A week with Andro

A week with Andro
03-28-05

My brother came to Tbilisi for his UVM spring break, being the best March birthday present I have ever received! How to show my most loved person in the world an entire country, an entire culture, in seven days?! In retrospect, we did a hell of a job of it. Here are some highlights:

Nariqala Fortress:
After Andrew, quickly dubbed ‘Andro’ by the Georgians, had slept off some jetlag, we took a marshutka ride down to the Old City and climbed up the alleyways to the old fifth century fortress that used to protect Tbilisi. From the promontory, we were buffeted by chilly winds as clouds raced overhead, and shafts of sunlight moved rapidly over the city below and hills around. We followed them with our eyes, and I pointed out all the landmarks within view: Sameba Cathedral, Sioni Cathedral, Freedom Square formerly Lenin Square, the Mtkvari River along with a quick Georgian pronunciation lesson, Rustaveli Prospekt, the distant concrete suburbs...

Birthday Supra:
We met up with a bunch of my friends, and took a marshutka to a restaurant in Mtskheta, a half hour distant, where Luarsab presided over a great feast of fasting-foods and hooligan singers. Andro was formally introduced to the art of the Georgian supra. Five people from the foreigner’s choir showed up to sing some of our songs, and about twenty of my Georgian singing buddies came to sing too. Unbelievable times.

There were a trio of women singing with a chonguri, the traditional instrument from the Black Sea coast. We were so many chanters, that chants needed to be sung three times with three different small choirs taking turns showing off their ornamentation. I could imagine grand old feasts in feudal Georgian times having this atmosphere as the bishop’s choir duelled with the noble’s choir....

Kutaisi:
We traveled by Niva jeep to the western Georgian capital city, Kutaisi, once the capital of the Colchian kingdom in pre-Christian times. We visited the great Gelati Monastery, where Ekvtime Kereselidze (whose biography I’m studying) organized all his scattered chant notes into five massive books.

We visited Motsameta Monastery, where Luarsab and his fellow church history researcher interviewed the oldest living monk in Georgia, a great white bearded man with enormous hands and a strong oak voice. While he told his life story to Luarsab and my minidisc recorder, Andro and I took a moonlit night-hike down the cliffs to a hidden pasture by a bend in the gorge river.

Motsameta sits on a peninsula five hundred feet above a river which makes a horseshoe shape around the monastery, cliffs closing in on all sides. What a gorgeous place. Twelfth century monastery. We skipped rocks and discussed college life in the moonlight.

Later we stayed at a priest’s house, where we had supra number two. In the morning, we were greeted with supra number three for breakfast, and on our way to the famous ruin of the ruling Bagrati palace and cathedral, we had supra number four with about five more priest friends.

One priest loved his wine so much he kept exclaiming to Andro, ‘bolomde, bicho!’ literally ‘bottoms up, boy!’ Luarsab intervened to save relative sobriety. Meanwhile this particular priest indulged to the healthiest degree, check out the pictures in the March album.

On the way to Bagrati cathedral again, we had to stop at another church, where Luarsab was again delayed at supra for three hours. This time, Andro and I took matters into our own hands, skipped the supra and walked across the city, over the bridge, and up the hill to the ruin.

What a beautiful place! Whereas many practicing cathedrals have a somewhat dim, musty air to them, a cathedral in ruins attests to a history far more complex, while sunlight on a nave floor adds an element of grandeur mixed with tragedy. Such was the feeling in Bagrati Cathedral, it’s elegant transcept half domes still intact in their perfect masonry, while the roof and south walls lay in ruin.

In all directions the two meter thick palace walls defended the royal family from Turks, Persians, and Highlanders, to name just a few of the attendance list of adversaries who fought in Georgia through the centuries.

We finally found Luarsab at another priest’s house, where interviews may only be conducted over the supra table. So again we were treated to beans, bread, salads, and wine, before we drove the four hours all the way back over the central valley mountains to Tbilisi, in hot debate over the Abkhazian conflict and other such issues which are of curiousity to Andro for his course on development and demography.

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Sighnaghi:
I’m almost tiring myself out just rethinking this weeks non-stop adventuring! What times. But one can’t really describe Georgia, it must be shown. Don’t expect a similar tour for each and every one of you as you get your flight tickets ready to come over here, I’m plain wore out!

We slept in after the trip, then ate vegetarian food at the only cafe of that speciality in the city, took the scary underground to the bus station, and ‘marsh’d’ it for Sighnaghi (traveling by marshutka minibus), most beautiful of Georgian villages. We were greeted by friends, homecooked potato dumplings, and lots of singing! No electricity or running water in Sighnaghi and it was cold cold!

Thursday, we went with Shergil, Shmagi, and two buddies down to some village schools where we performed two concerts for the kids. Andro had learned Aghdgomasa Shensa on the drive out to Kutaisi, so he performed with us in front of all the kids, they loved seeing the foreigners sing!

Before the concert, I schooled the local bullies at basketball, and taught everyone else how to pass to win, because they obviously haven’t seen Hoosiers over here recently. Four passes before the shot. Funnily enough, all the bullies showed up at the concert later and winked at Andro and I as if to say, ‘you’re cool, I’m cool, we understand each other.’ I hate bullies. I’ll school you guys again if I get the chance, and don’t count on any favors from this foreigner. :)

We threw another birthday supra for Shergil and I, both Pisces boys, at the grandview restaurant, where our view was a moonlit nothingness over the expanse of the Alezani far below. You’ve all seen my pictures of Sighnaghi and know it is in the hills high above the valley.... my present to Shergil were copies of twenty Easter chants, which he is drooling over all the time now, such beautiful chants no one has ever heard before!

Back around the woodstove, the girls wanted to play games, so we played games like saying a verse in Georgian after which one person would name a number. Then we would count up to that number, each person around the circle saying the next number. At the final number, if you were next in line and your hand was slapped, you were out! This game was particularly amusing because I didn’t get it, and while Andro did get it, he couldn’t count in Georgian and didn’t know how high to count anyway.

The next game involved blindfolding one person, dancing around them in a circle singing songs, then allowing them to try and tag someone who would become the next blindfolded person. I kept wondering if I was in kindergarten, since that is the last time I played games like this, but here we were, a bunch of 18+ers, dancing and laughing away. I think the girls just wanted to flirt with Andro, who after all isn’t that bad looking a kid, and maybe the best way for girls to flirt here is through kindergarten games. Dating is not quite the scene here shall I note....

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Tbilisi:
Back to Tbilisi in the wee morning hours when normal foreigners work and normal Georgians sleep, because I had to sing the Vespers service at 1pm. Andro came along and lasted for about an hour and half before wandering off to find Russian cigarettes for friends, a map and a flag.

The flag came in handy because, after a quick bite to eat, we were off to watch the Georgian National soccer team take on defending European Cup champions Greece! The game was madness, great fun, high energy. Georgia scored first to the ecstacy of thousands, but proceeded to lose three to one, oh well. The singing guys we went with weren’t contented with the evening, so we partied with folk singing back at my apartment until wee hours, complete with black wine and guitar.

Divine Liturgy in the morning, a grand hooligan basketball extravaganza in the afternoon, then wandering and shopping in Tbilisi, a crewcut for Andro’s college mop, then to supra at Luarsab’s house where we had great fun playing with two year old Elene. The night was too young at 10:30 so we visited my chess buddy John to play a few games and discuss politics. Quickly home, and then we drove Andro to the airport at 2am.

Bro, what times we’ve had this week! I hope the Georgia of these days stays in memory and inspires new energy for life back at school.

Renunciation

One of the privileges of having a grant has been that I have been able to afford to have internet in my apartment. I’ve enjoyed reading world news, Georgian news, being able to search easily for information, and most particularly to receive and send emails.

Great Lent is here, and though my education is still somewhat poor and must be improved on this subject, I understand it to be a time of renunciation. Through a period of denying ourselves certain ‘pleasures,’ we remind ourselves of the great sacrifice that Christ gave to humanity during this time of year, many centuries ago. It is His renunciation, His great suffering and sacrifice that we remember in order to remind ourselves to be better human beings, to ‘live in Christ’ which I take to mean to attempt to follow the qualities of virtue which he taught: compassion, charity, humility, honesty...

Though ‘fasting,’ as the food renunciation is called, is not followed by everyone here, it is definitly part of the culture. Many people threw ‘pre-Fasting’ supras in order to finish off their stocks of cheese, meat, fish, and other dairies. Restaurants will now have special fasting-menus, and every grocery-store clerk is fluent on the fasting-status of store items.

Going vegan won’t be such a stretch for me. It’s more the motivational idea that is worrisome. Why do it? It seems like some kind of tradition from the middle east two thousand years ago that wasn’t even Christian to begin with but came out of the strict eating tradition of the Jewish faith. Please correct me if I’m wrong in this.

So I’m thinking about the ideas of renunciation: I’ve never really given up anything during Lent before, or made New Year’s resolutions, or any of these types of things before.

The long and the short of my thinking is that my internet access is what I covet most, and therefore, it must go. Well, a cutback. If we’re to have renunciation, it has to be something important to ourselves right? Something that really actually reminds us daily that we’re giving up something in memory of Christ’s sacrifice. Funny that the internet is going to be that for me.

Of course, I’m going to keep the vegan fast, but honestly it will be more of an exploration of other available foods, and a daily annoyance in the supermarket, rather than a renunciation-act for me. But I have only continued my email vice from college days, so a self-imposed curfew will be good for me, and a challenge too.

Mdzlevari Choir

Mdzlevari Choir
03-15-05

I went with Lasha and Giorgi to the rehearsal of the famous Mdzlevari boys choir. These fifty or so youngsters aged eight to twenty five sing with such an incredible sound, they rival the great choirs in the world. They are directed by a famous soloist from the most well-known of Georgian choirs, the Rustavi choir. The Rustavi choir has been touring the world since the 80s with the equally famous Caucasian dance troup, Eresioni.

What a sound! They sing super quiet, super loud, with a rich, thick like molasses sound that can quickly change to an electrifying bright neon timbre that might make your hair stand on end if it weren’t so exactly in tune. I sat next to the director in a small room with fifty packed voices aimed right at my forehead. I employed my fire alarm hearing and poker face expression and weathered the storm of voices that are supposed to fill three thousand seat auditoriums. Indeed, the choir is going on tour to Moscow next week.

Suddenly, all the boys left, and fifteen of the older guys stayed. Wow, they sound amazing, exactly like the Rustavi choir. If closing my eyes were allowed here, I would have allowed my ears to do all my work, but eye-closing is somehow not culturally appropriate here because it appears you are sleeping and also other people cannot see what you are feeling and thinking. I could have used some Ray-esque shades. Anyway, I stared at the desk and listened, what a rare experience of chocolate covered hearing it was!

If any of my Futen boys are reading this, you’ll be excited to know that they sang nearly every song that we performed at Wesleyan including our first favorites, Kviria, Tsmindao Ghmerto, and Shen Khar Venakhi. Afterall, this is the Rustavi repertoire, which was my first inspiration to pursue Georgian music.

While listening, I chuckled in retrospect at how much my taste has changed. When I first heard the Rustavi cd, I only really loved two or three songs on the cd, and they were the most mellow, the most westernized songs coming out of the Russified music era of Georgian music. The other crazy sounding songs on the disc were beyond my listening capabilities at the time.

In contrast, at the moment, I’m listening to a 1930s field recording of West Georgian village singers singing crazy yodeling in three voice polyphony. I never listen to Rustavi anymore. It’s too clean, too western, it’s a new Georgia perhaps, but not the real Georgia; not the roots where Georgian folk music and Georgian chanting come from.

Nevertheless, it is a breathtaking sound, especially in knowing most of the songs, every note, every cadence. At school, I had to listen to every recording thousands of times to try to pick out the notes to write them down. Another chuckling memory, because now I can find note transcriptions for all of those songs.

But if I hadn’t needed to do that legwork, would I be here today? I’m just thinking that sometimes the tasks of love, though they might be drudgery tasks, end up changing our lives in the biggest ways.

I was so moved by the singing I had to make a speech, so in broken Georgian morphing into translatable english, I told them all about first hearing Rustavi’s cd in the library and falling in love with Georgian music, which has led me to be here this year and future years. I said their music has the ability to change hearts, to change lives, world-round. It is a proud music, and they should be proud to sing it.

What I didn’t say is that the Rustavi sound is a bridge. For those who have grown up with western music in our ears, we can listen to Rustavi, and from there slowly learn to appreciate what real Georgian music sounds like. Kudos to Rustavi, their famous director Anzor Erqomaishvili, who kept Georgian folk music alive through the communist era, and to all of their students and inspirees who will continue the revival of Georgian music!



For those of you whose interest I’ve sparked, just type in Georgian music on the web and see what you get for recordings: basically not much.

Check these sites out for information and cd possibilities:

http://www.deepdownproductions.com (distributor in Canada)

http://www.villageharmony.pair.com (Vermont choir who sell Georgian cds)

http://www.kavkasia.com (excellent American trio specializing in G. folksongs)

http://www.anchiskhati.org (the choir with whom I’m studying and for whom I will manage a States tour in October-November 2005 -more info coming soon!)

Best technique to find music (other than coming to visit me in Georgia): get hooked in with a University Inter-library loan system, and there are plenty of libraries around the States that have one or two Georgian cds each, some of them quite rare. Or track me and my computer down and I’ll hook you up :)

Language

Languages
03-14-05

Today my friend Stefania called, she is back in Georgia from Italy. Our common language is french, but I couldn’t even find the most basic words to express hello over the telephone, everything coming out was Georgian!

We made a rendezvous, and her friend Keti came along too. Keti is Georgian and speaks fluent Italian and some english. Over a coffee we had the most bizarre mixed up language conversation. Stefania would speak to me in french, I would respond in Georgian,and Keti would translate into Italian!

The experience made me remember a couple of my language adventures in New Zealand: once in a little hut along a track through a cloud forest on the South Island, I shared the evening with four Germans and two Italians, english being the common language. We had a massive political discussion, and often I had to come up with random words on the spot to help someone make their point. When disagreements happened, I had to mediate, and it just felt so odd being the American and having to do this.

Another time in New Zealand, I was on a trail with my great friend Ovid, who had just finished up his time in the Israeli special forces, and two East Germans from Drezden. One night, we had a drumming circle with spoons and pots in a little tiny three by four meter weather monitoring hut that we broke into to escape the wind. Outside it was the worst weather imaginable: think freezing rain flying up at us from the fjord valley below our ridgeline. Brrr.

Either before or after the drum circle, we had a memorable discussion about the Holocaust, again demanding my english interpretation and mediation. Ovid was all for putting the past behind, but the East Germans carried a deep guilt with them which made it difficult for them to express on the subject.

In Tbilisi, english is the international language among the Expats, and when I go out for drinks sometimes after the foreigner’s choir rehearsal, Spanish, German, French, and Americans try to speak their best english to get the point across.

My french came back incidentally, but it took a good two hours of absolute confusion as my brain backfired every time I tried to say anything. I suppose it’s a good sign for my Georgian, which otherwise seems like it is improving unbelievably slowly.

Soccer Boys

Sometimes two other guys, Lasha and Dato, show up to sing at my little church, Jvartan Maghleba. At first I didn’t have such a high opinion of them because I pegged them as Georgian lushes, too into their party scene to care enough to show up at church and sing with us regularly. I was right about this judgement, but now I’m partying with them so everything is fine!

First of all, I began playing soccer on monday nights after karate with Lasha and his extended gang of buddies. We play fast indoor soccer, six on a team, ten minute games. On the benches, the next teams are smoking and hopping around, waiting for their turn to take on the winning team. There must have been four teams there last week. I’m not that bad, but I’m not that good; some of these guys have amazing footwork which allows them to dance while the rest of us stumble.

Sunday, Dato’s baby girl became forty days old, what? Cause for celebration of course! The boys invited me, and we all went out to Dato’s parents house in the city suburbs, where a massive supra was laid out for thirty-five. Singing began even before we sat down to table.

Lasha was tamada -toastmaster; he brought our attention to these toasts (incidentally the word for toast, sadghegrdzelo, means ‘for long days’): Toast to our hosting family, big toast (i.e. drink a massive glass to the bottom, pass it to the next guy) to Dato’s baby girl... collectively we probably drank her weight in wine.... and many more of the traditional toasts to Parents, Children, Deceased, Life, and the best of all, to Friends, in which toast I was particularly honored as a new ‘dzma-katsi,’ ‘brother-man.’

Turns out Lasha, Dato, and two or three of the other singing boys there were all singing in Tbilisi’s most famous boys choir. This group of about fifty boys and teenagers learn some of Georgia’s hardest folk songs, play instruments, and sing in trios. Of course, they’re singing in a western tuning style, and their director is a famous soloist for the Rustavi Choir who have a very westernized sound, but nontheless, I was happy to accept one of their cds with the accompanying autographs! Now the whole gang of them are in their late twenties, most of them with one or two toddlers.

Lasha’s fiancee was there, and in a rare moment, he leaned over and said, ‘well, what do you think of my choice?’ I said, ‘what?’ But then I got it, and paid the appropriate compliments to his fiancee. Later as she held Dato’s baby, he smiled with pride and said, ‘now doesn’t she look good? As soon as we’re married...’ Folks start families over here around twenty-two, twenty-three, what I would consider young.

I thought three hours at the supra table was going to be good enough for us, but no, it was Irakli’s birthday, and he had to rush off early to be at his own birthday supra. Later we had to join him, and the night went on and on.

Once you’re involved, there is no backing out, but after a few glasses of wine and continued singing, who wants to leave? In fact, as inibriation progressed and time stood still, my singing buddies became more and more excited about me being in Georgia, singing songs, learning their crazy old language, drinking toasts to friendship late into the night... good times.

Georgian Chanting

I was walking out the door to church on Saturday having practiced my words all morning when I received a phone call and was made to understand that our men’s trio wouldn’t be singing today because the girls would be singing... or something like that. I was bummed.

I considered catching a marshutka minibus straight out to Sighnaghi to visit Shergil my brother, but then I realized I was free to go and sing with any of my friends in Tbilisi, what choices!

I decided to go visit my friend Giorgi Gvimradze, who is a super talented young guy from western Georgia, who sang at my baptism, and who directs the choir at Saint George’s church in Old Tbilisi. This church is made of brick and sits perched among ramshackle rooftops far up the hillside just underneath the cliffs leading up to Narikala Fortress. I love this area of the city, it has such an ancient feel because it was not destroyed or disturbed by the communist era except for the hideous silver statue that sits on the cliff above (I wrote about it in the story about my friend Til). The church is small, feeling packed when fifty people stand inside, and has an uncharacteristically small bell tower rising above (pictures in March photo album).

I arrived just in time for the service which was the preparation service for the first Sunday of Great Lent, which is a really big deal over here. By the way, I’m to be vegan until Easter, exciting. No meat, fish, dairy, or oil.

This is how we sang: only one voice on each of the upper two parts for any single chant, with three basses. I sing the middle voice part, but since there were two other middle voice parts, and two first voices, Giorgi would quickly point out who he wanted to sing the next chant, hum three notes and if selected we would begin singing. When one of the other guys was singing middle voice, I sang along with the basses.

I think this is the traditional way to sing Georgian songs, folk or sacred. Having just a single voice on the upper two parts allows those soloists to sing freely, and to tune exactly with each other. In the old American sacred harp singing style, there are also supposed to be many more basses than upper voices, I think there is some old folk taste to this concept.

In the Church of Saint Giorgi there is also a women’s trio. They were standing just across the church from us, and we would alternate singing chants with them, sometimes back and forth, other times they would sing for ten or fifteen minutes and then the men would take over for a few minutes.

People often ask me if women also sing in church in Georgia. Sure, in fact, I would say that more than half of the churches have female choirs. To be honest though, I have yet to hear a good women’s choir. I don’t think women are trained to sing, actually no one is trained to sing, but men naturally learn to sing at the supra table. The best women chanters I’ve heard have probably been out in Sighnaghi, Joni’s wife and her choir with Shergil and my other friends from last year, but I might be biased because I know all of them!

The chants we sang were of good difficulty, and I particularly liked one of the young basses, Guga, who is an accountant, but seems to share as much enthusiasm for chanting as I do. Our friend and director Giorgi was on top of the service, gave us clear notes in advance, and as we clustered around a single podium, he always had the chant book open to the next chant.

This organization saved my butt, because I could quickly read through the words one time in advance before Giorgi would ask me if I knew the chant. I always nodded yes, but actually I had never seen half of the chants we sang that day. No matter, that’s what I’m here to do. This was the most professional, organized, and as a result the most enjoyable chanting I’ve done yet in Georgia. What beautiful music this is!

All it needs is the correct organization and practice to sing it halfway as decently as it deserves. The chant itself, the words, the message, the music, is far beyond our mortal ability, but in rare moments, one tastes the beginning of how beautiful it can be. Meanwhile, as singers, we are never fully satiated, only temporarily gratified by a rare chord of true tuning, a brief phrase of pure unity. For listeners, I don't quite know anymore the experience, I have been a singer so long. But I imagine that if God is more fully in heart, more fully understood, through the chanted words and melody, then this must be an amazing experience that only asks Gods inspiration, and not the thanks of human chanters.

Teen Idol Georgia

Nika is director of the State Orchestra and Chorus now, but on the side he is co-owner/rebuilder of the state theater. The building was started in the 80s, but never finished. Now renovating and completing it is a four million Euro job.

On Tuesday I took the grand tour of the construction site. Interesting to see such a massive space completely unfinished, the sloping bare concrete floor with piles of brick and wood debris scattered around where soon there will be carpet and plush seating for 1200. The main stage will have three rotating sections, circles one within the other. As there is no flooring yet, we could see all the intricate details of the wheel-glider and metal frame substructure.

Up in Nika’s finished office, we had coffee and discussed the grand future of Georgian theater in Tbilisi. Nika will be music director and his partners will be artistic director and management coordinator. The Symphony will practice here, and perform every Thursday night. Every Wednesday night will be a folk music concert. Tuesday night will be drama club performances and dramatic readings, weekends will be foreign guests, and Mondays everyone will be sleeping!

As more and more people drifted into the office, I asked Nika what was going on. He explained that for a side income, he is one of the jury members for the equivalent of Georgian Teen Idol.

I’ve never even seen this show in America, or any of the new genre of reality shows or ‘ordinary people’ shows, -whatever they’re calling them- but this is supposedly based off of that model. Five hundred Georgians originally tried out for the competition (by singing a song); today we were to narrow the best twenty five down to ten Finalists, who will go on to be on live television. I was allowed to stay and watch:

First Nika did a briefing on the proceedings, then everyone filed out of the large half circle office except for about fifteen ‘insider’ theater people, all furiously chain-smoking and looking cool. I felt like I was back at Wesleyan, in line for the Senior Films.

The girls came first; one by one they came in, stood by the piano, and launched into a song. Ninety percent of the time Nika knew the song and played an incredibly complimentary accompaniment, but a few of the performances were acapella. Ages ranged from twelve to twenty five with most candidates being around twenty. Next the guys came in one by one and did the same thing: singing a song, or two if we liked them, answering a few questions, and quickly being hussled out of there.

The camera crews rolled the film, the room filled up with smoke. In small breaks, I quickly and discreetly opened the windows, letting the cold air flood my lungs and at the same time clear the room enough to see my way back to my seat five meters distant.

To my ear, it was farely obvious who the top candidates were, in style, confidence, singing ability, attitude, and look. On TV the visual aspect is equally important to the singing ability. Nevertheless, tempers roared, and heated discussion ensued. It is always more difficult when we’re personally involved I remember from Spirits audition days. Finally we had some tie-off performances by equalized candidates.

Nika was playing the whole time, so I took notes for him, and the other judges joked that he was so professional he had even brought in his own American consultant from Teen Idol. How far from that person I really am, they would never guess.

Ofoto Links

Ofoto Link address pages:


January-February in Georgia
http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=4xi3poy.7ll41p2&x=1&y=-1542e3


December in Georgia
http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=4xi3poy.17sd8x8i&x=0&y=f4mwn4


November in Georgia
http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=4xi3poy.8v3vevi&x=0&y=qao7e9


October in Georgia
http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=4xi3poy.19cqv30y&x=1&y=-qwew2h


September in Georgia
http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=4xi3poy.6850a6q&x=0&y=-sc78rc


Colorado-Utah, June 2004
http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=4xi3poy.fc69t7i&x=1&y=77p1i4

Apprenticeship

Apprenticeship
03-06-05

In 2005 my life has been dominated by singing in Orthodox services in the Republic of Georgia. Who could have guessed? What leads a decision, an action, why do we find ourselves in certain places at certain times involved in activities seemingly so arbitrary? Do we dream our futures, imagine them, plan them, or is the future solely based on the decisions we are capable of making in any single moment of the present time/space? The future is not worth thinking about. But thinking of the past as a series of future moments amuses me. I like to wonder what guides a decision, an action, an event. How many people’s lives are effected by a decision I make, and mine by the decisions made by people around me? To even imagine that we are independent of each other breaks down quickly. We are bound together, a thread of destiny weaves our lives together. The best decision making process I’ve found for myself is passive-active: passive in that I submit to the intuitive circumstantial path that seems to keep unfolding the carpet of life before me, and active in that within this framework I try to do everything possible to keep my options and doors open, and to pursue my activities with intent, though I might not know the true purpose in this moment.

Take Georgian chants. And why not Greek or Russian chants, Tibetan, Native American, or Hindi chants for that matter? But Georgian chants. I can’t really explain deeply what I’m doing here. But I am here, and this seems to be the right place. I seem to have the interests and skills to be doing exactly this study, uncanny though it always seems to me. One day perhaps I’ll understand in retrospect, but for now, I blindly plow ahead, imagining myself to be on some type of destiny from somewhere, towards something.... and I live life day to day.

I have finished another marathon weekend of singing. Sigh, cough. Thankfully, sleep awaits.

I have two interesting trios that I sing with. Luarsab and Ladi are professional singers but neither extremely religious. Services have recently begun daily in the Sameba Cathedral, we are the choir for the Friday Vespers-Saturday morning Divine Liturgy services. But the Cathedral does not have a regular attendance, the space is too massive, the sound systems horrendous. This all combines to make for a strange, oft-times non-religious feeling atmosphere, complemented nicely by Luarsab’s absolute disorganization of the service chants. However, when we do get around to singing the right thing at the right time, we sound fantastic.

Saturdays I have time for lunch with Luarsab where I am able to forgive him for being what I consider unprofessional in service, then I have to race off to my afternoon services at the little unfinished Jvartan Maghleba church. I sing here with two untrained but cool young guys, collectively under the tyranical rule of our director Antonina. Here is a sweet little passive-aggressive lady who is uber organized and spends her spare moments nagging us to no end. She conducts with a jerky upward-downward waving of the hand, and frantically tugs on Josep’s coat when he sings a note slightly wrong.

My main gifts of this season have been singing these gorgeous chants in their correct context; my main challenge has been putting up with my two directors!

But this is my apprenticeship. I have to learn the simple chants before the complex. I have to learn the liturgical cycle, the order and meaning of the chants.

Reading music is like second nature to me now, and actually prevents me from memorizing the music as I need to, similar to simply reading a play over and over instead of trying to learn a small speech by heart. So I have created word sheets and made up my own little notation system to try to help myself learn the chants by heart without the crutch of having the written music.

Gudauri

My friend Laura called last night and said, ‘I need to get out of the city! I’m thinking of going skiing in Gudauri tomorrow, do you want to come?!’ I said hell yes, canceled everything else planned for the morrow, and hit the road early!

Luarsab was over until half past midnight ranting and raving about all the details of turn of the century chant-related heads living in and around Tbilisi... but still I managed to get up at 7am and get my be-metroed butt over to the insanely chaotic bus station. Laura was lost, but miracle of science cell phones got us located and we piled in for the two hour ride to Gudauri ski resort in the North Caucasus.

To get there we went straight up the military highway that connects Russia with Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and points further south. Amazing road, amazing views probably, but it was snowing and so fogged in we saw nothing. Instead I jabbered endlessly about Orthodoxy, Waldorf education, and favorite travels.... oh bore.

Laura is an ex-lawyer who decided to dedicate her life to Christian service. She was in Romania and now she is in Georgia, working with Internally Displaced kids (refugees from Abkhazia) and orphans. She also sings bass... in Carl’s foreigner’s choir Okros Stumrebi (Golden Guest). Somehow, she has a great ear for listening, and led me on and on story after story. I realized I’ve been somewhat starved of talking, as conversations I’m mostly engaging in here are of the lighter variety or are focused on particular Georgian chant subjects. With Wes gone, no more late night Wesleyan style conversations for me.

At one point, the marshutka came up behind a slow moving car. We stopped, and our handy bus driver helped them push the car up the incline and off to the side so that we could get past. Another time, before passing an ancient looking snowplow, the driver hopped out and manually lifted an enormous chunk of snow from the road, throwing it on a pile in front of the plow. He also ordered everyone to the back of the van to provide more weight to the back tires going up the icy-slushy cutbacks. I was glad I couldn’t see the frightening dropoffs that no doubt loomed over every corner of this crazy road.

We arrived. Nothing to see at all. Complete white-out. But two helpful girls led us for a half mile walk around some buildings and we eventually found the ski rental place. As I was putting on my boots, a Georgian snowboarder came in. I said, ‘hey, how is it up there?’ in a friendly voice. ‘Terrible, really bad...’ he said, ‘the snow is too deep,’ gesturing to indicate chest-deep snow. Great.

An older man came in from the hotel in some fancy gear. I said, ‘gamarjobat,’ which means ‘victory to you’ and is the typical Georgian greeting. He replied in Russian, and we established that he was actually an Austrian here on a guided skiing trip. I asked him about conditions on the mountain and confided I had not been skiing since I was about sixteen. He said, ‘if I were you, being a beginner, I would not go skiing today in these conditions. Very difficult conditions.’

But Laura and I shouldered our skiis and headed downhill to the lift-station. On the way, a man was just wading out of a snow drift. He had a blond mustache so I figured he was with the German-Austrian crew (wrong -he was Ukrainian), so I asked him about the slopes:

‘This is terrible skiing conditions up there now. To my mind, this is very bad situation. I made three runs today, very bad, very bad, no more for me... The second run I had problem with my glasses and I could see nothing, the third run I got stuck in deep snow. The fog is thick, to my mind nothing is possible to see. I have no technique for skiing deep snow, it is one meter, I ski normal surfaces. This is not skiing, this is... fight for survival.’

With this encouragement in mind, I sweet talked the lift operator out of buying lift tickets for the day, promising we would only be going up once (and with God’s help coming down too!). The lifts were pretty typical three-person benches, only one of three happened to be working today. The mountain was deserted.

On the way down, Laura proved to be even worse at skiing than I, and spent the majority of her time fishing skiis out of the snow drifts! We did see a most peculiar sight though: clustered around a newly piled ski-jump were about fifteen people in nice jackets and ski-helmets. About six people were standing shoulder to shoulder above the jump, side-stepping up the mountain in synchronized little steps, apparently to tamp down the approach run. There is something peculiar about this, I thought, and realized, these cannot be Georgians! No group of Georgians can be organized enough to stand in a sideways queue, tamp-tamping uphill in unified steps! Sure enough, we came closer and heard German being yelled back and forth.

After our one hour run, with Laura recording more time on her butt than on her skiis, but bravely continuing downhill, we made it to the restaurant for a hardy pasta, soup, and salad meal.

The place was pretty nice, with a bunch of foreigner’s in there, and just a few Georgians. When leaving, we spotted six Germans getting towed out of the parking lot behind a snow tractor -they were heading for the top of the mountain holding onto little pieces of plastic and rope! We said to hell with these crazies, we’re outta here.

The marshutka took us home, and a beer in Tbilisi finished off a great day!