Extreme government service in Georgia

It’s comforting to find a tourist information centre when we reached any city. The tourist information staff always commend perfect English and is helpful in answering all questions. In Bojormi, the staff even post his mobile number at the door in case tourist have after hour of inquiries. He even helped us to translate our questions to the post office lady on the phone. There are always free map, brochure and we always find hostel information and restaurant recommendations. They sometimes arrange tours as well.

We also heard from local that those newly furnished government service building provide one-stop-shop and you queue up in one line for any inquiries about all government services. And you register a new company or renew a lost ID card in a few hours, for example.

 

There are always payment machine as many as ATM everywhere in Georgia. We could easily add-value for our phone card, bus card, retrieve train tickets and make payment for public services. Some machine will charge a commission and others not. We seldom enjoyed such 24/7 convenience in any country around the world.

In the past, the government admitted that with its Soviet influence, the police department especially was very corrupted and there was a movement that they fired most officers and tried very best to fight corruption with their new officers. While we were hitchhiking in Svaleti, we got picked up a few times by a police car. They seems to be rather friendly and helpful. My friend in Tbilisi once got his wallet stolen and reported to the police. He said in 6 hours, they called to reporting that it’s found! Amazing efficiency. I wonder how they did that!?

今天兩隻寄住貓被困在温暖的家

阿美尼亞人熱情好客，但couchsurfing並不熱門。只有在首都Yerevan年青一代英語水平較
高，大部份人多以俄語溝通，而多數人也與父母同住，couchsurfer 則是外國人居多。我們很幸運，竟在Yerevan找到一位獨居的阿美尼亞女士寄住幾天。

美女雅思雅工作很忙，雖要帶文件回家繼續努力，總算可以準時下班。

雅思雅家只有一條匙，為擔心我們太早起，便提議中午從公司回家一趟，讓我們出門。我們真的睡至十時多，吃了碗白粥，打點了行裝，但一等等到下午二時....噢！沒回來。可能忘掉了。但我們沒買本地電話咭，家中亦不能上網，沒辦法只好留下洗衫、寫blog，休息一下好了。

外面零下十度，天寒地凍，冰天雪地，我又感冒未癒，偶而窩在温暖的家中偷懶一天也不錯。幸好還有點吃的。

下午6時多，天已黑齊，沙發主人也差不多該回來了。原來她下午被老闆叫住開會，中午飯也沒著落。沒法子。

The love for Georgian food

We heard of a story about an authentic French restaurant in Batumi closed down eventually after 2 years, because Georgians walk in there and leave right away if they cannot find Georgian food on the menu. In Tbilisi, we also find a lot of Thai-Georgian, Indian-Georgian, International Georgian restaurants. They must love their own food so much. In fact, Georgia does have interesting menu, appetizers like Badrijani Nigvzit (eggplant roll with walnut paste), mchadi (cornbread), khachapuri (bread with cheese stuffing); main course, such as, satsivi (chicken in walnut sauce), mtsvadi (grilled meat), khinkali (meat dumpling, very similar to Shanghai dumpling), ostri (meat stew in tomato sauce), chakhapuri (meat stew with plum sauce) and desert, such as churchkhela (threaded walnut covered with grape juice and flour mixture, then hung dry).

Actually all these dishes could be included in one menu and after a while in Georgia, we do feel comforting to find the same dishes in any eatery. In a short while, we could memorize all these names and order without a menu, like a local.

The only thing is, their English menu, if a restaurant managed to have one, don’t always have accurate price. We read the menu before order and are told that we are charged more because the menu was not updated and they have new prices for everything. I guess the local don’t ask for price and don’t need to read any menu. They pay as they are told. Unfortunately, as budget travelers, we found ourselves arguing the bill with the cashier all the time.

Well, the amazing thing is, if you bump into a party at the next table, you will always hear guys singing wonderful dining a capella and they might treat you some of their local homemade wine.