Tbilisi: The City of Warmth

Tbilisi (თბილისი) smells like the skins of grapes, salt, and metal. An explosive, metallic, bright warmth tints the city.

I step outside of our flat, skipping down the city’s winding streets. Stopping at a bakery, I speak Georgian with a kind bebia. In our… unfair exchange, I give her a humble coin, only one lari (ლარი), and she hands me the best bread in the world. Bundled in yesterday’s newspaper, the smell of paper and yeast waft together. My hands are electrified holding this treasure fresh from the tone, half burning from the heat and half from my excitement. I do not skip, rather, I almost run home. My brothers and I fold cold sulguni cheese into tears of shotis puri (შოთის პური). We drown the gluten in our stomaches with ripe tomatoes.

Tbilisi is awakening, old men murmur to each other on the terrace, filling the silence with sips of tea and drags of their cigarettes. In the background, you can hear the soft rustle of a sheet as it is hung on the drying line. It will be crisp and dry by the afternoon.

We leave our flat, feeling the sun as it singes the air when we step outside. We pass the massive concert hall, and suddenly, the number of fellow pedestrians doubles. Triples. We walk by Stamba, a massive hotel in what once was the publishing house of Tbilisi. Vaulted ceilings and rows of books (and the temptation of delicious sweets at the cafe) invite me inside, but my brothers insistently drag me past. There is plenty of time to taste delicious food, “aren’t we still full from breakfast?” they say. Of course, we are. Every meal in Georgia is a feast, supra (სუფრა), an overflowing cornucopia.

Our feet take us past the popsicle-like façade of the Opera on our left, past the cobblestone roads leading to Mtatsminda Mountain on our right. Just like the sunflowers turning their petals to face the sun, people walking with us turn their faces to Kashveti Church and make the sign of the cross. Mirrored in the unblemished, art deco windows of the Museum of Fine Arts is the Parliament. Peppered by bullet holes, the Parliament is both a reminder of the past and a memorial. It is also the center of protests, demonstrations, and rallies.

While we wander, our attention is captured by the bright blues and purples and reds of the street art. The smell of paint lingers in the underground passage, “7 billion smiles and yours is my favorite” has been freshly applied, the black spray paint drips down the wall. Or has this mural been there for a while? There are 8 billion people in the world… We are lost, but only momentarily. We look up to our guiding stars, the pastel blue and purple and red houses. Attached are their Mozarabic balconies, and as a compass points north, they point us to Old Tbilisi.

The smell of charcoal and tendrils of incense reach us before we enter through the stone gate of Anchiskhati Basilica, the oldest church in Tbilisi. Many people are gathered in front of the church, and apart from a mandili (headscarf) in each woman’s hand, and the men clothed in pants and buttoned shirts, one might think we are all gathered for a party, not a baptism. But, Georgians are always ready for a celebration (and of course, always fashionable).

After the ceremony, we walk to a restaurant in our heels and dress shoes on the cobblestones. We will talk until we are only speaking in song and dance, and drink until the sun rises.

And tomorrow we will feast again, swords next to wine glasses. For the supra’s momentum never falters, unless we need to interrupt it to defend our freedom once again.

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