Zacho Falls Off a House

           I woke up angry on Sunday, though I’m not quite sure why. Tomorrow will be 24 days in the village without a break; 24 days without speaking in complete sentences, 24 days of eating questionable food, and that’s 24 days with only two unsatisfying showers. I’m not complaining, this is what I signed up for, what I live for in a lot of ways, but I’d be lying if I said I was certain that it didn’t factor into how I felt.

            I think what mostly put me into a foul mood was the epitome I had the night before. I was staring off at the mountains, looking without seeing, when I realized that this is the first time in my life that I’ve lived in a state resembling poverty. I was fortunate enough to be born to loving parents that did (do) everything in their power to keep me fed and comfortable. That makes me the minority in this world. There are entire continents full people that are trying to eat, and I come from the only continent full of people that are trying to stop.

            And then I realized that I’m just visiting. In two months time I’ll go back to buying 5 dollar coffee and this unsteady world will persist into the twenty-first century. It was a cripplingly somber thought, but I vowed to forever be conscious of my actions.  

Up in the Mountains

            The next morning, I rolled off my bed, slouched over my morning chai, and was informed that today I was going on a ‘holiday’. I am by no means a veteran of this country, but I’ve been here long enough not to ask what they meant, the answer would only leave me more confused.

            There’s an expression with the expats in this country, when you ask somebody what time an event is at they always add the appendage GMT: Georgian Maybe Time. I sat on the roadside for over an hour waiting for my holiday to begin, just as I was about to leave the marshrutka (van) picked me up. I was heading deeper into the mountains.

            Along the way I peppered my fifteen-year-old host brother with questions, my eyes scanning the countryside for familiar landmarks so that I could walk home. A copy of The Brothers Karamazov was burning a hole in my bedside table; I desperately wanted to curl up.

            After an hour, we finally reached our destination high above the valley. I finally received some answers too: my holiday was to a sixteen-year-old girl’s first wedding anniversary. Go back and reread that last sentence.

            Zacho was going to his first supra.

            A supra is a Georgian feast, a celebratory event, instantly recognizable by its tables loaded with food, wine, and chacha. A supra always has a tamada, a toastmaster, who spends the night hanging onto the end of a table giving long, rambling speeches about every five minutes.

Party Central, the Bride in the Red

            Fifty of us silently filed into a room, I tried a few cheery gamarjobas (hellos) out on a couple of people, but I was met with faces of unwavering stone. We sat down at two long tables overflowing with beef, chicken, bread, vegetables and fruit. As soon as we took our places, people began to eat without speaking. At small intervals along the table were plastic Tupperware pitchers that I assumed were filled with water. Almost choking to death on a chicken bone, I asked the man beside me to fill my glass. When I put the cup to my lips, I choked again on the sickly-sweet taste of Georgian wine.

            As soon as the tamada took his place at the head of my table and gave his first speech, the party began in earnest. Georgians pride themselves on their speeches: long, confusing affairs that can last over ten minutes. When Georgians finish giving a speech, you cheers (gamarjos!) but only with your right hand, and only after the person giving the speech has drank. It doesn’t matter if you’re drinking beer, wine or moonshine, you always finish your drink in one gulp.

Talking Champagne Showers: Bubbly and Baklava for the Happy Couple

            I thank the almighty Allah that I was sitting in the wine section that night, because the speeches piled on, increasing in frequency and decreasing in length. At one point, the men around my table stood and took turns toasting the happy couple. On a whim I too stood up and thanked them, President Saakashvili, her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, the Right Honourable Stephen Harper and the Sedin twins. When I sat back down, a stupid, shit-eating grin on my face, I was met with wide eyes. Nobody in the room had understood a word that I had said but they sure were shocked that I had stood up. Almost imperceptibly, something changed and my table erupted in laughter, my back stung from the good-natured slaps it received. I had done exactly the right thing: I had returned the honor that they had given me.

            The clouds of bitter Russian tobacco smoke forced me to go outside, but not before I two-stepped in a sea of gorgeous women, egged on by the irritatingly high eyebrows and wide grins of their patroni’s (chaperones). A few mothers informed me that they had designs on me and I thought it best to slip outside before I woke up married.

            I reached a little wooden balcony, brought out my trusty Nokia, and called a friend to tell him to call the government if he didn’t hear from me for a couple of days. I held the phone to my ear with my shoulder, my arms fanned out in front of me in a casual manner, my hands gently sought the railing and I fell off the goddamned house.

                        It was only 6 feet, but it was onto rock, and the three extra summersaults I did down the slope sure didn’t help. When I later talked to my friend on the phone, he said he had heard a thud, followed by nothing but Georgian voices. I can’t believe he didn’t hear the sound of my pride shattering.

My Moonshine Bandage and My Awesome Georgian Slippers

              I picked myself up, found my phone, critically   weighed the pros and cons of crying, thought better of it,  and called Papa Corey, the grizzled Canadian leader of our group. I could not put any weight on my right knee, my hands and elbows were bleeding, and I honestly couldn’t tell if I had hit my head. Corey kept me calm, talked me through it, and gave me some pretty sound advice. By a small miracle, I crawled into the only marshrutka that was headed towards my village, somehow got back to my house, and crashed heavily onto the couch, laughing like an idiot the entire time. Host mom took one look at my knee, and went and grabbed a bottle of chacha. I cringed, the room was already spinning and I doubted that more moonshine was going to help, but she pulled out a rag, doused it with the clear liquid, and wrapped it around my knee. The pain was so great that I had no choice but to laugh even louder. What a spectacular holiday.

            At some point in this adventure I talked to my father on the phone. When I woke up, he had sent the following to me in an email:

"perhaps you should send along a couple of contacts there – just in case you take in the wrong combination of chacha, palinka, wine, beer, vodka, bad meat and schnapps, and decide to go live in the hills for a while, chasing small furry animals, and we have to track you down."

Too late, Dad.

Kargad!

Zacho