Kazbegi

web-page

2007-12-05T14:44:00.000+04:00

Hallo everybody.

The Kazbegi-GLEN-girls Kadri, Christina and Elina are proud to present
the main result of their project: the very-very advanced web-page for
Kazbegi and surroundings:

www.kazbegi.info

Please enjoy and tell about it to EVERYBODY who is going to Georgia
and Kazbegi. Feedback is also welcome, we won't bite -- may-be.

Special-special-special thanks to Tõnu for design.
Special-special thanks to Steffen for consulting.
Special thanks to Nadia for correcting the texts.

Kadri-Christina-Elina

Revolution

2007-11-09T00:56:00.001+04:00

Now I am back in Germany but my thoughts still wander around in Georgia quite often. Thinking about the great time I had there but also about current events.

These pictures of the peaceful demonstration I took on my last evening in Tbilisi- 4rth of November. Since then many things happened. Saakashwily showed his interpretation of democracy.

Armenia at night

2007-11-09T00:38:00.001+04:00

The Skyline of Yerevan from the top of the Cascades. Mount Ararat looks so close and is still unreachable for Armenian people.

Mother Armenia looking towards Turkey, a sword in her hands.

This interesting fugure stands at the top of the Cascades just behind the huge 50th Anniversery of Soviet Armenia monument. It costs around 600000 euro and it is art...

With Agnesa and her husband, who where our angels in Yerevan, we went to Restaurant Caucasus for some delicious Armenian food. One meal was called "eat and shut up". I did just that.

After visiting Yerevan we spend a day with Agnesas family in the north of the country in Vanadzor. Great people.

Armenia at day time

2007-11-09T00:07:00.001+04:00

After Kadri and Elina had left I decided to spend the remaining 5 days outside Georgia and left with Dagmar for a short trip to Armenia.

Very nice and very expensive: Market in City Centre.

Yerevan is compared to Tbilisi older, but looks much younger. There are building and construction sites all over the city. According to our Armenian friends there will be elections next year and the present president wants to finish as much as possible for a better record.

Our first sight visited: Garni Temple. The last remaining pagan temple in the whole area of the former Soviet Union.

Geghard Monastery outside Yerevan. One of the most atmospheric churches i have visited, with one of the most scenic and at the same time disgusting toilettes (see picture below for outside).

Thanks to a group of German parliamentarians who travelled with an Armenian singing group for cultural entertainment we where able to listen to some great singing with fantastic acoustic.

Men socializing in the the park of the most sacred church in Armenia: Echmiadzi. When we where there, there was a church service held. Really impressing and different from the ones I have seen so far.

Last days in Georgia

2007-11-08T23:14:00.000+04:00

Project is over. So what is left is to say Goodbye. Due to bad weather and lack of electricity we left Kazbegi earlier then we had planned. On the last morning we went up to the church to see the sunrise. But there was no sun, only steady rain. Nether less a very special trip. In Tbilisi we spend the last days doing some fun stuff and trying to get everything ready for leaving.

Second and last visit to Mother Georgia.

Nivas final minutes in our company ended almost painfully- Or: Georgian driving. Kaspars rented Niva for the time of his and Elinas project. Sometimes we also had the pleasure of going on a trip with her. Great freedom on and off the road.

Nice and rather calm candlelight Sit-in in our second home the Latvian Consulate before the departure of Elina and Kadri on 31st of October. Very very sad. After they left I spend my fist night alone in a room for three month.

Next night I spend at Linas and Justs living museum. There was so much to discover!

The famous bath in Tbilisi. Looks like a mosque but is more a temple of cleanliness. We had some great parties here, it became like a ritual to go there before someone was leaving (so to all who are still there: Keep the tradition!)

Last Restaurant visit. Toasts about “What will Christina miss in Germany”: The people present, dancing in Restaurants, eating and ordering Georgian food, Georgian Wine, ...

After leaving Georgia early in the morning I had the day in Riga. Kaspars took me for a walk in the old harbour. It really reminded me of Hamburg... getting closer to home...

Image taken in Riga. I kind of felt like this.

Trip to an Orphanage in South Ossetia

2007-11-08T22:40:00.000+04:00

After Kadri and Elina left, I had the great chance to join Justs for a trip with his partner organisation "Levan" to an orphanage in South Ossetia. We where quiet excited, because of the uncertain political situation there. But as we came closer in our yellow bus passing trough some amazing landscape we found out that the town we went to was still under Georgian influence. So no border guards or police control, but the aftermath of the war was visible. We took some presents and doctors for the kids. There was some official talking but otherwise it was just a big PR show. My task was to take pictures and smile.

Levan and his admirers in the bus.

Happy shepherd on the way- great georgien spirit.

levan showing the way.

Some officials from Tbilisi came for some talking. Justs really enveyed this guy for his great beard.

The kids where happily posing for us. Later we where playing some games and had great fun.

Outside the house.

A Dentist was checking the teeth. There was no real treatment. The kids just got some chewing gum afterwards.

One of the highlights of the day was the visit of the museum of the house. Everything on display was made by the children of the Orphanage. Mainly wood work, some traditional weaving and carving. Great things.

Vardzia

2007-10-19T14:58:00.000+04:00

The whole cave complex was destroyxed by a big earthquake, so what is visible today is only a small part of the original town. There are hundreds of rooms on 13 floors, some are connected with tunnels.

Elina and Kadri climbing in the caves.

One of the churches with great frescos.

Through the tunnel back down.

The way to our "otel".

There was a great pool at the place where we stayed. The water is coming out of the ground with a temperature of 45 degrees and then cooled off a little. We had wine and we could also see Vardzia out of the window. We enjoyed it so much, that we decided to stay another day.

Sighnaghi- a somehow different georgien town

2007-10-19T14:41:00.001+04:00

Sighnaghi in the heart of Kacheti has an interesting story. It became the favorite place of the president and he decided to make it a nice place. That basically means a lot of reconstruction, building and painting, or "Kosmetics" how a local woman put it. It will probably take another three years and this place will have totally changed.

The view from the road: Looks somehow like some village in Spain or Italy.

Endless possibiliets...

Bodbe monastrie not far away from town. There is a place where the holy Nino prayed for water and a spring appeared. Very sacred.

Nice evening with Israeli backpackers and our host family.

Wine time in Kacheti

2007-10-19T14:31:00.000+04:00

Wine tasting in a family place. They had the best one we tried so far.

Wine fabrik in Kacheti. Everyone was suprised when we asked for a tour but then the big boss himself showed us around.

Some left over bottle from soviet time.

Truck loads of grapes wait in front of the fabrik.

Family selling theier harvest on the market.

Truso valley

2007-10-11T19:53:00.000+04:00

I love that place. By now I have been there 4 times. Its one of the side valleys and populated by Ossetians. Around 1975 they started to leave during the hard winter month when they where cut of from civilization and during the last years only few families come back during summer. The villages and houses are in all different stages of decay. Border guards and shepherds are the only people you meet and most of the time they are quite happy to see somebody and have a chance for a chat. Last time we wanted to stay overnight and they even invited us to stay in their tend. But we preferred to sleep in one of the empty houses that was still in quite a good condition (it still had a roof).

The atmosphere at those deserted villages along the valley and some side branches is quite special and in a way very energetic. Its like people have left but theier memories still remain at that place. Climbing through one of the villages we made interesting discoveries. They are many signs of a once lively social life with bars, schools graveyards and churches. Old watchtowers show that in earlier times these places where fought for and now nobody is interested anymore. Almost nobody. Since the valley is so close to the border to Southossetia it is a very strategically point. So Georgia government decided to open it up for tourists. Students rebuild some of the ruins which will be used as accommodation places. Hard to imagine this place full of backpackers, but the valley has a lot more to offer then old ruins.

Many natural water springs leave coloured terraces and the stones are also very colourful.

There is a little carbonated lake along the river.

The views are great.

State of mind III

2007-10-10T10:23:00.000+04:00

The other night Kadri proposed a toast: “To our last three weeks in Georgia!” No way. That can’t be true. Time is going to fast, slipping through our fingers.

What I will miss most? The company of my Triple team mates Kadri and Elina. Definitely the whine and the gloomy autumn weather. The enlightening atmosphere in the mountains, the feeling after reaching a point high above and resting in the sun. Georgian heartiness in all means. Our Veranda in Kazbegi, nights spend there in candle light or in company feasting. People who enjoy themselves, have a good time. The unpredictability of every day life and the feeling that there will be a solution for everything…

Yesterday we decided to go to a concert in the opera house. We had no clue what it would be and to my surprise the theatre chamber ensemble played Bach, Cantata 202: “Weichet nur, betrübte Schatten”. Sitting there and listening to a Georgian Sopran singing in German felt strange and familiar at the same time. But at some point in the last weeks I stopped wondering about these things. Georgia is different, Georgia is great.

Seminar

2007-10-10T09:17:00.001+04:00

On Oktober 1st we had our big show down in Kazbegi city. We planned and organized a seminar where we presented our results from the tourist inquiry, the web page about Kazbegi and said something about our project in general.

The invitation posters. First version was written with type writer because of lack of electricity.

Technical, moral and design support: Kaspers and Tönu help Elina to get ready for the presentation.

About 30 people from the village came and provided lively discussions about tourism matters.

Kadri is looking after the well beeing of our participants.

Spiritual intercultural communication.

Driving home after the after party.

Higth euphoria

2007-10-10T08:35:00.000+04:00

Last weekend some Glennies met in Kazbegi and we all went on a wonderful trip up to the Meteo station. In 8 thrilling but also exhausting hours we climbed from the church on 2200m to the Meteo station on 3700. It was the highest place we have ever been for most of us. Having a great party in the evening and seeing the sunrise in the morning above the clouds where unforgettable moments. So i would like to say thank you to everyone who came along. Very spezial time indeed!

The Meteo station in the clouds- our place for the night.

Mt Kazbeg came closer and closer.

Sunrise above the clouds.

Beeing in Batumi

2007-09-27T00:33:00.000+04:00

Our Glenny hosts in Batumi: Heidi (in a quite serious moment, quite exeptional) and...

Clara, who spend her final evening at the beach with us and left next morning for France.

Gonio fortress close to Batumi.

The beach... very great. We were lucky with the weather and went swimming several times each day.

Landscape in Adjara region.

At the entrance to the Botanical Garden north of Batumi.

Philipp made new friends...

Sightseeing in Gori

2007-09-26T23:38:00.000+04:00

Uplistsikhe, a cave city founded 1000 BC near Gori.

Our taxi driver who also took care of our physicall well-beeing after we arrived in Gori at 7 am with the overnight train from Batumi. The Wolga he imported from Ukraine 23 years ago.

A huge nameless stature on the central square of Gori of one of the most famous sons of Georgia: Stalin. He was born here and the town still practices a way of whorshipping him that simply ignores the cruelty of this man responsible of millions of death.

Stalin in the Stalin Museum. The museum is huge, almost like a temple and ends with the conference of Yalta...

Kids playing soccer on the streets. In every yard the vine was ripening, hanging over the street. They say its only two weeks left for the new wine to be ready. Looking forward to that!!

Evening light on a fortress overlooking the town of Gori.

Dogs are everywhre, here we met some very playfull ones. In other places, specially in the mountains, they can be quite scarry.

The entrance of the very impressive and still affordable Intourist Hotel. Only half of one floor was renovated, devided from the rest by a large curtain. We had a nice day here, spend mainly in bed because Philipp got his share of the usual georgian stomach problem. We all had it, some of us more then once and by now it makes a great small talk topic...

Mariamoba

2007-09-26T23:07:00.000+04:00

Mariamoba, on the 28th of August is one of the greatest holydays in Georgia. Thousands of pilgrims from all over the country make their way up to Sameba church in Kazbegi. It is a day for sancification, mediations and joy, a day spend with family and friends.

Resting on the way to the church.

Together with hundreds of pilgrims we went into Sameba church and lit some candles.

The biggest cars where parked just in front the church.

Everyone able to ride a horse was racing up and down the hill.

Georgian ritual: Taking a lamb up to the church, surrounding the church three times and then slaughtering the animal outside the church yard, boiling the meat and eat it there with friends and family.

Big party at our house. One of the sons of the family came home for the holyday- together with 14 friends. Georging feasting at its best, with great singing and music, delicious food, toasts from the heart and of course a lot of alcohol!

Mt Kazbeg with lightened chruch at night: This picture was taken on the same day at 1o pm with extreme long exposure time. In moments like this i really wish for a tripod!

State of mind II

2007-09-26T22:49:00.000+04:00

I am still alive! And have not a really good excuse for not writing for such a long time. Some great things in my life happened: My sister got married on the 8^th of September and this seemed to me an important enough reason to fly home for a week. It was a wonderfull, chaotic and happy time in Germany.

Philipp accompanied me on my way back to Georgia. Our triple team decided to take a week off and do some travelling before winter hits the country. So Kadri left with Tönu for Armenia and Elina showed some highlights of the country to her mother. Philipp and I took the night train to Batumi and spend some relaxing days at the beach and visiting the region, before we went back and had a stop in Gori. We spend Claras last day together with her and Heidi and it seems quite weird that for some of us Glennies the time here is already over.

Now we are back and working on the project. In a week from now we have a seminar in Kazbegi, presenting our work to all who are interested in the community. The web site was born yesterday and we will have a rough version ready to present at that date. Also our questionnaire shows some results that might be interesting for everyone here dealing with tourists. Many people ask us to come by and take pictures of their place. So this will keep us busy for the last month here and also working on the web page will take some time.

I could say that everything is great. But sometimes I feel doubts in my head. The easiness of the first weeks vanished a little bit. Questions arise in my head. Not so much about the project here, but about what to do after. At some point I have to decide which road to take. Maybe not for the rest of my life but for the next months, the next year. At one side I can feel the freedom of deciding for what I want to. On the other side this decision seems quite a heavy one.

It’s great to be in the same place for such a long time. It makes it possible to follow life and not only perceive the country in a static moment. Fall came to Georgia. The grass turned brown and the trees along the military highway show off in brilliant colours. The cows came back from the high pastures. That means more work for Manoni, because she has to milk three cows before going to work and great pleasure for us: fresh milk, yoghurt and home made cheese. Today school started again. The kids have off 3 month in the summer. It must be hard to get used to sit still after running around in the mountains all summer. Everywhere on the streets you could see small groups of young pupils nicely dressed... so much more to see and to experince. More pics are on the way.

Georgian impressions

2007-08-23T10:24:00.000+04:00

Kazbegi men

A different wine cup

Stalin still around

Bridge in Kazbegi

Old Pagan-Christian shrine in Sno valley

Going on a hike in Jutta

Georgian men at a mineral pool close to Kazbegi

Elina and Kadri having fun with a waterpipe. It's natural mineral water in Truso valley

The sky is the limit

One day we helped our host Dantuna to make hey. Great view, but hard work!

Houses in Kazbegi

2007-08-23T09:18:00.000+04:00

Typical house in Kazbegi. They all seemed quite fenced in- to keep the pigs and cows out that walk around everywhere.

Carpets everywhere

Mountain goat horns and a glass vitrine- common sights in every home

Having a break

I really don't know why but similar can be seen in many houses

One of the bathrooms. Running water is not yet standard in Kazbegi

The fotograph shows Alexander Kazbegi, famous Georgian writer

Fresh meat

State of mind

2007-08-22T18:59:00.000+04:00

Being back in Tbilisi for a few days and being able to use the internet and catch up on what is going on the world also leaves some time for reflection about the first 3 weeks.

I have to admit: I love Georgia! It is a truly fascinating country. One of the reasons is that it is in between everything:

modern and backward

peace and war

Asia and Europe

independency and sovereignty

Communism and Capitalism

Christianity and pagan mythology

east and west (taking the current events in account -you might have heard about the bomb that appeared from nowhere and fortunately didn’t go off- the cold war is not quite over yet at this end of the world)

…

And also: The people. Proud by nature, believing they are one-of-a-kind. Very charming, very emotional, very beautiful, very warm and hospitable (and sometimes just a little bit too much of all of that). The unbelievable landscape: Mountains, steep rugged, daunting and welcoming at the same time. Valleys, gorges, rivers, lakes, natural springs. The culture, the history, the food: All kinds of fruits and vegetables -we eat a few kg each day. The dishes enriched with fresh spices. Very tasty.

The project is going quite well, we work independently and have almost half of the places visited and can start to think about the layout of the website. More Glen people start their projects in the country and this gives us a good excuse to travel and visit. Tomorrow Kadri and I will go to Borjomi, Elina travels on to Batumi and further to Turkey.

As we drove back from Kazbegi I was sitting at the window and realized how dangerous this road is: at some places it disappears into nothing. You have to be at one with the world and yourself to go here, I thought. In a way it’s a pilgrimage… a very light-hearted one…

… and this is just what my next entry will be about: on the 28^th of August 10.000 pilgrims pay a visit to the trinity church on Mt Kazbeg- and we will be among them.

People from Jutta

2007-08-22T15:50:00.000+04:00

Last weekend we went on a trip to a little village called Jutta, situated in the Sno valley, one of the side valleys. Again we visited families who can accommodate tourists. All people in the village belong to the same family: Arabuli. They used to be shepherds, but now, where they have no access anymore to the winter grazing land 600 km away at the Caspian sea they keep cows and most of them work as border guards, checking the mountains between Chechnya and Georgia. Despite their hard life- the village is cut off from civilization during winter- these people kept an amazing humor and warm spirit. It was really amazing: here we sit just a few km away from one of the hotspots of current political events and still it feels like the most peacefull place on earth.

Our host Soso (the man on the right), who took us in his jeep from Kazbegi, showed us around. Here he is talking with Jargo.

When i was still in Hamburg a friend of a friend heard that i was going to Georgia and told me about Timo Vogt, who is a free photo journalist working a lot in and about Georgia. And here in Jutta, in the middle of nowhere, I met him. Together with Tine he is helping his friend Jargo to get his house ready for tourists. What a coincidence! We had a nice evening together and Timo could answer some of our questions about current political events in the caucasus region. His reportages and pictures can be found on www.i-traxx.net

What we do in Kazbegi

2007-08-22T01:42:00.000+04:00

Since our project description (“developing tourism infrastructure in Kazbegi municipality”) is quite broad we spend some time before and also during the project to decide what to do. We decided together with the people from the municipality that it would be quite useful to provide more information about this region for interested tourists. Since our financial resources are limited the internet seemed to be the best platform to work with. So that’s what we do at the moment: Visit all tourist sights in this region, take pictures and notes about it and eventually put all this on a website. I think I don’t have to point out that this part of the job is quite appealing to me. The nature up there is fantastic! Next to information for things to do and see we want to provide information about accommodation. So we get a list of families that can invite tourists to their places and visit them and again take notes and pictures and eventually put it on the web. The background for this is, that most tourists come with Lonely Planet or other guide books as their “holy bible” and just stay at the places that are mentioned there. But almost every family has room and Georgian hospitality can be appreciated in many places. Again this is quite a nice job. The hardest part is to convince the people that we can’t have coffee, food or Chacha (“Georgian spirit”) with everyone- and for me to find new angles, views and enough light for the pictures. Its amazing to see the houses from the inside. Huge rooms, quite unusual for mountain area- apparently a left over from better times during communism. There are carpets everywhere and the furniture is similar in most places, but every home is unique. The third part of our project at the moment are standardized interviews with tourists. The aim of that is to find out about their opinion about tourism in Kazbegi: What is needed, which steps of development should be taken. At the end we will conduct a workshop at the village with all who are interested and tell about the results.

Our working partners

On one of our first days in Kazbegi we got to know these really nice men, the heads of the local municipality who offered us any possible help. They took us on a tour to see some local highlights, the township called Tsdo, almost abandoned but majestically situated on a mountains rige, a waterfall and the trip was topped with a nice picnic – and 10 litres of homemade wine. To make a long story short: After spending quite some happy hours emptying this kanister of whine, toasting in Georgian style, singing and talking about the world and Georgia in particular we refused to get in the car with them and decided to walk home- apparently some 12 km. Our new friends got really offended- in Georgia you are expected to drink, but not to get drunk and their pride and hospitality seemed to be at risk. In the end we could convince the one that seemed to us most sober to drive the car after we walked the most dangerous part and arrived safely back home. What followed was a weird sequel of phone calls, unexpected visits in the morning “girls, you like beer? I will be there at 10” and one of them even showed up totally drunk at night, convinced that we had a secret party with the other one.

Well, we learned from that. Being more carefully with whom we do what and working more closely together with Nona, who is in charge of tourism in that region and avoiding other “business meetings”.

Where we live

2007-08-22T01:19:00.000+04:00

The town Kazbegi, or Stephensminda how it is actually called, is situated at 1700 m above sea level and is the heart of the Kazbegi district in the north of Georgia that covers 1081sq km of the Caucaus region. The biggest road, the military highway cuts through it and is the lifeline of the region, the passage through the Caucasus and also the connection with Russia. In Kazbegi live about 1500 people and 3400 in the whole district. Mount Kazbeg, a 5030 something meter high distinct volcano is clearly visible from the town and is just an amazing sight. There are borders with Russia in the north- closed since last year and at the moment out of reach because the rain took away the road, North Ossetia and Chechnya.

The Tereck river took over the Military Highway, about 12 km north of Kazbegi.

We found a really nice and friendly place to live. Our hosts are Minoni and Datuna. They have three kids, the youngest at home at the moment. Minoni works at the municipality and established the first contact when our project was born last year between a Glen member and the officials here. They are almost self-sufficient - like most people here due to the high unemployment rate, low wages and relatively high food prices. They have three cows, who are in the high pastures in the mountains at moment, a big pig and 6 little one who roam the streets of Kazbegi, bees, a huge garden, a cat and a little dog “Sharik” who is already our best friend. We have two rooms, a kitchen and a veranda where we spend most of our time and a balcony with an impressive mountain panorama on all sites. Most of the time there is power, sometimes there is none. Most of the time there is water and sometimes there is none. After a week we managed to get gas for cooking. Nothing to worry about…

Mt. Kazbeg on our first evening, picture taken from the balcony

The Churo Mountain range (up to 4000 m high) at the other side of the house, just after a little shower.

The view south. Little villages along the military highway.

Arrival and first week in Kazbegi

2007-08-13T16:30:00.000+04:00

Our first week in Kazbegi is over and we're all doing fine. We saw a lot of this beautiful landscape and can't stop taking photos. We started to contact the people to get an idea of what we can do with our project.

Because there is no internet connection here, I can't update my blog every day. But we will make another trip to Tbilisi, and then you will see some photos of our region!

Also I've a georgian mobilecard and you can call me under 0099593124976. Using the 010017 before might be the cheapest way from germany.

last day in tbilisi

2007-08-05T12:31:00.000+04:00

Kadri, Elina and me

Our time as "tourists" in Tbilisi is almost over (at least for this time, because I'm sure we will be back sooner or later). Today we will leave to Kazbegi and start our project. In the last days we allready had good ideas. We talked to many people and they shared theier view on the topic with us. I'm really excited to get there. Kazbegi will be again a totally different world...

ethnographical museum

2007-08-05T11:33:00.001+04:00

Another wonderfull experince: Georgi invited us to the ethnographical museum. It is an outdor museum and they have all kinds of original houses from different regions on display.

Georgi shares his place with 15 cats and dogs

Georgi is explaining some ancient resurrection ritus

The artist and his masterpiece

images

2007-08-05T11:20:00.000+04:00

These pictures where all taken at the ethnographical museum in tbilisi

die ersten drei Tage...

2007-08-04T00:23:00.000+04:00

... sind sehr schnell vergangen. georgien fühlt sich richtig an. die menschen, das land- alles passt. irgendwie hab ich das gefühl, dass hier viele pfade zusammenführen. mal sehen, wie es weiter geht.

Tbilisi at night

2007-08-03T23:17:00.001+04:00

cloth shoppin in a little secound hand boutique

Mtskheta - the spiritual heart of Georgia

2007-08-03T23:11:00.000+04:00

Leri, whom we met on the marschrutka ( small busses, a common public transport) offered us a tour.

the market in tbilisi

2007-08-03T22:51:00.000+04:00

Soo many impressions, smells, noises! People want to know where we are coming from, offering us bites to taste. The market consits out of differen section. We made our way through the fruit and vegetables section.

first impressions of tbilisi

2007-08-02T18:47:00.000+04:00

culinary highlights

2007-08-02T18:39:00.000+04:00

the first georgian meal this morning with Kadri, Agris, Ines and Elina

Arrivel in Tbilisi

2007-08-02T18:29:00.000+04:00

When we arrived 5 o’clock this morning after spending the day in Riga we took a taxi and got our first lesson in the Georgian way of driving: with 140 through the city, honking once in a while when another car is getting to close. To put a seatbelt on would personally offend the driver. yeppeee! We arrived safely at a very nice place: Regina is hosting us for the time until we will leave for our final destination Kazbegi on Saturday. In her spacious office right in the middle of town we put down our matraztes and tried to sleep, what at first seemed to be impossible- too many impressions already - and too hot.

Today where wandering around the city today and paid our tribute to mother Georgia- a big statue overlooking the city.

Last day in Hamburg

2007-07-31T12:26:00.001+04:00

The last weeks where busy and wonderfull. I finished my final thesis with great help of my mother and was able to see many friends. So now I am (almost) officially no student anymore! Its time for a new advanture. Tomorrow i will start my journey to Kazbegi in Georgia. Kazbegi is a beautifull village right in the heart of the Caucasus mointains. Together with my triple partners Elina from Latvia and Kadri from Estonia we will work for three month on a project there trying to improve the touristic infrastructure so more people of the region have an income and don`t have to leave for the big cities.

First I will fly to Riga early tomorrow morning and meet Kadri and Elina there and join the Latvian Glen-Group for a good-bye party. In the evening we will continue to fly to Tiblissi and arrive there about 3 o'clock in the morning. Until then- a lot of prepearation and packing to do!