Gilotsavt
gazapulshi! Happy spring! It snowed today.
Before I go
further, I should say that a few different people have suggested the things I
wrote at the beginning of last month were at times uncomfortably personal.
Re-reading them, I have to agree, but as the old quote (possibly one of the
most frightening that I’ve ever read) says, the
written word endures. I’ll probably go back and edit the posts, but what
was read cannot be unread. And so indulge me, if you will, as I offer something
of an explanation.
I write
often and post rarely, manually selecting the appropriate dates when I do.
Usually I re-read things quickly before I post them, but if time is short I
scan rather than read. Writing has gotten complicated. In New York, I wrote to
let my parents know what was going on and to keep track for myself of the
places where interesting and free things were happening in the city. In Prague,
I wrote again to keep my family updated. From there, though, I also started
writing notes for my concentration and (if I may be arrogant enough to
presume anyone else would find my
observations valuable) for people interested in the city and its history.
Berlin was a similar story to Prague, except by then my friends were reading
posts from time to time as well. So here I am in 2012, in Georgia, writing
under a title that I choose lifetimes ago. “Of Princes and Teas and Baobab
Trees.” That was my life: studying fairytales, buying fancy teas to drink with
friends, re-reading The Little Prince
in French…knowing that I didn’t know enough to be an intellectual but fancying
myself enough of an academic to have thoughts worth thinking…
Every time I
think I’ve learned how the world really works, I am (thankfully) kicked in the
butt by something that informs me of my arrogance. It’s a messy way of
learning, but it works. And since my computer breaks and my notebooks wrinkle
and my memories blur, I’ve been storing these notes online. Which means that at
some point my blog became updates for family, stories for friends, city tips
for travelers, and personal notes on daily life. Those personal notes are the
dangerous ones. They’re the stories about things I find strange or absurd or
frightening or intriguing; these are the things that I hope will teach me about
this culture and that my reactions to will hopefully teach me about my own
culture. For example, learning that old women, their sons, and the local priest
discuss my menstruation would have embarrassed me to no end a few months ago.
At this point, I just think “this would never happen at home,” chuckle to
myself, remind myself to write about it later, and roll with it. ra vitsi.
And now to
continue taking up web-space, embarrassing myself, and hopefully giving the few
souls who read this a thing or two to think about…
February 27th,
2012: Reflections on a Conversation
I’ve started
going walking some nights with two young women and two slightly older young
men. Tonight there were a few points made during our conversation that are
worth mentioning. They informed me that the aggressive, kill-you-with-kindness
kind of hospitality that I’ve been struggling with here is specific to Racha.
They called Oni a big village, because everyone knows everything about
everyone. They complained about the gossiping and attributed it to the fact
that people have nothing else to do. This was as we sat by the side of the road
and they talked about who drove/walked past with whom going where.
I learned
that they believe most of the hard drugs entering Georgia come from Russia, and
that drug-related deaths are not unusual. Most of the deaths of younger people
that they mentioned were either caused by car accidents (not surprising
considering that they drive fast and drive drunk and don’t like seatbelts) or
by drug use.
A big thing
that I learned was about their concept of adulthood. I’ve flinched on more than
one occasion when someone has called me a “good little child.” I was informed
tonight that we don’t become women and men by Georgian definition until we are
old. I’ll be 60 before I’m a woman and 80 before I’m getting old, by their
perception. On a slightly related note, they teach the days of the week using
circular charts instead of linear charts. Read into that what you will.
On a more
personal note, I learned that my grandfather will be undergoing an operation on his back
tomorrow. When my father called to give me the news, he said, “Your
grandfather’s in the hospital again.” Again? These are the times when living
abroad becomes a difficult thing. It inevitably means that sometimes you don’t
know what’s going on in your own family, and usually when something bad happens
at home it’s tough if not impossible to be there as soon as you’d like. I may
have teared up a bit when I hung up the phone. My friends told me that they
liked seeing this. Tears, they said, are evidence that someone has a heart.
Then they said that they have the impression most Americans don’t cry. They
asked if this was true and I laughed. Then one of them told me he and his
brother phone each other every 4-5 hours. He offered to buy me a second memory
card for my phone, because a different phone company has cheaper rates for
calls to America than the company whose card I have. I stood there on the
street in the rain with friends who don’t speak English lecturing me about the
importance of closeness between siblings and offering to help me call my
sisters more.
February 28th,
2012: The Day of Wishes
In 7th
grade today, a girl handed me her personal notebook and asked me to write
wishes in it. I thought she wanted me to translate her wishes into English, but
she handed me a blank page. I asked if she wanted me to write my wishes or to
translate hers as she dictated them to me in Georgian. She said I should write
what my wishes for her are. I wrote something short and simple—somewhat taken
from things I’ve heard people say when making personal toasts as supras—because
she doesn’t know much English. But the question was haunting: what do I wish
for these kids? Sometimes, I’m enough of an ignorant, egocentric Westerner to
wish that they could come see New York or that they didn’t have to go to
Tbilisi for everything or that they would all get university degrees. Always,
though, I wish for them whatever is best: a combination of what they wish for
themselves and of what will bring joy and peace to their lives. So I wish them
sincere and happy marriages, along with the knowledge that they don’t have to
marry to be real people. I wish them enough money for firewood and food and
their parents’ medications…and a little more. I wish that their lives not be
touched anymore by war, and that the earthquakes here are no stronger than the
houses can handle.
When that
class actually started, our lesson was about the Statue of Liberty.
“Independence” was one of our vocabulary words, and I asked if the girls
thought that they were independent. At first, they only thought politically, so
of course they asserted that their European, democratic country has of course
made them independent. With careful questioning, I got them thinking more in
terms of personal independence: whether they are able to choose, make, or
question things on their own. They still said that they are independent—power
to them—but my co-teacher turned aside. She told me that she thinks most men in
Georgia are not independent. I asked who they expect to take care of them.
Their wives? No, she said. Their parents. I said it’s curious and she said it’s
bad. We talked about how a 40 year old man should do his 80 year old mother’s
laundry and not the other way around. We talked about a man we know whose wife
lives elsewhere and whose mother just died; a woman friend visits weekly to
clean his house and cook for him, because when he’s left on his own he doesn’t
know how to make toast. He can chop firewood and butcher a cow and sing very
well, but he can’t boil an egg. He was never taught, because it’s “women’s
work.”
The only
other interesting note for the day is that I was informed as soon as I got home
that our television had broken. My host-grandparents waited expectantly for me
to reassure them that I could fix it, but unfortunately I know nothing about
electronics. So I told them I was sorry to hear about this and then I sat down
with a book. They milled around for a bit in the kitchen, and then both sat
down, too. Maguala was pleased to have the television off for a while, because she
gets tired of the constant noise of it. Even so, she was disgruntled when her
soap operas started and she couldn’t watch them. Jumberi was miserable. I
thought about how many times they and others had told me about the power
outages during the Soviet times and how they hadn’t had constant television as
recently as 10 years ago (due to wars and things…). Now they were here pouting
like suburban kids whose personal DVD-players had broken and who had forgotten
how to amuse themselves otherwise. I enjoyed a brief respite from the soaps and
studied verbs.
February 29,
2012 Happy 3rd Birthday, Keti!
One of my
students is a leap-year-baby. Today was her 3rd birthday. I made her
a card that Matsatso and I both signed. When I first arrived, I gave students
Hershey Kisses on their birthdays. I still have enough candies, but because of
the fast I can’t give them out.
What a fast!
They aren’t eating eggs, dairy, fish, or meat. They debate at school about
whether they can eat foods made with oil. Then again, they also debate about
which days have more restrictions than others and which days are exceptions, on
which eggs or fish are allowed. I keep thinking that they should have this
figured out, because they’ve been doing this for a few years (ahem). But
apparently their patriarch doesn’t always lay out the same rules as their calendars, local priests, or even their understanding of the rules as they were
explained by the patriarch last year.
I appreciate
fasting. There’s a lot that could be said about it, but this is not the time or
place. What’s more interesting is what happened while I was with my co-teacher
in her friend’s shop. The local priest came in to put money on his cell phone.
When he entered, everyone stood up and went over to him to be blessed. I
hesitated, but he gestured for me to come and be blessed as well. My co-teacher
tried to stand behind a freezer so that he wouldn’t see that she was wearing
pants. The shop-keeper carefully nudged a bag of macaroni onto the copy of The Godfather that she was reading. When
the priest left, I asked if Father didn’t like women reading. She said that he
doesn’t like reading books like The
Godfather during the fast. My co-teacher and I argued with her, saying that
it’s irrational to think she’s forbidden to read a classic novel when everyone
in Oni watches hours of trashy soap operas and Russian porn disguised as
comedic reality-TV. She shook her head and put the macaroni back where it
belongs. The woman who recharges phones reported that Father had criticized her
for wearing jeans (she’s a grandmother whose jeans are tasteful…i.e. not ripped
or too tight). Meanwhile, Father’s oldest daughter walked by our window. Her
short, tight, faux-leather skirt with her patterned stockings and high boots
seemed much more sexual to me than our grandmother friend’s jeans, and I
wondered about how many traditions become social law while the intention behind
their invention is lost. “Pants are men’s clothes,” I’ve been told. I’m tempted
to ask if they really think Adam wore pants from the first day that he knew his
nakedness. But maybe they wouldn’t see the connection…
There were a
few other cute things that happened at school. My 3rd graders acted
out a Dr. Seuss story—the one about the two creatures who never turn. In the
original story, the creatures run into each other. Because both refuse to move,
they are stuck standing there as progress progresses around them. In our
version, the creatures were a cat and a dog. Other creatures walked around
them, but eventually two bears (Matsatso and myself) came up and ate them. The
kids had a blast.
When we were
finished, one of the boys aimed his pen at me while I was checking another
student’s homework. Every class, I tell this boy that I don’t like guns,
especially in the classroom and especially aimed at my face. But the culture
here is such that I’m really the only one who is bothered by this, so I’ve
learned to react to it minimally. Today though, when he started making
machine-gun sounds I collapsed on the floor and played dead. When I stood up,
the kids called to me that I had dust on me. I brushed off my arms and legs,
and then one little girl rushed over to brush off my back—and my butt—for me. A
toy gun in class, a teacher playing dead, a 3rd grader dusting off
my behind…none of these things would have worked in an American school for
sure. Here, though, it’s just an episode to laugh over and an excuse to teach
new words like “gun” and “pocket.”
After
school, we walked home with a group of other teachers. They explained to me
that there would be an election at school soon for the “Caring Persons
Council.” Teachers, parents and upper-classmen from Oni school would be elected
to the council. What exactly they do or how often they meet, I’m not sure yet,
but the teachers were very eager for me to understand the concept and tell them
if similar councils exist in the US.
Later we
went back to my co-teacher’s friend’s shop. The women started talking very
rapidly and animatedly about a man they know, and eventually I understood that
he wants to “win/take a wife” but the woman he wants doesn’t want him. They laughed and my co-teacher turned to
inform me that he intends to literally take her if she doesn’t want to come on
her own. She asked what this is called in English. I replied that it’s
kidnapping—specifically bride-napping—and that it’s illegal in most countries.
She and her friend chuckled, and we left. Having been a kidnapped bride
herself, my co-teacher kept talking about this man as we walked in the street.
I said again that bride-napping is a very bad thing. She said that this is true
but that they are Georgian and so their men are crazy. Like her husband. I
pushed the issue, trying to make her understand that this is actually something
very serious. I said that countries in the big organizations—the EU, the UN,
WTF, etc.—that Georgia is working so hard to align itself with consider
bride-napping a very serious issue and a human rights violation. I told her
that Western tourists usually don’t go to parts of the world where bride-napping is a
common issue. She said that this is how it should be; her life is her own and
so no one should be able to touch it, though her culture allows them to anyway.
Logically, if a man really loves a woman he’ll want what’s best for her, so
he’ll ask and if she doesn’t want to marry him that he’ll respect that. If he
has to take her against her will…if he has so little regard for what she wants
for herself that he would force her into marriage, than he doesn’t actually
love her. We talked about this for a while, and she told me to be careful. I
replied that I’m not scared for myself—seeing as I’m a government employee, an
American, and a non-Orthadox pants-wearing woman—but that I am scared for our
girls. I told her how I get frustrated when they don’t talk in class or when they
tell me that they sat in their houses all weekend (not all the girls, but many
of them), and how I want them to be more confident but it’s impossible if
they’re scared and if their community allows them to be intimidated by
permitting this tradition.
When we
parted ways, my mind was heavy. I hiked to a mineral water spring instead of
going home. By the time I went to play practice with Maguala (Gio was in Tbilisi so we had a week off; it felt good to be back in a routine), I felt as close to better as one can when living with such an
issue as daily reality.
Finally,
back to the first day of spring. Actually, there was very little unusual about
today. We had a windy snow-storm, and the students loved it. I was told how to
make pickles. The 9th graders told me how they see their village
(dirty but beautiful, small but full of people). There was curtain-stitching
and fire-twirling at play practice, and then there was kartopiliani for dinner. I love this dish; it’s potato-filled flat
bread. But considering that most of my diet here consists of potatoes and
breads, I’m starting to worry a bit about my health. I laugh thinking back to
when I first got here. Now my hair is long and dark. My legs are toned from my
walk to school, but I’ve put on weight over the winter due to the
carbs-and-starches diet and the exercise-inhibiting cold both inside and out.
My knuckles have burns from touching the wood-stove pipe. My eyes haven’t
changed color, but I’ve learned to consider them “river-water green” or
“honey-colored” instead of “hazel.” My name hasn’t changed either, but the
concept of names is also different here. Giorgi tells me that his name is
George when he’s speaking English, and some of my students have asked how their
names translate. I try to explain that we neither decline nor translate names.
Ana, in Georgian, can be “Ana” or “Anas” or “Anam” or “Anichka” or “Aniko”
depending on the case of the name in a sentence. Ana tried to tell me that in
America we only have “Annie” and so her name in English would be “Annie.” I
explained that we have “Ana” as well and that even if we didn’t we wouldn’t
change her name. Ana is Ana. Giorgi is Giorgi. I, meanwhile, have become “Abi”
and “Habibi” and “Abicito” and “Abigaili.” On official documents, my principal
and resource center personnel Georgianize my first and my last names by adding
“i”s on the ends. I tried to explain that when they do that it stops being my
name, but they didn’t understand. And so, even legally, I’m not who I was when
I arrived here. I was expecting growth and changes…I just didn’t expect that they
would be physical and legally documented ones.
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