How I Met the President and How I’m Certain Everyone Knows About It:

My School

            It was a Tuesday (4.10) and I was teaching class.  Exhausted, I was absolutely relieved when the bell rang, which it does manually.  Someone has to literally press and hold a black button down to summon us teachers to a different room.  That’s right the kids don’t move, we do.  Often, coffee or pastries provide adequate distractions for the dedicated bell ringer and it can be well after ten or fifteen minutes past schedule before it’s sound screams down barren hallway.  Oddly enough the kids don’t mind that class is extended but us teachers constantly steal irritated glances at the clock.

            In the teacher’s room I noticed I missed a phone call.  I step outside of the walls that are prone to echoes in such a fashion that every sound is magnified, including phone conversations, and call back the missed number just as the kids begin to pour out of the school.  Most kids in my experience try to avoid teachers at all cost, but here I’m surrounded.  “Hello,” “Garmarjoba,” “Salem,” “Goodbye”.  Each student says each word at least 259 times as if those four words encompass an entire conversation.  Barely able to understand the conversation on the phone I agreed to be in Gori the following day at 16.30 to go to some event. 

            News in the villages travel fast, very fast.  During our training we were told of an instance where a female TLG Volunteer had a male friend stay with her host family.  He spent the night in the same room and even the in same bed, a big no no in the Georgian culture.  She probably expected such an event to be frowned upon but I doubt she realized to the extent that this would become famous.  By the following morning she was receiving phone calls from other volunteers, in villages of excess 200 kilometers away, enquiring about the circumstance.  

            The next day (5.10) I ventured into Gori around 15.00.  Normally the mshtrutka barreling down the road comes at 15.00 but there were four of us and we shared a taxi for the same price as that of the mshtrutka.  In the taxi was a Georgian English teacher from a neighboring village and we started to talk, comparing our classes and resources.  Thanks to the taxi ride I made it early to Gori and enjoyed some Turkish coffee before heading to the meeting place.  The coffee was great but my phone kept ringing.  One of my co-teachers called me and said that the head teacher was very nervous about how I would get home.  To put an end to any lingering fears I said I would take a taxi back.  That worked for a whole five minutes, then she called again: “Mike, why are you in Gori?  You need to be in Kareli.”  This took a few more minutes to explain and 10 minutes later:  “Mike, the head teacher has called your host mother…she will pick you up tonight.”  These phone conversations were quickly losing their novelty.

When I finally got there a lady, donned in a bright leather red coat immediately approached me and exclaimed “Mike!  So nice to finally meet you,” and so forth.  This was apparently my Educational Resource Representative and I was slightly disturbed by this since I wasn’t wearing a name tag.  More disturbingly, all of the program officials know me as Richard, but she knew me as Mike.  I never caught her name leaving it as another mystery to unravel at some other point.  The bus was pretty modern, up to western standards and we all took our seats which weren’t attached to much of anything.  When the bus would brake your seat would simply fly off the skeleton of what should have been a bench.  Our idea of going straight to Tbilisi was crushed when we pulled into three other cities to pick up other volunteers. 

            We were told that the event would start around 18.00 and that we would be back in our villages by 22.00.  Frankly, I wasn’t the greatest math student and did not even bother to attempt to compute the numbers and the statistical reality that such an itinerary was nearly impossible. 

            Finally we pulled into Tbilisi and got off the bus and surrendered our passports and metallic materials to pass through a security check.  Hundreds of people sat about and cameras were tested while the event staff scurried about.  After sitting for about ten minutes we grew bored and restless and saw dozens of people go off to a far corner and remerge with glasses of wine.  We ran over and began sampling, a few glasses and random “Garmarjos” later we were asked to return to our seats and wait.  Moments later President Saakashvili emerged and delivered a speech about the building behind him that would now be opened, the Teachers House.  I have no idea what that is but they did hand out pamphlets which probably go into detail about it however it is all in Georgian.  Oh well.

            Saakashvili is a great public speaker, even if I didn’t understand what he said.  His body language was very informal, he cracked jokes and for a guy who makes a speech on live television 5 times a week its pretty amazing that he doesn’t use a prompter or notes.  The end of his speech was marked by everyone standing and clapping and he went off to the wine tent.  A few of us, not wanting to miss out on any action, followed him and to our amazement when we called out his name he answered us in English.  Perfect English.  His bodyguards made way, took our photos and in an instant he was dragged off by reporters.  I can say this with certainty:  Saakashvili is a massive figure.  His fist was larger than my head.  It was kind of scary.   

            We left the event and I started to doze on the bus but awoke to the city lights and familiar streets.  Gori wasn’t in this direction.  Nothing made sense until we arrived at America’s gift to the world:  McDonalds.  The volunteers rushed to get some food, we hadn’t been fed all day and most of us rushed to Gori immediately after school.  For about 20 or so foreigners to randomly show up at 22.30 at a McDonalds in the outer part of Tbilisi, I think the staff did a great job.  Slightly shocked, they handled everyone with a great amount of speed and I suspect few errors.  I couldn’t justify eating McDonalds and began exploring this part of the city that seemed faintly familiar.  Remarkably, this was the first time I failed to find a place to eat in Tbilisi.  It wasn’t until our bus filled with jeering volunteers pulled past the golden arches that I saw if I had gone one block further my stomach would have been comforted by a shwarma.  

            My ride back was peppered with calls from home asking me where I was, when I would return.  I honestly didn’t know.  I told them “twenty minutes” about 9 separate times.  After a bit, I just handed the phone to my representative and had her deal with any issues.  When we finally passed through Gori there were three others left on the bus, they asked me where I was living and I told them.  “Ah,” said one looking at the others, “he’s the guy in Urbnisi we’ve been hearing about.”  I asked them what about but couldn’t get a straight answer.  To say that the rest of the ride was awkward would be a strong understatement.  The bus pulled over at my village while on its way to Kareli, kicking up a storm of dust that clouded the head lights of the passing cars.  It was 1.00.

            The next day in the teacher’s room everyone asked questions about the event, how I made it home, etc.  Then my co-teacher told me that she shared a taxi to Urbnisi that morning with a friend of hers, an English teacher in a nearby village and she wanted to know how her friend new me.