Where did the month go?

March is over already. Here, people are discussing (aside from the usual political and social gossip) their plans for Easter. Among the other foreign teachers, there is talk about post-contract sight-seeing trips. Part of me feels like it would be nice to go around the country for a week after contract…but life is speeding up as it always does this time of year, so I’ll be leaving as soon as the contract is up. I have a bit of ausilebeli travelling to do in the US before classes start in July.

The weather has been strange. We had a snowstorm yesterday morning and two earthquakes yesterday afternoon. Today started out sunny and warm, but now it’s raining. Eka and I have started walking to the mineral water spring each morning again (we stopped during the record-breaking cold of the past few months); usually the weather at 8, when we set out, is totally different from the weather at 10, when I’m walking to school.

Matsatso and I are planning a talent show at school, modeled off the popular television show “Nitchieri/Talented.” One of the third graders informed us she could write poems about presidents, and then she gave a poem to Matsatso as proof: “Misha is our president. Eduard is not, because Eduard did not win. And it didn’t happen with blood. It happened with roses.” That’s an approximate translation from the Georgian, with “Misha” being Saakashvili’s nickname and the “roses” being an allusion to the Rose Revolution. I remember when I was little and my parents would take me along to the firehouse where they voted. They always commented to me and my sisters that our elections were amazing because the president always stepped down and let the new president take power.  I didn’t quite understand what the big deal was; my teachers told me that we lived in a democracy and that this was how it worked, so it seemed obvious to me that elections should lead to peaceful transitions of power. If not, I thought, we obviously wouldn’t be able to keep calling ourselves a democracy, could we? Now I’m living in a country where the election is slated for “sometime in September or October,” where human rights groups have already accused (correctly) the ruling party of persecuting members of the opposition, and where a third grader praises the last peaceful transfer of power for being a bloodless revolution (though a revolution nevertheless).

Other classroom conversations this week were equally interesting. A 7^th grader asked me if the words “big bang” mean anything in English. His peers insisted that he must mean “Big Ben,” the clock. I did my best to explain big bang theory, and when they were still obviously confused I asked what they study about the beginning of everything. They were still confused, as was my co-teacher, but eventually they caught on. They told me that in the beginning humans were made from red earth by God. They also told me that they’ve heard some crazy people think we came from monkeys, but this can’t be so because 1) we’re superior and 2) how could there still be monkeys if we came from them (and there’s no way today’s monkeys could turn into people) so the theory is absurd. I asked if they had heard about other theories, and one girl pulled out a textbook with an old Indian creation story in it. But that was it. I did my best to explain about creationism and intelligent design and evolution-ism. If the partially theocratic state wants to educate children only about creationism, it can and will, but I don’t think it’s fair to neglect to inform them that other theories exist and that dismissing an idea as nonsense is only fair if you actually understand what the idea proposes.

That “We are superior because we have exclusive access to truth” attitude some religious groups have always rubbed me the wrong way. Shouldn’t religion be about compassion and brotherhood rather than fighting over who’s the favorite child? When a teacher learned today that we don’t dye eggs red on Good Friday where I’m from, she asked, “What kinds of Christians don’t know to dye eggs? Do they know nothing? What do you do on Good Friday?” I thought for a moment and just answered, “Pray.”

The Georgian Orthodox tradition is very interesting, and I’ll write more about it when “Adgoma” is actually here. What I’ve been told is that families dye eggs red on “Red Friday” (or “Good Friday”). Sunday they have big parties, and then Monday they have big parties in the cemeteries where their family members are buried. The dying of the eggs comes from a story about Mary putting eggs in Christ’s blood while he was on the cross. When she learned that he was resurrected, she took the eggs around to show people as she spread the news. Actually not a story I’ve heard before, but it would explain why we associate eggs with Easter (I always just thought it was a ‘new life’ thing, though the rabbit I still don’t understand).

Some slightly disturbing news: one of my students has herpes. My co-teacher explained, “It’s a virus. It’s common for kids to get it, but it’s still a little scary.” Sometimes I think that it must have been the study of places like this that led to the idea of genetics. In Oni, I’ve noticed both twins and diabetics to be unexpectedly common. There also seem to be quite a few alcoholics, people with blood-pressure problems, and people with hormone problems. There are few blue-eyed people, though the few I’ve met are all relatives. And a non-genetic trend has to do with more psychological factors: earthquake and bomb related phobias. A friend told me the other day that she can’t shower with the door closed because she wants to be able to run out quickly if there’s an earthquake. Sometimes it makes my heart heavy.

Then again, sometimes conversations are hilarious. It’s very normal for people to ask me if I’m bored here. When I reply that I’m not, they act surprised and tell me that I must be lying because they’re bored. When a grandmother complained to me that she’s bored with keeping house all day and always doing the same thing, I asked why she doesn’t try something new. She’s a talented musician, artist, and cook; I asked if there isn’t somewhere in Oni where she could join one of the choirs or ensembles or buy some paints. She laughed and shook her head. I suggested she play around with new recipes, since she’s mastered the ones she has. Again, she shook her head. Later, her young niece also complained to me that she’s bored. As a mother of two toddlers, I’m not sure how this is so, but again I asked why she doesn’t draw or write or knit or play piano (every house seems to have a piano, but not many people seem to play). She just shook her head. Confused, I asked my 9^th graders if they’re bored in their village. They answered that they’re bored in school, but that they’re never bored in their village. I asked what advice they have for the women whom I had been talking with. Their suggestions? Watch television, garden, sleep, drink vodka, go fishing, play with children, go fishing with children, walk in nature, ride horses, hunt birds, hunt bears, play football, and play computer games.

My to-do list is slightly different: study Georgian, read, prepare for my colloquium, walk in nature, and sometimes study Georgian cooking. Like “potato pies” or “piroshkies” (not pirogies, apparently). Matsatso and I went to her parents’ house yesterday so that I could fix her computer and she could teach me to make “potato pies.” Her mother had made dough in the morning. The dough is simple: flour, salt, yeast, and warm water or milk (water, now, because they are fasting). When we arrived at the house, we rolled the dough into balls and set them in a warm place to rest for just over another hour. Meanwhile, we boiled potatoes in a big pot. When they were boiled, we mashed them with salt and oil. We boiled rice in mushroom broth in another pot. When that was ready, we drained the rice, added black pepper and a little salt, fried some onions, and added in the onions. These were our two different stuffing options for our “pies.” They weren’t quite pies; they were too long and thin to be dumplings, but maybe they were like potato pockets? And rice pockets, too, of course. We filled the pockets and sealed them, and then we fried them lightly in sunflower oil. They were delicious.

Matsatso told me the Georgian name for them, but she used the Russian word when talking. It’s interesting. Georgians call the use of words from other languages “barbarianism.” I’ve been lectured on how English is difficult because our phonetic rules aren’t anywhere near consistent, while the Georgian alphabet has only one sound per letter. I have to remind them that the Georgian alphabet only is used in the Georgian language, and that (mostly) they (claim to) resist appropriating foreign words. I say ‘mostly’ and ‘claim to’ because they have lots of old Iranian words and Russian words and even some Turkish words that they use every day. Regardless, English uses an alphabet that they share with many other languages. Each language has slightly different phonetic rules, but English-speakers like to take words from other languages when it seems practical to do so. Thus we have ‘karaoke’ and ‘sushi’ and ‘kamikaze’ and ‘bon appetite’ and ‘borscht’ and lots of others (why can I only think of food words right now?).

Snow White and Kiln Bread

Today was the children’s play. The date was changed three times, which means today was the third time a group of my students missed school for “last day prep and rehearsal.” The play was hilarious. They did a version of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” in which the evil queen’s assistant and master of torture was colorful and flamboyant, the dwarves were named after weekdays, the smallest dwarf had a crush on Snow White, and the dwarves carried away the evil queen while chanting (in English) “Down with dictator!” At the end they held up a sign (also in English) that said “The And.” Gio probabally should have asked me about that one…

I was sick again last night and this morning, probably because I was at a birthday party in a strange house yesterday. I’ve figured out that I can eat at five houses without getting sick. Anywhere else, I’m doomed.

Saturday, the weather was warmish, so we cleaned the yard. We swept up leaves, weeded around flowerbeds, and planted tomato seeds (under a plastic dome to keep them warm). Then Maguala taught me how to make kiln bread. The dough is just flour, salt, yeast and water. The kiln is in our yard. It has a clay tube in the center, with stones cemented around it. Maguala lit a big fire to warm the clay, and then we waited for the fire to burn down. When it was low, she laid thin bricks around the edges of the embers, to catch falling bread. Yup. Falling bread. To cook the bread, she took each loaf and patted it into a thin oval. She dipped her fingers in water and poked the loaves with them. Then she slapped them to the sides of the clay tube, poking the middle of each with a fork once it was suspended on the wall. Two of the loaves had butter and ground walnuts in the middle. She fit 11 loaves in the kiln, and left them to cook for 10-15 minutes. Then she covered the mouth of the kiln with a metal lid for another 10-15 minutes. When the loaves were finished, she pried them off the kiln walls with a big knife (at which point the flat bricks on the embers became important). Yum.

March comes in like a lion and...and...and?!?

Usually, this is the time of year when the warm weather reminds me that time always runs faster than I grasp. We did have a little warm weather this week: there was a day when I sat outside barefoot and my host-grandparents started tending to the yard. But then they stopped pruning the grapevines and roses, and I put my shoes back on, because we’re getting ready for another week of snow.

We’re being defiant, as much as we can. I made paper flowers for the windows at school, Maguala bought ingredients to make bread in her outdoor kiln, and my friends are bringing horses tomorrow so that we can ride off into the mountains…weather permitting. Will winter never end?

There are lots of interesting little happenings around town.

Ivanishvili just set up a headquarters here, as simultaneously the current government decided to fine him another million dollars for funding his presidential campaign. I’ve learned that—should Saakashvili lose the election (set for sometime in September…maybe) everyone working for the local government will lose their jobs (guess they’re appointed rather than elected…). A few people have told me that they’re nervous for September. “I’ve seen many things in my life,” one friend told me, “I don’t know what the fall will bring, but it won’t be pretty. One candidate has lots of American money, and the other has lots of Russian money. There’s no democracy here. This will be ugly, I’m sure of it.”

In other news, I’ve learned that the police here do actually pull-over drunk drivers from time to time. Somehow, a neighbor has now been stopped and fined for the second time…when most of those driving past 9 pm are drunk and worry-free.

Another story is that a man took a wife (probably literally ‘took’) last week. She stayed with him for two days, and then the third day she disappeared. She was with a different man—her new husband’s friend, apparently—for a day and a night. When she came back, she told her husband that she went because she preferred to be with the second man. When her husband called his ‘friend,’ the second man told him: “You knew I loved her. Why would you marry her?” Giorgi told me that the woman must be crazy to cheat on her husband after only two days. I responded that I couldn’t understand why she would marry the first man in the first place if she loved the second man. The silence of everyone else in the room is part of the reason I say the woman was probably literally taken to wife. *sigh*

A third super-short story: my 7^th graders want me to teach them how to make hamburgers when the weather gets nice. I want to teach them to make tacos instead, because I have a student named Tako in that class and the rest of them watch Mexican (and sometimes Argentinean) soap operas. They’re fantastic kids.

"The Logic of Women"

There’s a television show called “The Logic of Women” (translated…). Six men play in teams of two. Six girls have been placed in teams of two and asked questions. Their reasoning and answers to the questions have been taped. The men are then asked the questions…but they don’t win by answering. They win points by trying to guess how the women answered. Inevitably, the men are slightly older (and generally misogynistic) traditional Georgian men, while the women are young, beautiful, short-dress wearing, cocktail-sipping dolls. Sometimes one of the women has a brain…but usually they aren’t the brightest. The questions are usually things like “Is this a president, actor or clown?” [shown a picture of the Venezuelan president] or “What is this?” [shown a coffee filter]. The teachers at my school don’t like the show because it makes women look stupid. I shouldn’t need to say any more.

But let’s have a bit of fun and think of the variations of the show that could be popular here: city people being asked about village people, young people being asked about old people, old people being asked about old people, Georgians being asked about Turks/Armenians/Azeris, Georgians being asked about Ukrainian and Russian women, maybe Western Europeans being asked about Georgia (or being asked what they know about Georgia…which would be funny for about two episodes and then it would get cancelled for not being nationalistic enough)…

Variations of the show that could be popular in the US? Maybe siblings being asked about siblings or parents about children. Anything else, I’m pretty sure, would draw protest. I hope it would. As interesting as this kind of situation is for someone like me, studying the nature of one group’s stereotypes about another, as public entertainment it comes across as rather offending (and stereotype re-affirming, in this case) (anti-women) propaganda. 

Dolmas and diets

So I actually wrote a lot at the beginning of the month, but I'm not posting it because it's about time I took a break from documenting the political and social games that have made winter very long. Instead, I'm going to say that there are flowers blooming despite the snow. Neta that I may be the same way. Let's talk about something more interesting. Like food.

When Maguala makes vegetarian dolmas, I always try to watch. Finally, I think I have the recipe figured out. She simmers pepper strips, tomato pieces, and carrot pieces in a frying pan. Meanwhile she boils rice. When the rice is done, she drains it and adds it—with black pepper—to the vegetables in the pan. She stirs it often for a few minutes, and then removes this pan from the heat. Then she takes cabbage leaves and boils them. When they’re soft, she cuts out the middle stalk. These leaves are stuffed with the rice and vegetable mixture to make the dolmas themselves, but this isn’t even half the work. She also simmers chopped onions in a big deep pan. When the onions are soft, she adds pulped tomato and an herb paste—presumably of dill, cilantro, and parsley. She salts this, and then she lays the stuffed cabbage leaves in the juice. Extra rice gets added to this pot also. She sprinkles freshly chopped dill and cilantro on top, salts this again, and then does something curious: she puts a plate upside-down into the pan so that it covers the dolmas. Then she covers the pan and lets it simmer for 3 or 4 hours. They’re delicious, but it’s a process that takes her all morning. We have dolmas on Saturdays. Since the fast started, we’ve eaten pretty much exclusively potatoes and macaroni the rest of the week. I was really sick this past week, so it worked for me. I ate yogurt and toast for breakfast and then baked or boiled potatoes for dinner each day. It’s been pretty miserable. What’s worse is I feel my body begging for vegetables and less sunflower oil. I know that a week of eating spinach, broccoli, brussel sprouts, kale, asparagus, and bell peppers would make me feel so much better. I actually had a dream about eating bagels with my sisters. I ate it the way my dad does, with cream cheese and then blackberry jam, and it was glorious.

Seriously, though, the ideas here about diet and illness are making me worry about my body. When I was sick, my co-teacher told me that I needed a strict diet. The other teachers all chimed in and told me what I was allowed to eat: bread crust, dry old bread, boiled rice, boiled potatoes, baked potatoes, jam, tea, cheese, yogurt, boiled macaroni, crackers, apples, boiled raisins, and granola. They told me to stay away from oil, butter, margarine, milk (because it’s mixed with oil here), eggs, cabbage, oranges, and soft bread. They also suggested half a dozen medicines, mineral water, or spending all day drinking water with salt and sugar added. When my co-teacher and I went into a pharmacy to get her medicine for something, the drunk pharmacist was pretty useless. Then a second lady came in and told me that I needed to buy two medicines and take them together. I don’t like meds anyway, and everything here is in Russian so I never know exactly what’s in the medicine, so I declined. Instead I went home to diet, drink water and sleep.

Even that was a bit of a problem though. In the US, when someone is sick the usual attitude is that the poor dear needs to relax and sleep. Here, Jumberi pressed me to drink coffee or wine or vodka, to eat lobio or fried meat patties…essentially the opposite of what I wanted to be putting in my body…and people kept trying to get me to go run around in the cold. My friends texted to ask if I wanted to go out, and I said that I was sick. They asked if that was a yes or a no. I said it was a no, that I wanted to stay home until I felt better. They texted 5 more times to ask if I was coming outside to meet them, and one got upset that I wasn’t up to wandering in circles in the snowy streets. I get off easy because I’m a foreigner. Eka and Nona were sick too (apparently there’s a virus going around). Nona got teased. Eka and her parents just yelled at each other non-stop. I can set down strict rules for myself and explain that I’ll buy and prepare my own food and everything…yet it’s still a constant battle to control my body. Almost everything said (to me and to each other) is a (well-intentioned) order to sit her or eat this or drink this. I hate arguing to begin with, and when I’m sick it’s really the last thing I feel like doing.

On an unrelated note, there were re-runs of that old game show “Double Dare” on TV and I decided that the world needs a TV station devoted to the ‘90s. It would play game shows like “Double Dare” and “Legends of the Hidden Temple” and whatever that Nickelodeon one was that had the big pink head with words in it. It would play old episodes of “Doug” and “The Munsters” and “Angry Beavers.” From time to time it could even play music videos…from Nirvana to the Backstreet Boys. I would appreciate it.

Ants MARCHing...Ch'ianch'velebi...umm...(verb?)

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 27^th, 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 28^th, 2012: The Day of Wishes

In 7^th 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 3^rd Birthday, Keti!

One of my students is a leap-year-baby. Today was her 3^rd 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 3^rd 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 3^rd 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 9^th 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.