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HOMELAND
By David Turashvili

'Three Chairs to Uncybernetic Georgia!...'
Nieles BOHR

One may survive anything. There was a prisoner in one of Tbilisi's jails, who served his fifteen year sentence and they stayed on in prison. He grew afraid of freedom and had adjusted to prison life. Georgians cannot put up with foreign lands, and they have never emigrated. No one left this country of his own free will. They were banished from Georgia. But as for some Armenians, our neighbors, are everywhere. They can live in any place across the world and remain Armenians. We, however, need the land, the land which we fled recently, and startlingly, scattered all over the world. One may come across a Georgian even in Africa or Australia, as well as in America: Americans were first to discover Georgia, and John Steinbeck was one of the first to visit Tbilisi. On returning, Steinbeck was asked his opinion about his trip, but he could recall absolutely nothing, saying only that he remembered having a horn in hand and looking up at the ceiling (he wanted to write a novel "Georgian Ceiling",but did not manage to). Before Americans, Jews had come, twenty six centuries ago, and stayed. The fact that they were never troubled or killed in Georgia unlike other countries is still being marveled at. The fact surprises you as well, because neither you, nor the Israelites know that Georgians kill only Georgians because they love one another. They love one another very dearly.
They adore Krasha in the morning and argue about Plato zealously and loudly in the evening. They are soft-hearted and envy only those who can never be assailed by nostalgia. They never envy travelers and the arrival of Greeks before Jews merely surprised the Georgians. But they had to honor their guests, and Georgians gave the pulchritudinous Medea, already married, along with the golden fleece to Greek lazon (Jason). They were crying and singing as they gave Tier away. They sing remarkably well to date. Georgians sing today and sang then, when they had multitudes of enemies to resist. In the end, Georgia was invaded by Russia. When Pushkin was assassinated, one Georgian noble sold everything he had and departed to kill Dames, Pushkin's killer. The Russians conquered Georgia nevertheless, and the Georgian, though temporarily, had no destination. For a long time they had nothing to do, and that is why they know almost everything about one another. They know the kind of things they hear every day, at the table, when drinking wine, and they drink a lot and eat a little and without noise, unlike Americans in films, where one basically has to listen to jaw noises.
There are many churches in Georgia and presumably that accounts for the fact that women refrain from talking about sex. A Georgian may condescend to do many things, but a Georgian harlot won't busy herself with prurient sex out of ethical considerations. Georgians like to drink to liberty, think of poetry, football and their history, literature and the arts.
So do I . Because I am a Georgian.

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