Ramapo in Tbilisi

Prof. Jeremy Teigen, associate professor of political science, on a Fulbright in Tbilisi Georgia, at Tbilisi State University
Some conclusions I wrote this as our final jetliner of the artificially overlong day takes us across the Atlantic, cutting westward through time zones before we set our watches back to Eastern Standard Time. The reasons behind my applying for a Fulbright more than a year ago were many. There were the self-fulfilling reasons: it supported my wife’s research goals, and Georgia is a country I have experienced twice before and I was eager to see how much progress has been made in the ten years since my first time in Tbilisi. But, the mission of the Fulbright is obviously bigger than me, bigger than my benefits. The intentions from the beginning, when Senator Fulbright innovated the legislatively mandated money for these projects, it was about forging ties between countries, and academics are more often than not the agents. When American taxpayers are asked to fund these projects, whether it is a foreign scholar given an opportunity to study in the United States or an American professor with a temporary posting overseas, the taxpayer should know this is money well spent. Like my daughter, learning the languages around the Caucasus was not a priority for me. But, I have a couple new favorite Georgian words, for which English provides no elegant translation: “Zeg” and “Mazeg,” or “day after tomorrow” and “day after the day after tomorrow,” respectively. I won’t be back to Tbilisi zeg or even mazeg, but doubtlessly we shall return again.

Some conclusions

I wrote this as our final jetliner of the artificially overlong day takes us across the Atlantic, cutting westward through time zones before we set our watches back to Eastern Standard Time. The reasons behind my applying for a Fulbright more than a year ago were many. There were the self-fulfilling reasons: it supported my wife’s research goals, and Georgia is a country I have experienced twice before and I was eager to see how much progress has been made in the ten years since my first time in Tbilisi. But, the mission of the Fulbright is obviously bigger than me, bigger than my benefits. The intentions from the beginning, when Senator Fulbright innovated the legislatively mandated money for these projects, it was about forging ties between countries, and academics are more often than not the agents. When American taxpayers are asked to fund these projects, whether it is a foreign scholar given an opportunity to study in the United States or an American professor with a temporary posting overseas, the taxpayer should know this is money well spent.

Like my daughter, learning the languages around the Caucasus was not a priority for me. But, I have a couple new favorite Georgian words, for which English provides no elegant translation: “Zeg” and “Mazeg,” or “day after tomorrow” and “day after the day after tomorrow,” respectively. I won’t be back to Tbilisi zeg or even mazeg, but doubtlessly we shall return again.

Parenting on the road Another interesting angle to the Fulbright experience at this phase in my life was traveling and living overseas with my four year old. It certainly added wrinkles and nuance to the logistics. A higher degree of care needed to go into decisions regarding health care, living situations, school quality, and other matters. Traveling when I was younger, in the “before child” era entailed fewer details. But, two large boons unexpectedly appeared, perhaps best seen in retrospect. First, one hopes a host of “direct” benefits for our daughter accrue from having lived in a different place. She made friends with kids her own age that she won’t soon forget. She did not care for all the foods, but was keen on the cheese bread and the soups. Second, and perhaps, more “indirect,” language exposure (not immersion) to a country where she heard Georgian and Russian every day in addition to her staying with English gave her the knowledge that languages are more than different oral codes for the same meaning. She learned who in her life, between friends her own age, teachers, her parents friends, and others, spoke which languages and why. Masha speaks Russian because she is Russian, her teacher speaks Georgian because she’s Georgian, for example. She did not actively learn these languages in any active way. She can count in Georgian and certainly knows oft-used teacher/parent phrases, such as “modi ak!” (“come here!”) and “ara!” (no!), but she does not “know” either foreign tongue in a meaningful way. Yet, I hope there was value for her later in life, when encountering languages in school of on the road. Perhaps she has unlocked the door in her mind that understands languages as cultural expressions and not simply a different code for the same meanings. Perhaps she has permanently understood that there are many languages, and she speaks but one. Maybe just the desire to learn one someday. I should not mean to overplay my daughter’s linguist perceptions. At London’s airport earlier, when we were en route home, she had pilfered a vomit bag from the Baku – London flight, and was chirping happily down the maze of Heathrow’s halls with an improvised puppet on her hand. To get between terminals, we rode a bus, whose driver acknowledged her homemade puppet with a little joke when she boarded. Upon hearing the man’s English accent, Amelia nodded politely and blinked to the driver as he patted her head. She told us after he was out of earshot, “He’s speaking Georgian.”

Parenting on the road

Another interesting angle to the Fulbright experience at this phase in my life was traveling and living overseas with my four year old. It certainly added wrinkles and nuance to the logistics. A higher degree of care needed to go into decisions regarding health care, living situations, school quality, and other matters. Traveling when I was younger, in the “before child” era entailed fewer details. But, two large boons unexpectedly appeared, perhaps best seen in retrospect. First, one hopes a host of “direct” benefits for our daughter accrue from having lived in a different place. She made friends with kids her own age that she won’t soon forget. She did not care for all the foods, but was keen on the cheese bread and the soups.

Second, and perhaps, more “indirect,” language exposure (not immersion) to a country where she heard Georgian and Russian every day in addition to her staying with English gave her the knowledge that languages are more than different oral codes for the same meaning. She learned who in her life, between friends her own age, teachers, her parents friends, and others, spoke which languages and why. Masha speaks Russian because she is Russian, her teacher speaks Georgian because she’s Georgian, for example. She did not actively learn these languages in any active way. She can count in Georgian and certainly knows oft-used teacher/parent phrases, such as “modi ak!” (“come here!”) and “ara!” (no!), but she does not “know” either foreign tongue in a meaningful way. Yet, I hope there was value for her later in life, when encountering languages in school of on the road. Perhaps she has unlocked the door in her mind that understands languages as cultural expressions and not simply a different code for the same meanings. Perhaps she has permanently understood that there are many languages, and she speaks but one. Maybe just the desire to learn one someday.

I should not mean to overplay my daughter’s linguist perceptions. At London’s airport earlier, when we were en route home, she had pilfered a vomit bag from the Baku – London flight, and was chirping happily down the maze of Heathrow’s halls with an improvised puppet on her hand. To get between terminals, we rode a bus, whose driver acknowledged her homemade puppet with a little joke when she boarded. Upon hearing the man’s English accent, Amelia nodded politely and blinked to the driver as he patted her head. She told us after he was out of earshot, “He’s speaking Georgian.”

We must head back to the States soon, all too soon, for getting spring 2012 going at our respective institutions. We did take advantage of the holiday week in Tbilisi to abscond to Turkey and Greece. The Aegean was a pleasant place to be before heading back to our home latitudes.

We must head back to the States soon, all too soon, for getting spring 2012 going at our respective institutions. We did take advantage of the holiday week in Tbilisi to abscond to Turkey and Greece. The Aegean was a pleasant place to be before heading back to our home latitudes.

Back to the land of Cedillas and Umlauts

The new year’s chill of Tbilisi could only be solved with a little warmth. On some timely and nice advice from a colleague in the know, we are enjoying a bit of a break in Bodrum. If you think of Turkey as a large rectangle, we’re enjoying (relative) warmth in the SW corner. I’ve been in Asia minor a few times , and it has always been good to me.

Tbilisi’s New Year traditions differ from what Americans expect. Fireworks of all magnitudes were for sale in the street kiosks and bodegas for two weeks prior. Firecrackers, bottle rockets, and roman candles (or their equivalents) could be heard here and there for many days prior, day and night, sporadically. On New Years Eve, starting after dark, the intensity increased, and the large colorful sparklies started reaching high above the building roofs of Vake. Not from a central, organized center, but it just seemed collectively done from all around us. Then, after I thought we had reached a plateau of near perpetual booms, about ten minutes before midnight, the rate, altitude, and intensity doubled. It was pretty impressive. If you like the choreographed precision of a well-done show, synced with F-16 fly-bys, this was not your eve. If you wanted to see a chaotic, probably unsafe, citywide razzle-dazzle surrounding you, this was your eve. Oh, and it is good luck to eat a roasted suckling pig on New Years Day here, as it is in many other places. So, entrepreneurial types with a connection to a pig farm and a large enough car would set up near markets and sell pigs out of their trunk.  Christmas is not for a few days in this part of Christendom, so the streets have been freakishly quiet during the holiday period leading up to it. Besides the tumult of New Year’s eve, it has been very quiet. A lot of folks have this whole week off from work and school. Many shops are shuttered.        qc-in-tbilisi: New Year pigs. Poor guys. Smelly car, I imagine.

Tbilisi’s New Year traditions differ from what Americans expect. Fireworks of all magnitudes were for sale in the street kiosks and bodegas for two weeks prior. Firecrackers, bottle rockets, and roman candles (or their equivalents) could be heard here and there for many days prior, day and night, sporadically. On New Years Eve, starting after dark, the intensity increased, and the large colorful sparklies started reaching high above the building roofs of Vake. Not from a central, organized center, but it just seemed collectively done from all around us. Then, after I thought we had reached a plateau of near perpetual booms, about ten minutes before midnight, the rate, altitude, and intensity doubled. It was pretty impressive. If you like the choreographed precision of a well-done show, synced with F-16 fly-bys, this was not your eve. If you wanted to see a chaotic, probably unsafe, citywide razzle-dazzle surrounding you, this was your eve.

Oh, and it is good luck to eat a roasted suckling pig on New Years Day here, as it is in many other places. So, entrepreneurial types with a connection to a pig farm and a large enough car would set up near markets and sell pigs out of their trunk. 

Christmas is not for a few days in this part of Christendom, so the streets have been freakishly quiet during the holiday period leading up to it. Besides the tumult of New Year’s eve, it has been very quiet. A lot of folks have this whole week off from work and school. Many shops are shuttered.       

qc-in-tbilisi:

New Year pigs. Poor guys. Smelly car, I imagine.

Had a great event yesterday in Telavi. That city is only an hour or two by windy road away from Tbilisi, but it feels quite distant because of the proximity of the large Caucasus looming in every view. Telavi State University hosted my short talk on the upcoming presidential election (via translator), and the students asked probing, cogent questions. The institution’s rector, Prof. Javakhishvili, was a classic Kakhetian hostess, hosting us (me and the Embassy people who made it happen) for a pleasant supra lunch. I told the students that I had no idea how they were able to study given the distracting vistas out every window.

Had a great event yesterday in Telavi. That city is only an hour or two by windy road away from Tbilisi, but it feels quite distant because of the proximity of the large Caucasus looming in every view. Telavi State University hosted my short talk on the upcoming presidential election (via translator), and the students asked probing, cogent questions. The institution’s rector, Prof. Javakhishvili, was a classic Kakhetian hostess, hosting us (me and the Embassy people who made it happen) for a pleasant supra lunch. I told the students that I had no idea how they were able to study given the distracting vistas out every window.

So how is the quality of living in Tbilisi? I would say it has been enjoyable, but my vantage point is not comparative. The Mercer Survey outfit conducted a “quality of living” ranking based on criteria comprising an array of factors as well as some metric of personal safety. Tbilisi fared terribly, I’m afraid. Terribly in both indices. I am not surprised by the safety angle. I watched a man writhe in pain in the middle of a major thoroughfare with his groceries exploded across four lanes, from the passenger seat of a shelled out mercedes with more cracks than glass in the windshield, strapped in my a seat belt held to the anchor with an knot.  (photo credit) 

So how is the quality of living in Tbilisi? I would say it has been enjoyable, but my vantage point is not comparative. The Mercer Survey outfit conducted a “quality of living” ranking based on criteria comprising an array of factors as well as some metric of personal safety. Tbilisi fared terribly, I’m afraid. Terribly in both indices. I am not surprised by the safety angle. I watched a man writhe in pain in the middle of a major thoroughfare with his groceries exploded across four lanes, from the passenger seat of a shelled out mercedes with more cracks than glass in the windshield, strapped in my a seat belt held to the anchor with an knot. 

(photo credit) 

[Flash 10 is required to watch video]

FINALLY got my panduri today. After multiple iterations of lost-in-communication disconnects between me and the man who crafted this thing, or more specifically, his intermediaries, I got it home this afternoon. Panduri are three-stringed folk instruments, native to the eastern part of Georgia. Traditionally fretted ones like I have use seven frets, but these are not major scale spacing, but something unique to the Caucasus, I think. My confidence is not high on this matter, but it is fun to play nonetheless. 

I tried tuning it in many ways. First, I tried the traditional way, which is do-re-fa, or as my resident expert advises me “*approximately*” do-re-fa. It is important to remember that Georgian folk music does not rely upon Western music intervals, i.e., they are not afraid to use the notes between the notes. Tobe Richard’s publication asserts that the panduri takes either E3 B3 A4 or G3 A3 C4, but I believe this may entail interpretation. 

Another thing to know about the panduri and Georgian folk music generally: it is all about the singing. Instruments are there to complement or support the singing, not to charge into the melodic lead. Which is to say: I’m already doing it wrong. It’s not common to play the panduri for panduri’s sake. Not that it isn’t done, and by some rather able hands, I should hasten to add.

So I tooled around with it for awhile, but the tuning of a “standard” guitar is so ingrained in my head that it was difficult to adapt my rusty knowledge from those old days to a new instrument with different fret spacing and differently tuned strings.

Seeking to produce something listenable-ish, I tuned it so something more familiar to my ears: major chord (do-me-so) so I could at least pick around a riff that made some sense to my nongeorgian ears. So, apologies to the Georgian sensibilities out there for my invented riff above; like I say: day one.

Earthenware: Everywhere So, on our return journey from Kutaisi, my wife says, “Can we stop at this place I sort of remember that had some clay pots?” Um, yeah, we stopped. Turned out they had some.

Earthenware: Everywhere

So, on our return journey from Kutaisi, my wife says, “Can we stop at this place I sort of remember that had some clay pots?” Um, yeah, we stopped. Turned out they had some.

A too brief but dense visit to Georgia’s planned second capital The US Embassy and IRI wonderfully organized three events for me to discuss American politics in Kutaisi last week. It was also my first time to Georgia’s “official” second city (though “Batumians” have oft reminded me that their port city is the new number two). Georgian politics makes a change in the upcoming couple of years with the migration of Parliament from Tbilisi, home of roughly a fifth or a quarter of all Georgians, to much smaller Kutaisi, Georgia’s historic capital city  from parts of its antiquity. Ancient Colchis, if I’m not mistaken, made what became Kutaisi its central city. Kutaisi is much smaller than Tbilisi, but feels very nice in the downtown area. It is in the west of Georgia geographically.  In addition to a small meeting with high school freshmen in an English language club facilitated by a member of my “Fulbright fraternity,” I met with two separate groups of party activists in Kutaisi. Many of Georgia’s parties were represented; I did not get just one slice of the spectrum. I gave a presentation about how the process of presidential nominations has changed over time in American presidential party politics, and robust discussion followed in both groups about Georgia’s future and potential reforms within Georgia’s parties. Thanks to Maia Lyons from the embassy for both planning the whole thing and taking pictures like the one above with me and my interpreter, Nino.

A too brief but dense visit to Georgia’s planned second capital

The US Embassy and IRI wonderfully organized three events for me to discuss American politics in Kutaisi last week. It was also my first time to Georgia’s “official” second city (though “Batumians” have oft reminded me that their port city is the new number two). Georgian politics makes a change in the upcoming couple of years with the migration of Parliament from Tbilisi, home of roughly a fifth or a quarter of all Georgians, to much smaller Kutaisi, Georgia’s historic capital city  from parts of its antiquity. Ancient Colchis, if I’m not mistaken, made what became Kutaisi its central city. Kutaisi is much smaller than Tbilisi, but feels very nice in the downtown area. It is in the west of Georgia geographically. 

In addition to a small meeting with high school freshmen in an English language club facilitated by a member of my “Fulbright fraternity,” I met with two separate groups of party activists in Kutaisi. Many of Georgia’s parties were represented; I did not get just one slice of the spectrum. I gave a presentation about how the process of presidential nominations has changed over time in American presidential party politics, and robust discussion followed in both groups about Georgia’s future and potential reforms within Georgia’s parties.

Thanks to Maia Lyons from the embassy for both planning the whole thing and taking pictures like the one above with me and my interpreter, Nino.