Birjas, Spoons, and Rebellion

The reality of the situation set down upon me perhaps two days ago. The State of Emergency had yet to be declared, but the government had already been pushing the social distancing message. Shops were closing, banks were adjusting policies, the border had been closed, newcomers were subject to forced quarantines, and so on.

I had a package waiting for me at the post office. It’s not far away, just a couple of blocks, so I put on my rain jacket and scarf. Not that the scarf would really do anything, but it was a kind of psychological protection, I guess. That and it was cold.

Leaving my apartment was nothing unusual. It’s usually devoid of life: All cold concrete, a giant slab on one side and a line of cold steel garages on the other. As I wandered down some alleys to the main street, the eerie quiet gave me a vague feeling of the Resident Evil games, waiting for some sort of zombie life to emerge, but I was a bit let down when around the corner bolted a gang of laughing kids, tagging each other and playfully wrestling. A generally pleasant thing to watch on a sunny day, a bit disturbing when the city is trying to manage the spread of a highly infectious virus.

My beautiful apartment block

Then onto the main street. The only unusual thing were the empty buses passing. Otherwise there was regular traffic. Where were these people going? Most businesses had already closed their doors, bars shut down cancelling their events, restaurants converted to delivery operations. In short, there was pretty much nothing to do, unless you were visiting friends and relatives, the exact thing you shouldn’t be doing right now.

And up the main road… mass collections of guys in black clothes on the street, hanging closely together, chain smoking, sharing drinks, getting into cars together, getting out of cars together, sloppily eating street food… what is here termed “birja”, meaning a kind of social marketplace or what have you, going on with full vigor and energy. This was the population that was about to be culled, that’s for sure. Looking from their grimy, black caked hands that have never been washed to the way they sucked down those cheap cigarettes, they seemed to be prime candidates for the upcoming death row. And by the way they seemed to take life grimly serious, never smiling even when joking, it was strange that they wouldn’t take this seriously.

I passed them and continued on my way, reflecting on Georgian society. If the coronavirus hadn’t already hit, it was going to hit Georgia hard. They have a fundamentally social society, few having any clue how to be in self-isolation, and I can’t imagine the despair that would cause one of them. In the course of one day, the common Georgian has probably kissed 20 people, shook hands with 20 more, held his close friends in his arms, kissed them, shared cups, drunk at overly public water fountains, visited no less than three households, and ridden transit in aimless circles for about 50 kilometers. And that’s on a day where a Georgian would answer, “Nothing” if you asked him what he did today. Throw hanging out in a crowded church in the mix and BAM, you’ve got 100 percent of the population infected, except for that handful of weirdo expats who have never met a Georgian and only hang out at strip clubs.

Church during quarantine, pic going around FB lately, source unknown

A state of emergency has now been called, which is great, as that gives the government more power to enforce the 10-man rule. But the Church has decided to take this as an affront to its authority, and as Georgians love any reason to rebel or show off, people are flooding into churches today. Some priests are attempting to be responsible, encouraging their parishioners to maintain some social distancing (in a church without pews, this isn’t an overly difficult thing), but the numbers of parishioners have overwhelmed most of the more practical priests, and then there are the firebrands preaching on about the end of days and others going on about magic spoons, certainly not helping the situation (it’s been a somewhat amusing month on Orthodox FB boards where people have been voraciously debating the theology of magic spoons, an argument I would have thought the Moscow Patriarch Kirill had ended when he proclaimed the spoons to, in fact, not be magic – the Goergians on the other hand maintain their stance – and the more conservative Orthodox accuse the MP of caving into Western Gayropeans and CIA infiltration, and no I’m not making any of this up).

From the boards today

It is what it is. I’ll probably take an effort to not be around any of my religious friends for at least a month though. If they could only have held out until Easter… It's not the time to be heroes. It's the time we should all act if we are sick, as we very well might be, and we don't want to spread the infection to others.

#tbilisi #coronavirus

The Necessity of the Unnecessary

I was going to start trickling in general daddy blogs, with the theme of raising a child in a strange, faraway land. Then the coronavirus struck and now it feels a bit odd if I venture too far off that topic. So how about trickling in daddy blogs about raising a child in a faraway land during the plague?

I’ll admit, I wasn’t that worried about the virus at first. It was in distant China and they seemed to be doing quick quarantine measures. They built that hospital in a few days and seemed like they were reacting much better than during SARS-1. Panic was already building up on social media though, with people asking why China was moving so quickly. But hadn’t it simply been because they had learned their lesson?

Then more and more people around Tbilisi were wearing masks.

This was strange to me. Clearly a sign of panic. Many Georgians love any excuse to don those cheap, paper masks, which according to many don’t actually do anything (unless of course, somebody’s limb just got lobbed off, blood is spraying everywhere, and you want to do something to keep it from flying into your mouth – sick people need them more, so that their sneezes and coughs don’t spray everywhere). During winter, you can visibly see how easily the water vapor passes through… the same goes with respiratory droplets – except big fat ones that might fly in if somebody directly sneezes in your direction, and how often does that really happen?

Anyways, people had started wearing masks.

And there weren't any sick people in Georgia yet. Not one.

People were already in a panic. Was it the media? I don’t know. I don’t watch TV. I read news on the Internet, which means I filter a lot. I tend not to click on clickbait articles by habit. But panic must come from somewhere, so I did start keeping my eye on the news about the novel coronavirus – mostly from WHO updates – but it still didn’t seem something to panic about. It only was really serious with old and obese people and smokers, right? With everyone else, it seemed to be about as serious as the flu, with some outliers here and there.

But then it was proving to be more and more infectious, hitting country after country. Soon Georgia started tallying some numbers. People were flying back from China and Italy, bringing their unwelcome friend with them. But the government was quick to handle them, quarantining people, closing the borders, taking all measures that they could in reason do so early (and indeed, even today Georgia has one of the lowest rates of infection globally). But there were reports of Georgians taking medicines to lower their temperature so they could pass through the border controls, Georgians running out on self-quarantines, even one story (possibly fake) of Georgians overpowering a quarantine bus, crashing it, and running off into the wild.

For some time, Georgia had only “imported” cases, and cases connected to those known imports. But now cases are creeping in, proof of community spread, most likely from those people I just mentioned, the ones that cheated the checks, fell off the radar, and started infecting everyone they came around.

As the tally built, it became less about the healthy people. 1% of 100 might be one person, but one percent of 1,000… of 100,000… of 1,000,000? Now we’re starting to talk about a lot of people who don’t really need to die at the moment.

Sadly, there’s no way we can even save them all. As long as there’s no vaccine, the tactic is to spread the curve. Because the virus is so infectious and it spreads so fast, it’s prone to overload hospitals. That means a few things happen:

1. Not enough respirators for everyone

2. Not enough beds for everyone

3. People who are sick but with minor symptoms get released – and spread the virus

4. People who are not yet recovered, but recovered enough, get released – and might spread the virus

5. Doctors, nurses, and staff are all on overtime and with everyone buying up all the good masks (that you can’t get in Tbilisi anyway), they don’t have access to adequate protection either, so they get sick

All these mean that the rate of death goes from 1-3% to onwards up to 50% among some populations even (just look at Italy… if that doesn’t make you the least bit frightened or sad, you’re a sociopath). The idea behind spreading the curve isn’t to really contain the virus, but to slow it down so the health care system can handle it, the people who need care can get it, those who can survive will survive, the people who are sick don’t spread it further, and most of all, our healthcare workers aren’t worked to death and can still manage to put in the hours.

(By the way, if you want to keep track of the numbers, here is a good site).

And again, maybe it’s not about you. Maybe you’re healthy. I’m healthy, my wife is healthy, my son is 5 months old and healthy (and the virus doesn’t really seem to effect babies anyway). Of course, I am a little worried about my son, but that’s not my real concern.

My parents are old. My wife’s parents are old. Their parents are old. Now, my parents aren’t coming to Georgia (more on that in the next blog). But what about my wife’s parents? Is it safe to visit them? How do I know my allergies aren’t really the virus, and that if we visited, it could be their death sentence, or the death sentence of their parents? That’s what we have to think about.

Sure, social isolation sucks. And maybe for ourselves it seems unnecessary, because I’m not saving myself. But for others what may seem unnecessary has become necessary. The bell doesn’t toll for thee today, my friends. The bell tolls for your parents, for your grandparents, and for all your smoker friends.

#tbilisi #rantsandraves #georgia #coronavirus

How much is a taxi in Tbilisi

Drunk after a long meal of wine and barbecue, I’d stand at the curb, wave my hand, and miraculously a dozen odd vehicles would line up on the street, honking and shouting, asking to take me somewhere. The cars were anything from dusty Lada Jigulis to shining Mercedes, anyone who was out driving and bored or needing some extra cash was there to pick up strangers on the side of the road.

Even if you didn’t need a taxi, often a car would pull up to your side and creep along, with the driver sticking his head out and whispering, “Taxi? Taxi? You want taxi?” My American lady friends thought they were just being targeted by creepy guys, but this wasn’t necessarily the case. The Georgian taxi driver did this to everyone. Albeit, this didn’t mean he wasn’t creepy…

That was the taxi situation 10 years ago.

Times have changed though.

Recent laws and Georgians’ love for copying successful trends have done a lot. Firstly, the government required every street taxi to undergo a white facelift and to get a proper license. So now when you wave your hand, only a couple of white cars will pull over, and each of those white cars will typically have a taxi sign and a license. Probably for the better, but it has certainly decreased the completely random conversations with old guys about how they’ve got 12 law and medical degrees from the Soviet Union and now they’re stuck driving a taxi in Tbilisi.

Prius, the unofficial car of Tbilisi taxi drivers

The other big thing is that deep in the taxi cave, where the Taximus Prime, Lord of Taxis lives, it was decided that every taxi driver should drive a Prius. He snapped his fingers and it became so. Now if you’re a taxi driver without a Prius, you’re dreaming of buying a Prius, and if you’re a security guard secretly yearning to be a taxi driver, then you think you have to buy a Prius first. And if you’re a Prius driver who doesn’t operate a taxi, you get confused for a taxi all the time. The trend is inexplicable, except in the case of there actually being a taxi god.

Getting a taxi and for how much

Just like hailing a taxi anywhere else: You stick your arm up when you see an approaching taxi. It’s easy these days to tell who is a taxi as the car must be white and there will be a sign on top, it will be lit red for occupied and green for available (not always, plenty of drivers are too lazy for this function).

Is he available? Is he not? Does he have a passenger? Eh, who cares!

The majority of taxis do not have meters. That means YOU MUST negotiate in advance. If you don’t, they’ll likely assume you’re an idiot foreigner and charge you an absurd amount of money. Within a neighborhood, expect from 3-5 lari, if you’re taking the taxi from one neighborhood to the next, like Rustaveli to Vake, expect 4-8 lari. If you’re going across town, expect 8-12 lari maximum. It’s okay to refuse a taxi and take someone else. Here I’m giving you typical foreigner rates, as Georgians can get them even cheaper.

Sometimes it's a Prius followed by a Mercedes

Tbilisi Taxi Apps

The best way to get a taxi is to just use an app. Bolt, Maxim, and Yandex all operate pretty large fleets here and you’ll generally never have to wait more than 8 minutes. Download the app ahead of time, and you can even use your credit card. Uber does not have a presence here, as they have a strategic deal with Yandex that they won’t enter any more post-Soviet markets. Do note Yandex is a Russian company (Maxim is Ukrainian, Bolt is Estonian), which doesn’t matter much except there apparently have been some reports that they send your info back to the Motherland. Those reports are from Georgian reporters though, so take that with a grain of salt.

Sitting down

Take a seat. Guys typically take the passenger seat up front. Ladies always in the back. Ladies should sit in the back because they don’t have to worry about the Costanza Move, “Stopping Short”, as illustrated here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzkEFWrMVys

It’s generally pretty fun sitting in front for guys though. For one, you get to witness firsthand all the absurd driving going on. For two you can get into all sorts of awkward conversations about your salary, religion, and political positions – generally a taxi driver will bring up everything you consider taboo to discuss back home.

Tipping

Most taxi drivers will flat out refuse a tip, or even get confused and possibly insulted by your insistence to give extra money. Which is weird, because if you don’t have change they’ll also gladly keep the change when you didn’t intend to give them any. This I think depends on where they’re from. There are plenty of taxi drivers from the villages who don’t know what tipping is, and then there are those Tbilisi old timers who often do everything to cheat you out of your coins.

Other times it's a Mercedes followed by a Prius

Tbilisi airport taxi

There is a taxi mafia that exists at the airport, like anywhere else. Don’t use them. Supposedly the cost from the Tbilisi airport to the center should be about 25 or 30 lari to get to the center from the airport, but in reality these guys will try to charge you the equivalent in euro, or even charge up to 100 euro for the trip. The best thing then is to use one of the taxi apps, or to shuffle on over to the Arrivals gate and catch a taxi just arriving and dropping someone off. They’ll take you to the center for anywhere from 15 to 30 lari, which is far more appropriate.

And you’re off!

Now you should be prepared for taking a taxi in Tbilisi. That’s all the advice I can give you. By and large, they’re super friendly people, and I suggest chatting and getting some insight on the country. Most taxi drivers have chosen their profession because they enjoy people (and because they’re desperate for cash and their favorite hobby is driving in circles). But yeah, they’re nice people. Just start off by saying how much you love Georgia, and you’ll get a positive experience every time.

And yet other times it's a... wait, what is that car?

Lastly, if you’re looking for somewhere to go in that taxi, think about heading to the Philharmonia where you can start on a GPS-guided audiotour of Rustaveli that I’ve prepared over on VoiceMap. Check it out here. And if you enjoy it, please rate it!

#tbilisi #transit #georgia #taxi