The End

    This always happens. I turn my back for a few minutes and then suddenly the trip is over. I'm leaving Georgia tomorrow, very early in the morning. I had the last day of my internship yesterday, and said good-bye to the paleontologist who I had been working with. I got her email address and promised to write. Considering the fact that I've only known her for a week, I was surprised how sad I was to say good-bye to her. She was a really kind, interesting mentor, and I'm going to miss her.
    Last night our whole group had a big farewell dinner at a nearby restaurant.

There was loud music and it was generally hectic, so I didn't really enjoy that, but at least there was good food.











Today I walked around the city a bit with my roommate for the last time. While I'm not a big fan of the city itself, because it is (like most cities) busy and full of noxious fumes, it was nice to see some of the buildings that I had grown familiar with once more before leaving. It was a little chilly today, but the sun was shining and it was actually kind of pleasant.

Strangely enough, we passed a big group of kids offering free hugs.











Tonight my host family had a good-bye dinner for me and my roommate, which was much more pleasant than the big group one. It was also very sad. And I now finally have pictures of my family!

My host mom setting the table.

My host dad cutting bread.

My host dad and host sisters, Internet-code-names I and M.

Left to right: My host mom, my roommate, my sister (code-name I), a cousin who was visiting, my host dad and my other sister,  code-name M. Way in the bottom right corner is Chiara, the dog.









After dinner we spent a long time talking together and looking at some of the family's picture albums. My sisters and I came up with some new games that didn't involve speaking. We spent at least fifteen minutes making farting noises at each other and laughing. It was fantastic. Finally I had to go off and pack and, since I wasn't expecting them to get up heinously early tomorrow, I hugged my sisters good-bye. I really wished I'd had more than three weeks to get to know them. They were a lot of fun to spend time with, and I'm really going to miss them. I know I'm going to feel the same way tomorrow, when I say good-bye to my host parents. All in all, I couldn't have asked for a better family, and I'm definitely going to be keeping in touch with them. It's so cool to think that I now have friends in Georgia.

This trip didn't feel like three weeks, and I'm still in the process of digesting a lot of things (including the massive dinner I just had). It was definitely a good experience, and one that I've taken a lot away from. While I'm not sure if I'll visit Tbilisi again in the near future, I now feel like I understand a lot more about Georgia than I could by just reading about the country. And I can now connect it with actual people, who I've gotten to know and care for. And, in my opinion, that's the best thing one can take from going abroad.
Okay. That was kind of sappy. I hope you've enjoyed the blog, and feel free to ask me questions. I'm off to bed. I have a plane to catch in six hours.
Good night!

Stalin, Rocks and Some Churches on Hills

This weekend we had a whole bunch of excursions to various parts of Georgia. Most of these excursions involved climbing all over insanely picturesque bits of the landscape. It was a lot of fun.
Our first stop yesterday was the town of Dmanisi, which contains an archaeological site where the oldest human remains outside of Africa have been discovered. Apparently, around 1.8 million years ago this particular part of Georgia was very popular with our distant ancestors.

Here is one section of the site.

And here are some skulls that have been dug up there.

Another section of the site.











Nearby was a little church and a fortress with a great view of the town and valley.

It had tiny doors and even tinier cats.

Then we went to a church on a hill.

Way on the right is a little line of cows.

That concluded our first day. We went back to Tbilisi, and I went with a few people to look for bookstores. I... may have bought books.
The next day we set out again, bright and early. The first place we headed was to another church on a hill.

The important thing about this cathedral is that it overlooks Mtskheta, which was the capital of Georgia before Tbilisi. It's an old city, and buildings from over a thousand years ago are currently being excavated there.







After that, we drove to the town of Gori, best known being the hometown of a certain Joseph Stalin. He was Georgian. Russians are very big on this point.

On the way there we passed by this settlement. These homes belong to refugees from South Ossetia, one of the areas of Georgia affected by the Russo-Georgian War of August 2008.
Which I don't think I've really discussed yet. Okay, story time. I'm not clear on the details because, well, no one's really clear on the details. It was all very confusing and involved a lot of finger-pointing. But what I've managed to gather is that, in August 2008 the Georgian army attacked two areas of Georgia: Abkhazia and South Ossetia. These were areas with a lot of Russian citizens, and there's a fair amount of racism in Georgia against Russians... for obvious reasons. So. These attacks caught the attention of Russia, which sent in troops and used... the term in the official report was "disproportionate force"... to majorly kick the Georgian army's butt. This took place over a span of five days. After this, Abkhazia and South Ossetia declared independence from Georgia. So far their independence has only been recognized by a few countries, including Russia. Georgia refuses to accept their independence, and considers Russia to still be a hostile, occupying force.
All in all, I've decided not to mention my fascination with Russia while I'm here.

Gori was a rather decrepit town with a noticeable military presence, since it's fairly close to South Ossetia and, therefore, those evil Russians. The town's main feature is the big, dramatically columned Stalin Museum. Apparently it's other main feature used to be a big statue of Stalin in the central square, but the statue was taken down. In 2009. In the middle of the night, to avoid possible angry locals. Hm.

The first thing we noticed about the museum is that it was colder inside than it was outside. There's probably a joke in there somewhere. We were led around, through grand rooms with stained glass windows, by a woman who talked a mile a minute about all the pictures and artifacts in the museum. It was the cleanest, most blameless description of Stalin's life that I had ever heard. One particularly entertaining moment came when our guide was discussing Stalin's second wife, who committed suicide. Someone asked why, and she responded "The official story was that she had a headache" and then moved on. 

Stalin...washing a car? I don't even know.

A miniature version of...

...this! Lenin's Mausoleum. Though you'll notice that the miniature includes Stalin's name too. This is because his body was in there too for a few years, until the Soviet government thought better of it and took him out.  

And this is the house where Stalin spent the first three years of his life. The inside wasn't all that interesting- just a single room with a bed and table and stuff. I just liked the big temple-like enclosure they put it in. 

And this is Stalin's armored train car. 

Stalin's armored train was pretty nice. But I going to put it out there and say that Trotsky's was cooler. His had printing presses. 

After getting our minds broadened at the Stalin Museum, we headed to the cave city of Uplistsikhe to climb on more rocks. 

The cave city is a network of caves and buildings dug into some cliffs. They were used by various people from the 6th century BCE all the way up to the late 1700s. And they make for some great rock climbing. 

There were a great variety of dogs in the parking lot. 

And then we went to a restaurant, where we had Exhibit A: baked beans in bowls with bread on top. 

...As well as a bunch of other stuff.

All right. That was a very basic overview of what I did this weekend. I'm ending this post now because it's late and I need to go to bed. Good night!

My Internship and Stuff

I can't believe I've already been here for more than a week. Actually, today marks the halfway point. Nine days here and nine days left. I figured it would go by really quickly, but it's still a bit of a shock.

I started my internship at the Georgian National Museum this week. It's located in the middle of Tbilisi, near the main squares, and... while it isn't the biggest or most impressive museum I've seen, it's not a bad one. My host dad works there, so I've been able to carpool with him, which is nice. I particularly appreciate this because on my first day, Monday, I ended up having to walk to the museum by myself. I made it there, but... it wasn't an enjoyable enough experience for me to want to do it every day. I'm just not cut out for walking around cities by myself.

The first two days I was shown around the museum and introduced to people, and yesterday I finally got assigned some work, editing English descriptions of various aspects of the museum. I spent the whole time sitting in a shared office, working, while other employees wandered in and out. I was perfectly content, but at the end of the day one of the employees came up to me and said she was worried because I hadn't had anything to eat or drink the whole time I had been there. She insisted that I let her know if I got hungry in the future, and said that she wanted me to feel like I was part of the museum staff family. It was startling and gratifying at the same time.

Today I was assigned work in the paleontology department, re-shelving and arranging the bones in the collection. It was fun, though I was a little embarrassed because the paleontologist I was working with had to keep explaining what kinds of bones they were and which way I needed to arrange them. Still, though, it was fun. And those of you who know about my work with rat teeth this summer will be happy to know that this time I was working with 2 million-year-old rhino bones.

My little corner in the paleontology collection.












Now for the promised Stuff.
On Wednesday, a few of the other students in my program and I hiked up the big hill in the middle of Tbilisi. It was a pleasant walk through a rather scraggly forest, and it offered some great views of the city.

Partway up the hill, in the middle of the woods,  we found a strange, makeshift workout center.

Yes. That's a dumbbell... made out of car wheels. I want one.

...Or I'll just steal this one.











As if the mini-gym weren't strange enough, at the top of the hill we found a little amusement park. There was a man working there who told us to get in by crawling under a fence. Slightly sketchy, but we went with it. It had some funny little rides and one big ferris wheel. And there were actually quite a few people there, so it ended up not being as sketchy as it had initially seemed.

Finally, I've been getting to know my host sisters more and more, particularly the younger one. It's a lot of fun spending time with them,  and we've managed to find games that don't involve speaking, like chess and... um... playing with a laser pointer.  Also, the younger one has been teaching me to count in Georgian.

My big list of Georgian numbers, courtesy of my little sister.

















I think that's all the stuff for now. Tomorrow I'm leaving on another excursion to various parts of Georgia and, once again, I'll try to take a lot of pictures. For now, I'll end this post with a picture of my family's big puppy, because I don't think I've shown her to you yet.