A Little About My New Home

Alright, I’ve finally found some time to write a little. I’ve been living in Georgia for a little more than a month and so far everything has been great. It’s surprising how quickly you can get used to this place. Right now I pretty much feel at home here. My Georgian is also coming along quite quickly. I still cant speak with any fluency whatsoever, but I can scramble around and usually get my point across when I need to. As I’ve said many times already, the people here are incredibly nice and, for the most part, love America.
My classes here are great but way too intensive. I have four hours of one-on-one instruction five days a week for Georgian language, which is not what I was expecting, but it all cost the same so I’m not complaining. I’ve been surprised at how long words are in Georgian and how difficult they are to remember. It seems like the average word in Georgian is always twice as hard to memorize than it would be in some other language (“chrdiloeti = north “aghmosavleti” = south for example). But hopefully words will become easier with time.
I live with a host family. It’s two parents, Marina and Vasha Bokedze, and no children. My “host cousins” are here a lot though. I have about seven I’ve met so far. Everyone is great and most of my host cousins speak at least a little English.

Other than that here are a few things I’ve noticed about Georgia:

Cars always have the right away. Even on sidewalks apparently... I’m not joking. In general, the roads here are ridiculous. Since I’ve been here I’ve seen someone get hit by a car (he flew about ten feet but was ok) and a car crash that involve three cars and a glass building. I was within about thirty feet of both accidents.

People are generally Christian Orthodox and very conservative. Churches are everywhere and most people cross themselves every time they pass are see one.

Beggars and gypsies are everywhere on the streets. They will hassle you constantly for the first few weeks your in Tbilisi.

A lot of people think that if they tell you a huge six syllable word that’s nearly impossible to pronounce and recite it a two or three times you’ll be able to remember it a week later. I unfortunately can’t.

Guys kiss each other on the cheeks and walk arm-in-arm all the time. Nothing wrong with it, but it’s still kind of strange to me.

Food here is pretty amazing. Khachapuri is the classic Georgian dish. It is basically cheese and bread. It’s ok, but I still cant eat it that much and I think Georgians kind of resent me for it. My host mom makes all sorts of dishes and they’re always good.

*please forgive me for mistakes...I still didn’t have that much time to write this.