Kelsey S and I went to Gori on
Saturday. Gori is the birthplace of
Joseph Stalin, and it’s only about an hour’s marshrutka ride from Tbilisi. Keley’s term is up at the end of December, so
she’s trying to make the most of every weekend and check off all the places she
wanted to see in Georgia before then.
We had to catch the marshrutka from the
Didube metro stop, which meant that we had to run the gauntlet of eager taxi
drivers to find the right bus. It’s kind
of amazing (and a bit scary): as soon as we step out of the metro station, we
are always surrounded by men trying to block our path and shouting the names of
popular destinations at us.
“Batumi!” “Kutaisi!” “Rustavi!”
“Gori!” If we hesitate or look
the slightest bit interested, the drivers will try to pull us over to their
cars and put our bags in the boot. This
happens at all the big metro and marshrutka stations; we must be doing
something that just screams “sucker” to everyone we pass.
When we found the legitimate marshrutka to
Gori, it was parked beneath a sign that said “Gori” and beside the ticket
counter. No shoving and shouting drivers
involved.
We had a look at the Stalin Museum first,
but neither of us wanted to pay fifteen lari to look at pictures of Joe. The lobby of the museum was really pretty,
and they had a gift shop where we could buy coasters and flasks with pictures
of Stalin on them. There were even
t-shirts with CCCP and Stalin slogans on them.
Honestly, the outside of the museum was
probably more interesting than the inside.
This is the super-heavily armoured railway car that Stalin rode around
the country in.
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| Somebody had trust issues... |
According to what I could read of the
plaque on the wall, this is the house where Stalin was born. They built a shell around it that looks an
awful lot like a temple.
I’m not sure what these statues were below
the ruins of the fortress on the other side of the city. There was a small shrine sort of thing off to
the side with little niches for candles.
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| I have no idea why they're missing bits. They were like that when we found them, I swear! |
In true Georgian fashion, the police officers across the street didn’t
even care that Kelsey and I climbed up on the artwork to take pictures.
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| Don't mind me, just climbing on your monuments. |
On our way up to the fortress, we got a bit
lost and wound up walking all the way around it. But we found this statue on the way.
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| I'm not sure who he is, but he doesn't look very comfortable. |
The fortress used to provide a vantage
point for defenders of people who were trying to invade the city. Now, the fortress provides a vantage point
for police officers who like to watch people with their super- strong
telescopes from the top of the walls.
Still, we did get a fabulous view of the mountains in the distance.
Kelsey and I tried to find a different way
down for the return trip. After
clambering down slippery rock slopes and massive erosion through what used to
be a terraced set of rooms leading up to the top, we hit a dead end. No outlet.
Oh, well. We both got a pretty
good workout climbing back up.
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I’ve tried many different kinds of kinkhali
over the past few months, but I finally got a chance to try mushroom
kinkhali. Kelsey and I stopped in a tiny
little café and impressed the waitress so much with our ability to say hello in
Georgian that she made us mushroom kinkhali even though they were technically
not available. They were pretty spicy,
but totally worth the wait.
In 2008, Gori was right in the middle of
the hostilities between Georgia and Russia, and the city still has some
scars. On Stalin Street, many of the
buildings still have bullet holes in the outer walls. Some places looked like someone just went
crazy with a machine gun, like this one.
It was a morbid kind of tourism, but we couldn’t stop ourselves from
taking loads of photos.
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| Those black spots are not dirt. |
Rather than taking a regular marshrutka
back to Tbilisi, we would up in a giant bus.
There was lag room and everything!
In the evening, I went souvenir shopping with both Kelseys in Old Town Tbilisi. We stopped for the best ice cream I’ve had in
Georgia and then found a place that made fairly passable lo mein and fried
rice. All in all, it was a very good day
for my belly.
