lies, damn lies and statistics

November 23 2011

Ron and I read a daily Georgian English language paper here. Today’s paper had a small article on the unemployment figures in Georgia. You have to love this. Just more proof about how useless statistics can be. I quote “Official statistics claim that unemployment in Georgia is 16.3%. Official statistics identify an unemployed person as someone who is older that 15 who was not employed for even one hour for the last seven days who has been searching for a job for the last four weeks and was ready to start working in the following two weeks. One cannot be considered unemployed in a rural place if one possesses at least 10 sq meters (a meter is 39 inches folks) of land. (Emphasis is mine). Of those employed 17.4% live on approximately GEL 2 a day. (a GEL is 60 US cents). A total of 80% of the rural population is self employed. That means they work on their land. (that probably means they are growing some veggies to prevent starvation). If we add up all those figures and assess the reality then unemployed is around 60% in the country.” End quote. OY!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today I went to my former housekeeper’s home for a visit. I had never seen her house and she wanted me to see it. Nino and Zura started building their house about eight years ago when he had a good job. Before they finished the house, he was laid off and he hasn’t had regular employment until he started working as a guard for the embassy in August 2010. So the house remains unfinished. Most of the downstairs is completed although it was not heated. The kitchen and dining area are heated and that is where we visited. Zura’s mother lives with them and she prepared tea for us. When we sat down at the table, there was a bowl of fresh fruit, three kinds of ‘preserves’, two kinds of juice, something that looked like a hamburger bun, some salami and ketchup. Zura wanted me to try everything. I cannot handle much sugar so literally ate a quarter of a teaspoon of the preserves and about two inches of the juice. Zura’s mom comes from a rural village so making all these items is common. Unfortunately there was so much sugar in each of these items I could not taste the fruit. Just about then Nino’s mom came over. She lives next door. She brought cake with a half inch of sugar frosting and two kinds of pastry that I thought it might just be baked dough. No such luck. They were filled with sugared fruit. I took the thinnest slice of the cake. I thought I was going to throw up on the way home from all the sugar. I wanted to eat a teaspoon of salt to counteract the sugar.. They were curious as to why I didn’t eat more but I explained that I had eaten breakfast before coming and that I had a noon lunch date. Mind you most people in the family are overweight. No surprise there given the diet.

My friend Steph from MN said her mother-in-law who is Georgian offered to boil them bake a turkey for her family for Thanksgiving. When Steph asked why would she boil and bake a turkey she discovered that turkeys are so tough here that boiling is necessary to tenderize the bird. No Norbest or Butterballs here folks! You can also assume the birds are much smaller if she has a pot big enough in which to boil a turkey.

November 24, 2011

Today is Thanksgiving and it is cold. With the wind chill factor it is 28 outside. It is gray but dry. The hills are covered with snow and the clouds are hovering over the hills obscuring the tops. I walked for 30 minutes to pay for a scarf I bought a few days ago from a local artist. I didn’t have the money on me at the time but she insisted I take the scarf. Great technique so I couldn’t change my mind.

After I returned to the hotel, there was a knock at the door and one of the housekeepers handed me a replacement shoe shine brush. I had set the dried up one by the trash can this morning. After she handed it to me she said in a thick Georgian accent ‘Thank you for the money’. I leave tips for the staff. Then she said ‘Happy’ and she tried so hard to remember the word and I said ‘Thanksgiving’. Her face lit up and she smiled brightly. I thanked her and off she went.

After describing the weather today and the hills, the sun came out and the beauty of the sun on the hills made me weep. Or maybe it was the housekeeper’s gratitude.  This place can be so grim and yet it can transform into a place of such beauty.

Ron and I ate a simple dinner at a nearby German restaurant.

Black Friday. We woke up to a snow covered Tbilisi and were grateful it was a light snow that was dissipating by the time we got up. I walked to the laundry and it was bitter cold, the kind that makes tears come into my eyes.

Today is Ron’s last day of work. He will teach half day then go to the office to do his paper work. We will have dinner with our friend Leslie at one of our favorite restaurants, Vong, an Asian fusion place. Tomorrow we will pack up and store two suitcases at Leslie’s and have brunch with Lily, Adey and Fantanesh, our friends from Ethiopia. At 4:00 a.m. Sunday we will fly to Croatia for a mini vacation. We will be there for six days then return to TBS for two days before flying home on the 5^th.