Amy and Yuliya left for Turkey early on Tuesday Morning. This meant that I had a day to explore Georgia on my own. So, I decided to head to the village of Gori, Stalin's Birthplace.
I decided to be adventurous and take the Tbilisi Metro to the Didube Bus Station where I would eventually catch the rutiera to Gori. This was more complicated than I expected. I had to put a 2 lari deposit on a Metro Card and then put money for my fare on the card. After an awkward exchange, I basically ended up hold out a handful of coins to the station attendant, who took what she needed and in return gave me a Metro Card. The next challenge occurred when I had to decide which train I needed to get on. Luckily, I found a rare Georgian, English speaker who informed of the correct train and that I should get off after four stops. I finally arrived at Didube Station!! Now, I had to find the rutiera to Gori. I wandered around about four different rutiera yards trying to match the Georgian letters in travel book that supposedly spell Gori to the Georgian letters on the rutieras. Eventually, I came across a man who was yelling "Gori! Gori!" and I got on his rutiera. After an hour and a half ride, I arrived in Gori.
Gori is not big, but it is not as small as I would have liked. My one goal was to find the Stalin Museum. But first, I came across a restaurant, "Sport Cafe," that had an English Menu; so, I went in for some lunch. After about another half hour of wandering, I came across creeper #1, Grigore. Grigore stopped me on the side walk and attempted to ascertain from me what I was doing in his village. This conversation occurred in a mixture of Russian, Georgian, English and Romanian, as well as gestures. He seemed nice enough, so I asked him where the museum was. And when I say I asked, what I really said was "Museum! Stalin!" So, Grigore took me to the Stalin Museum. However, before we arrived there I had to defend myself from his several attempts to hold my hand and put his arm around me. I was relieved when we arrived at the museum, a mere three minutes later. I said good bye to Grigore and headed inside.
Now, the Stalin Museum was not all that English-speaker friendly, as was indicated by Lonely Planet, but I did get the impression that it was more of a tribute to Stalin than an accurate portrayal of his life. The one room that stuck out was the one that held nothing but Stalin's Death Mask. It was pretty creepy!!! I guess that makes Stain creeper #2 in this blog post.
After, exiting the museum I headed to the Gori Fortress. On my way there, my good friend Grigore tracked me down. This led to a change in my plans. I decided to walk briefly by the fortress (instead of surveying it in more detail) and then back to the bus station, in order to be rid of Grigore as soon as possible. I parted with Grigore about a block from the bus station, but not before he gave me a thumbs up and said "Georgia, Good?" to which I replied "Yes!"
Friday, April 15, 2011
Monday, April 11, 2011
Hairy Hotties
I am currently sitting in an internet cafe in Tbilisi, Gerogia. I have been really terrible about writing blog posts, but Amy and Yuliya are sitting next to me posting on their blog, so I feel obligated to post on mine. Their blog has a ton of pictures, so I won't be posting any on mine (nevermind the fact that I chose not to take any), but I will give a shot recap of the trip highlights.
I arrived in Kiev, Ukraine on Wednesday. My flight landed a few hours before Amy and Yuliya's, so I waited for them at the airport. At around 11:00pm-ish, we were all reunited!! Then we all went to our hostel and slept!!! Yuliya brought me my favorite tea, Peet's Xiao's Blend, and a card that another friend, Liz, had sent for me with a picture of a half naked man on it. They know me so well!!!
The following morning, Thursday, we ate breakfast and headed off on our flight to Tbilisi. We spent most of the day in transit and finding out hostel/homestay, but we did make time for a delicious dinner including: Khachapuri, Khilkali and some Georgian wine.
On Friday, we set out on a tour of Tbilisi. We walked through the Old Town, where we saw some beautiful old churches and buildings. While walking by a synagog, the man who ran it seemed to know intrinsically that Yuliya was Jewish and invited us inside for a short tour. Finally, one of the last and most exciting parts of our Tbilisi day occured when we decided to take a taxi up to see the fortress which sits on a hill overlooking Tbilisi. The hill was so steep that is took the taxi driver three tries to get up it. It was all we could do not to laugh throughout the entire incident.
The weekend came and we decided to head to a new city, Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. We took a Rutiera (or marshrutka)and 6 hours and one border crossing later we arrived. The snow covered mountais that we saw on the trip were beautiful, take a look on Yuliya and Amy's blog.. After finding our homestay, we headed for a look at the Cascade and the Monument to 50 years of Soviet Armenia, neither of which was finished at the fall of the Soviet Union.
Yesterday, the weather deteiorated. We headed out into the rain and made our way to the Armenian Genocide Museum and Memorial Complex. We walked around the main park a bit and made our way to Republic Square. We went to the History Museum to see a statue of Lennin the was supposedly located in the museum courtyard after the Armenian people broke it into several pieces. When we asked about the statue, the women at the Museum simply said "we haven't." After some more research, it turns out that this statue mysteriously disappeared in 1996 and now one really knows what hapened to it (So, Lonely Planet maybe you should update your guide book!!). After lunch, the rain drove us back to our Armenian abode. We headed back out into the weather for a quick dinner in Opera Square and then retired for the evening.
Today, we took the long return trip to Tbilisi. While Yuliya and Amy spent the trip mezmorized by the attractiveness of our Rutiera driver, I preferred the looks of his assitant. We arrived back in Georgia at a decent hour and headed out for an early dinner which included another Khachapuri. Yum!! And that brings me to the present.
Yuliya and Amy will head to Turkey tomorrow morning. I will stay and extra day or so in Georgia and then return to Moldova. Around the 22nd, they will make their way around the rest of the Black Sea and hopefully spend Easted with me and my host family.
Until then...
I arrived in Kiev, Ukraine on Wednesday. My flight landed a few hours before Amy and Yuliya's, so I waited for them at the airport. At around 11:00pm-ish, we were all reunited!! Then we all went to our hostel and slept!!! Yuliya brought me my favorite tea, Peet's Xiao's Blend, and a card that another friend, Liz, had sent for me with a picture of a half naked man on it. They know me so well!!!
The following morning, Thursday, we ate breakfast and headed off on our flight to Tbilisi. We spent most of the day in transit and finding out hostel/homestay, but we did make time for a delicious dinner including: Khachapuri, Khilkali and some Georgian wine.
On Friday, we set out on a tour of Tbilisi. We walked through the Old Town, where we saw some beautiful old churches and buildings. While walking by a synagog, the man who ran it seemed to know intrinsically that Yuliya was Jewish and invited us inside for a short tour. Finally, one of the last and most exciting parts of our Tbilisi day occured when we decided to take a taxi up to see the fortress which sits on a hill overlooking Tbilisi. The hill was so steep that is took the taxi driver three tries to get up it. It was all we could do not to laugh throughout the entire incident.
The weekend came and we decided to head to a new city, Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. We took a Rutiera (or marshrutka)and 6 hours and one border crossing later we arrived. The snow covered mountais that we saw on the trip were beautiful, take a look on Yuliya and Amy's blog.. After finding our homestay, we headed for a look at the Cascade and the Monument to 50 years of Soviet Armenia, neither of which was finished at the fall of the Soviet Union.
Yesterday, the weather deteiorated. We headed out into the rain and made our way to the Armenian Genocide Museum and Memorial Complex. We walked around the main park a bit and made our way to Republic Square. We went to the History Museum to see a statue of Lennin the was supposedly located in the museum courtyard after the Armenian people broke it into several pieces. When we asked about the statue, the women at the Museum simply said "we haven't." After some more research, it turns out that this statue mysteriously disappeared in 1996 and now one really knows what hapened to it (So, Lonely Planet maybe you should update your guide book!!). After lunch, the rain drove us back to our Armenian abode. We headed back out into the weather for a quick dinner in Opera Square and then retired for the evening.
Today, we took the long return trip to Tbilisi. While Yuliya and Amy spent the trip mezmorized by the attractiveness of our Rutiera driver, I preferred the looks of his assitant. We arrived back in Georgia at a decent hour and headed out for an early dinner which included another Khachapuri. Yum!! And that brings me to the present.
Yuliya and Amy will head to Turkey tomorrow morning. I will stay and extra day or so in Georgia and then return to Moldova. Around the 22nd, they will make their way around the rest of the Black Sea and hopefully spend Easted with me and my host family.
Until then...
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