Walking around Tbilisi is a bit like walking through the fun house at the carnival. You see things that don’t look just quite right. You see things that aren’t really there, and you see things that could be. You see things that look vaguely familiar, but just don’t look quite as you recall them. You see things that make you laugh, and you see things that make you flinch. Occasionally you see something of breathtaking beauty, but mostly what you see is a distortion from the norm. That’s Tbilisi. Not that there isn’t potential here. Potential and, in an agonizingly few cases, absolute magnificence.
Tbilisi used to be, as you know, a republic in the Soviet Union. The Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic was treated like a red-headed step child most of the time. The leadership in Moscow did what was required and little more. An example is the architecture. Tbilisi is inundated with Soviet-style apartment blocks. These blocks look as if they were set down by a giant child playing with blocks. They are rectangular, uniform, functional (for the most part; more on that later), and remarkably unimaginative and unattractive. Their unwavering color is concrete. Made from cinder blocks and concrete, they have all the charm of a mean drunk. In a few rare instances, on the main road from the airport to downtown Tbilisi for example (a road named George W. Bush Highway), one side of all the buildings (the side facing the road, of course) have been painted. At one time it was a bright red. Now, three years later, it’s a pale pink. The buildings are so ugly that I can’t even photograph them. The camera lens shuts itself tightly when I point it at one.
Their beauty is matched only by the quality of their workmanship. In almost every case, elevators have been broken for years (and many of these apartments are 10-12 stories high). Bare wires are omnipresent, many humming with electricity. Washers and dryers, all Soviet-made and built into each apartment, have become little more than a place to toss your keys when you enter the apartment. And if you like the color “concrete,” you’ll love the interior. Most are a dull gray that gave up long ago any chance of being attractive. The only color in most of these buildings is the spray painted graffiti (surprisingly, mostly in English). Residents hang carpets and unbelievably garish wallpaper over these bare concrete walls, but the shoddiness of the finish is as obvious as Rosie O’Donnell in a dayglo thong.
And it’s not just the big things that are wrong. For instance, they don’t seem to have grasped bullnose tile here so counters end abruptly, with the gap between vertical and horizontal half-hazardly filled with caulk and in some cases leftover mortar. Wire to outlets run along the wall itself, not hidden behind the walls as in the rest of the world. And plumbing pipes are exposed, the better, I suppose, for the legion of plumbers and DIYers who spend their weekends trying to coax just a little bit more hot water and water pressure from them. Ugly. Just ugly.
And then there are the sites in this town that are staggeringly impressive. Tbilisi is in a valley, surrounded by steep hills. That hasn’t stopped the Georgians from building on them. In fact, if there are two rocks on top of one another, the Georgians have built something on it. One of the most impressive edifices is this large fort that overlooks the river and downtown Tbilisi. The photo below doesn’t really do the thing justice. While not incredibly effective, as proven by the number of times Tbilisi has been sacked by invading armies, it is a point of pride to all Georgians – “Look! We built that a thousand years ago! And it’s still standing.” If you can get to it, it provides some of the most beautiful and breathtaking views of the city. The photos below don’t come close to matching the actual views. Trust me – the views are spectacular. Getting there, however, is an exercise in overcoming common sense. Note you don’t see any goats in any picture of the fort. That’s because goats are too smart to climb the paths to get there. These paths are to casual hiking what LT Calley was to thatched huts (look it up; that’s a funny line). And once you get up to the fort itself, you have this set of stairs to climb that go practically vertical (see the picture below if you don’t believe me). What makes the whole thing complete is the lack of ANY safety considerations – no handrails, no signs cautioning you not to go up there, no safety nets, and no huge air bags to fall into once you’ve lost your balance. The only way to climb the steps, and many of the paths leading to the top of the fort, is literally on all fours. If you don’t have vertigo when you start the climb, you’ll have it when you get to the top. But the views make it worthwhile.
Even the streets in Old Tbilisi offer their share of impressive buildings and construction. Many of the old houses have overhanging balconies, some of which literally overhang the river a hundred feet below. Wine being the national drink, each house has its own arbor, many woven into the actual structure of the house. Some of the streets are so steep that steps have been built into the side of the street to allow for better downhill access (going uphill is physically demanding but relatively safe; coming downhill reminds you of the power of gravity – you build up speed very quickly with no soft landing anywhere in sight). It’s amazing, what with average alcohol consumption levels being what they are and combined with the steepness of the streets, that there aren’t little crosses posted at the bottom of each street, much like we do in the US at the sites of deadly car accidents.
I hope you can see why I enjoy walking the streets so much. Every turn, every side street, every building makes you stop. Sometimes you stop to marvel, other times you stop to figure out how that building is still standing, and yet other times you stop just to shake your head and laugh (see the final picture below). But one thing’s for sure – there’s always something to see in Tbilisi.
Thanks for reading.
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