From palm trees to mountains, and how to eat dumplings #7/13

15 September

Biking to Kutaisi was mostly downhill at a comfortable to exhilarating pace. In 75 miles I went from staring at glaciers to biking past palm trees. Before I made it to town I had one big hill to climb. A very humid hour into it, the sweat was streaming down my arms and legs. Cars had stopped honking at me as I looked more like the swamp thing than a girl on a bike. Eventually I pulled myself into town and threw myself into the nearest shower I could find, a lovely hostel named "Georgianize Yourself." Dinner and a glass of wine almost had me feeling normal again.

To keep my sanity I decided to take the bus, and figured I might as well take it all the way to up Kazbegi, 200 miles away. I was charged double for my bike, but it was worth every lari. I left the bus,walked around the streets of beautiful Kazbegi (aka Stepantsmida) and found a guest house that would take me in.

 I walked in the door of Ananu Guesthouse and was invited immediately to sit at the table and drink wine out of a plastic liter bottle, with the owner and other guests. We spent the night talking and laughing as a video of places in Georgia played on the TV. When an image of Ushguli popped up, I pointed to it and said, " I've been there!" The owner immediately said, "Ah, you know this bitch!" I was taken aback until I saw the video had changed to an image of a gigantic sheep dog, and laughed until I cried.

 The next morning I hiked up to Gergeti Sameba Church, probably the most iconic image of Georgia. Perched on a hilltop at 7100 feet, the church was built in the 1300s and is a steep 3.5 mile climb from town. How they managed to haul the stone to the building site seems impossible.

Though it was very foggy, I continued up the trail to the base of Mt Kazbeg (16,560 ft) crossing my fingers that the clouds would clear up. When I reached the saddle where you can see the glaciers, the clouds parted, the sun kind of came out, and you could see almost to the summit. Since most of the hike up had been in a near white out, I considered myself extremely lucky.

 I took some pictures and just as quickly as the clouds broke open, they snapped shut again and it started to rain. Satisfied, I quickly retreated to town.

In a cafe I ordered khinkali (dumplings) and started to eat. A woman looked at me with my knife and fork and said, "No!!" And marched over to my table. "You are eating this all wrong!" Her husband shouted over, "don't listen to her." She shushed him, had me pick up a dumpling and instructed me to take a little bite. "Now blow! Blow! Very hot!" So I blew on my little dumpling. "Now drink! Drink!" So I sucked the juice out of my dumpling. "Ah, much better!" She went and picked up her plate to show me, "See? Dry. No juice!" She pointed to my plate where my dumplings were floating in their insides. "Very wet! You eat wrong!" Her husband shouted over, "you eat however you want."
Under her watchful eye I ate another, this time with the correct form as I tried not to laugh. She smiled a huge grin, "Better! This is important." Her husband shouted over, "it's not important." She ignored him, "Now you teach friends how to eat right." She gave me a satisfied look and marched back to her table leaving me to practice eating dumpings.