can play any instruments they’d most likely ignore me thinking I’m trying to sell them something.

My ‘foreigner fame’ has reached a new height recently. Over the past few weeks I’ve practically been rented as entertainment for birthday parties. A whole bunch of Nini’s friends have February birthdays and they all insisted that I absolutely must attend their parties.

Basically, I’m a party clown. I sing songs during dinner, I mispronounce things in Georgian, I dance when no one is dancing (and I accidentally use the juice cup as a wine glass and pour myself three times as much wine as anyone else). At the last party I went to I even brought my entire computer to DJ the event and nearly got yelled at by a group of fourteen-year-olds for not dancing “crazy enough”.

There is a lot of power in my being the clown though. At one party, Salome the birthday girl made another girl stand up and move her seat at the table because she wanted to sit next to me. Oh, and at a different party, I decided I was only going to dance with the boys that no girls wanted to dance with (‘Wedding Singer’ style) and lo and behold my ‘undesirable boys’ ended up dancing it up with cute girls the rest of the night.

This power and fame I have as a foreigner has even stretched into marriage proposals with strangers. A woman I sat next to on the train gave me her address and phone number so that I could come and meet her son and marry him.

I’m sure a lot of this attention has to do with the warm and welcoming nature of Georgians (not just that I’m some goofy girl from the United States) but it’s still going to be a challenge to resort back to being just another American in America come July.  Therefore, I’m going to eat up my fame for the next four months.

I mean, I might as well face it- I’m addicted to love.

Indeportant Acts of Georgianglish (and Other Misunderstandings)

When living in a different country it’s inevitable that you’ll face lots of misunderstandings every day. Words get incorrectly translated, customs get misinterpreted, and the big ‘ol language barrier all contribute to this. (I can only imagine how confused the cast members of “Three’s Company” would be over here).

I admire all my students’ efforts to speak English, but often their blunders make for slightly different sentences. Beso, one of my favorite ninth graders, came up to me in the hall one day surrounded by his friends and asked me if I liked rape. I was a bit surprised by his question and replied by repeating his question to make sure I got it right. After Beso and his friends began nodding and smiling he admitted to me that he loves rape. He went on to say that he loves rape lie Jay-Z and Eminem.

After sighing with relief, I explained to Beso that ‘rape’ and ‘rap’ are very different things that he should be careful not to confuse.  

Our exact conversation went a little like this:

Beso: Do you like rape?

Me: [Jaw drop] Do I like rape?

Beso: Yes, yes! Jay-Z, Eminem…

Me: Ohhhh! RAP! I love rap, I hate rape.

Another one of my sweet kinderlach (shout out to Yiddish) is thirteen-year-old Mari. Mari is a real firecracker who’s too clever for her own good sometimes. While writing vocabulary sentences in class one day Mari shared the following sentence: “She is indeportant to her family”.

I turned to Mari and I asked her, “Do you want to say important or independent?”

Mari looked at me as if I asked her a strange question. “I want indeportant. Independent and important. She is indeportant”.

Well, there you have it; my kids are making up words. Shakespeare made up words and the youth of Georgia are too.

At home with Eka, misunderstandings are a dime a dozen. Eka happens to be obsessed with three English words:

1)      Probably

2)      Sometime

and

3)      Tomorrow

Whenever she hears me say any of these three words she often repeats it like a sweet Georgian parrot and then adds the phrase, “probably sometime tomorrow” just because she thinks the three words sound beautiful when said together.

Well, a few nights ago while watching an American film on television at one in the morning Eka heard someone use the phrase ‘f*** you’ and decided she liked how that sounded too.

She turned to me and promptly said, “Tomorrow f*** you probably sometime”.

Initially shocked, I told Eka that her sentence didn’t really make sense. Eka thought for a minute and then turned to me and said, “F*** you probably sometime tomorrow”.   (Well at least this sentence made sense).

Nini got a huge kick out of Eka abusing the F word and so we didn’t exactly go through the trouble of telling her it’s not exactly a polite thing to say to someone. Granted, I told Eka that the F word is a bad word, but I didn’t go into very many details… 

(Oh, and if you think that’s bad then I’ll spare the story about the time I taught Nini that an “Mmmbop” is just a word for ‘a boy with long hair’).

Well, back to the F word. A few days later Melissa came over to the house for some coffee and cookies (I have a rough life, I know) and Eka deemed it a good time to test out her newly learned phrase. So, with a huge smile on her face she looked at Melissa and said, “Probably f*** you tomorrow!”

Melissa’s eyes nearly popped out of her face.  Before I could even tell Eka that she really shouldn’t be yelling that phrase to every Tom, Dick and Harry- she looked at me with big eyes and said, “f*** you”.

Of course, after this small charade I did explain to Eka just how bad a word the F word really is. And I kid you not; the scream she emitted when she realized what she’d been saying for three days could be heard in Kalamazoo (which is actually a small city in Michigan). Anyhow, Eka gave me quite the scolding for allowing her to say what she said for three days.

Sometimes a simple misunderstanding can be averted by using the Georgianglish principle. The Georgianglish principle is similar to basic Spanglish. See, when speaking Spanglish (a combination of Spanish and English) people tend to add the preposition ‘el’ before any noun and add the letter ‘o’ after any noun. (Case in point: ‘el computero’ sounds like it could actually be a word in Spanish).

Georgianglish is similar; you just add an ‘i’ at the end of a noun and words suddenly sound Georgian. One afternoon I was restlessly trying to explain what ‘cancer’ is in Russian and after describing what one person thought was ‘narcotics addiction causing baldness’ it turned out that simply saying ‘canceri’ actually turned out to mean cancer in Georgian. Just adding one little letter put everyone on the same page.

It even works with celebrities. Eka was watching a movie on television and she was having trouble remembering an actress’s name.

This is the actual conversation we had (except it was in Russian):

Eka: Who is that?

Me: Susan Sarandon

Eka: No, that’s not her name.

Me: Oh, Susani Sarandini?

Eka:  Ah yes, that’s it.

Oh Georgia, your quirkiness never gets old. 

Chilling with Stalin

When I first decided I was going to come to Georgia I was really excited to tell anyone and everyone that I was about to go on an adventure and teach English for the year. The funny thing was that most people didn’t really know anything at all about the country. The responses I got were limited to the following five statements:

a)      Georgia? Where is that?

b)      Georgia? Don’t people in Atlanta already know English?

c)      Georgia? Are you insane?

d)      Georgia? Isn’t that where the winner of Project Runway was from?

But the most common I response I got was the following:

e)      Georgia? You know who comes from there? Stalin.

Yes, that Stalin. Despite the fact that Joseph Stalin was a man of questionable morals (to put it kindly) he’s definitely an iconic leader who had a huge influence on history.  Ever since I got to Georgia I’ve been eager to go the Stalin museum in Gori (the city where Stalin was born) and see how the museum presented him.

See, before I came to Georgia my parents gave me the following advice: “Never bring up Stalin. You never know who loves him and who hates him”. In my five months here so far, I’ve encountered both deep admiration for Stalin and extreme disgust for the man. I was honestly just curious to see how native Goriebi felt about the man.

On Saturday I finally made it to Gori. The girls and I actually got to the museum before it opened so we spent some time walking around the museum grounds and snapping photos. The house Stalin was born in and the train car he used to travel (he was terrified of flying) are actually in the museum courtyard.

Stalin's house!

Love him or hate him...

 In fact, I was so excited to see the train car that I didn’t notice the huge strip of black ice just in front of the train. Of course I slipped and fell flat on my back. Tara watched the whole thing in shock. It was rather painful and I ended up just lying there for a minute screaming some rather crude sayings blaming Stalin and his damn train for my intense back pain. If I wasn’t wearing two shirts, a sweater and a puffy winter jacket, I’d probably still be lying there blaming each individual member of the Bolshevik revolution- but since I was practically wearing padding I rallied from that fall ready to get my Stalin on.

Our admission to the museum included an English speaking tour guide who told us all about Stalin’s background; how he became a leader and how we went on to influence so many people. The tour was very informative, but didn’t touch upon any of the ‘bad things’ that Stalin did. Our tour guide, Tamuna, only casually mentioned that he was responsible for killing 47 million people but nothing in the museum actually noted this fact. Tamuna told us that the purpose of the museum is not to focus on the questionable actions of Stalin, but to show his sense of character and his journey to become such an influential person.

It was definitely interesting if not a bit surreal to hear someone talk about Stalin in such a glorified manner. With my western education I can only really compare Stalin with Adolf Hitler and I’ve yet to meet anyone who even marginally praises Hitler for being a great leader and omits the fact that he was also responsible for an entire genocide.

In addition to the museum we also went to Uplistsikhe, an ancient cave city from the third century. Uplistsikhe was just really cool and so beautiful. It’s pretty well preserved and you can see where the ancient apoteka, amphitheatre, winery were. We also had a great English speaking tour guide to tell us about the caves but I couldn’t help but finding his name to be so strange.

So get this- our tour guide’s name was Stalinberia. I was pretty taken aback when I heard this. For one thing, having ‘Stalin’ as part of your first name is pretty crazy, but the weird thing is that his name was Stalinberia. See, Beria is the last name of the man who supposedly poisoned Stalin who’s responsible for his death.

Sometimes I have a huge mouth with no filter and that happened to be the case when Stalinberia introduced himself. I think my exact words were, “Stalinberia? Like Stalin and his supposed murderer? That’s like being named Caesarbrutus!”

I probably should have kept my mouth shut but I couldn’t help it; all that kind of slipped out. His name surprised me so much that my mind started wandering on the tour thinking of other combination names encompassing a killer and his victim. (Other bizarre combo names I thought of include Lincolnbooth, Abelcain and Mufasascar). 

This one is for Barbara.

Right where they're standing is where human sacrifices took place way back in the day.

The whole gang (and Melissa's backpack)

Anyway, right after our tour the girls, Taylor and I actually stumbled upon the slaughtering of a cow. I can honestly that one of the saddest things I’ve ever heard is fellow cows mourning over their slaughtered companion. The “moos” they emitted were so woeful and full of sorrow; even the nearby stray dogs were whimpering over the dead cow that was just lying there spread-eagle.

Ironically enough, my day of Stalin and cow slaughtering was one of the loveliest days I’ve had yet. Granted, it might be due to the fact that the rest of our day was filled with adorableness. We met up with a sweet Fulbright scholar who is teaching English in Gori and already working on her PHD (she’s twenty-two) and later we cooked two huge pans worth of Israeli shakshuka at our hostel. (The easiest way to make friends at a backpacking hostel is to cook dinner and invite people to help you eat it). Then with our new hostel friends, we hit up a few bars in Tbilisi and just had a great, great night.

Meeting up with Fulbright scholars in Gori

Oh and in case you’re wondering, I rode the metro escalators all weekend and I didn’t shed a single tear.

When Big Puddles Attack

Samtredia has a good relationship with puddles.

Back where I’m from in the States, February weather translates into snow-induced school closings and early dismissals. In Samtredia, Georgia- February weather also means school closings but for a slightly different reason.

It rains here. Sometimes it rains so much that school is cancelled.

In general my school has been having a rough couple weeks. A combination of swine flu and pneumonia has somehow made it to School No.11 and bedridden about sixty percent of the elementary school. (Last week, 27 of my 35 third graders were home-sick). The school director thus made the decision to indefinitely cancel all classes for students in fourth grade and below.

School hasn’t been the same without all the cute little rug-rats running around screaming my name and asking me if I like ‘snow, cat or dog’ (hey, it might be a strange grouping of words but it’s English).

Plus, with all the third graders absent my days are much less adorable. They just happen to be my favorite. They shriek like I’m a puppy wearing a dress whenever I enter the classroom and give me love notes and gifts when class is over. It’s almost funny how singing some songs, whipping up a few games, drawing a picture on the board, and correcting some class work- can send eight-year-olds into such hysteria. I guess I just miss the little squirts. Well that, and I’m generally concerned they might all be violently, ferociously ill.

Asides from the dying elementary school, school days are being cut short by one to three hours each day because of bad weather. Most kids walk to school and the school faculty is terrified to have kids walk home in the rain convinced that they’ll get the swine-flu pneumonia bug. 

Thus, every morning my day is pretty unpredictable. I don’t know whether classes will be shortened or whether certain classes will just be cut out of the day. It’s a bit annoying, but the unpredictability makes my day interesting. For my own sanity, I’m trying to love all the little quirks in the Georgian educational system.

Anyhow, today was an especially odd day at school. We had no electricity or heat (which is pretty normal) but all classes were cut to half-hour sessions which really isn’t that much time at all. You go over homework, you read something, you play a game- boom, class is over. At around 10:45 though, the faculty decided to cancel all classes because there was a giant puddle outside the school and they were worried it would only get bigger throughout the day.

I thought the same thing you did- a school cancellation because of a puddle?

Well, turns out that ‘big puddle’ was more like a lake. My students were even joking around and asking me if I knew how to swim since I’d practically need to swim home. As I left school today, the entire school even led me in a chant of “Swimming! Swimming! Swimming!” (Again, a bit of a bizarre chant, but it’s English).

This is the 'big puddle' aka lake outside my school.

Normally, on the left of that concrete barrier is a small creek and on the right is a road

Hydroplaning at its finest.

Random lonely ferris wheel cart

 

The new church they're building in town- and its lake.

Everything just looks prettier after the rain.

Isn't Samtredia pretty?

I love a good tree reflection photo

Woof