Where Stalin was born
Trip Start
Sep 19, 2009
1
8
16
Trip End
Oct 10, 2009
Gori, Georgia
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
A but to Gori left from northern bus station of Tbilisi and took about 1,5 hours. On the way I saw a "town" or refugee camp built for the refugees of the recent war between Georgia and Russia. Neat houses lined in straig rows, I'd say there were a few hundrer houses all together. It was like a neighbourhood more than a camp! But, I'm sure it's not nice for the people. This was the first time during my stay in Georgia that anything reminded me about the war.
Gori seemed to be a quite nice regular town, nothing special, nothing annoying. The main reason I went there was the pompuos and famous Stalin museum, which is redicilously large to be a museum of only one man! The museum is a majestetic soviet style building situated in the center of the town. It was easy to find from the bus station, and enjoyed the walk through the main street of the town. On the way I saw a really weird and interesting tiny church - there were only frames made of wood and the altar, nothing more. And no, it wasn't under construction, it was like that.
The first thing I saw when I arrived to the museum was the house that Stalin grew in - the whole house has been moved to stand in front of the museum. It is a kind of traditional old house, very small. The city used to be full of that kind of houses, but of course Stalin tore them all down to make a new more soviet kind of city. Stalin didn't treat his home town any different than all the other towns. On the yard of the museum was also the green train carriage that Stalin was traveling to Yalta conference with. I didn't get in but it was nonetheless interesting to see, especially when I just had read about the conference in more detail.
The museum itself was a bit of a dissapointment. Not because of the content, but because almost none of the information was in english, making it very hard to get much out of it. There were rooms after rooms full of informations, items and pictures of Stalin's life, all of them no doubt fascinating, but without english it was a bit frustrating. Mostly I enjoyed the picture of Stalin from his childhood to his death, some models of buildigs, and of course it was interesting to see some of the cloths he was wearing, pipes he was smoking and documents he signed. There also was the the death mask of Stalin. The last room was filled with gifts given to Stalin all around the world, including, for example, a carpet with his picture on it and vases with his pictures on them. He must've loved himself. I was almost alone in the museum, which was weird. It was quite expensive, too. I was done after an hour, back to exploring the city.
For me the most fascinating thing wasn't the museum, but the fact I was in the city Stalin was born in. One of the main roads was called Stalin Avenue, and in the middle of the square in fron of the City Hall was a huge statue of Stalin - one of the first ones still standing in the world. After walking around, I went to have lunch in a restaurant recommended by lonely planet (there didn't seem to be many restaurants in Gori!). It was well forth recomminding - not only did I get delicious and cheap food, I actually got a private room! The restaurant was in Stalin Avenue, but I can't remember the name. After lunch I went to a bridge crossing one of the rivers and suddenly saw an old monastery on top of a hill far away - should I climb there? By inner monastery-lover was really tempted. However, it was raining a bit so I didn't go. And this was also supposed to be day without monasteries or churches, it was a different day.
Instead, I went to the second most important sight in Gori, the fortress Goris-Tsikhe standing above the city in a rocky hill right in the city centre, maybe 200meters from Stalin museum. They don't really know when the fortress was built - its was first mentioned in 13th century records, but archeological evidence says it has been built as early as in early centuries BC. The fortress is now mosltly in ruins (mostly because of the 1920 earthquake) but it's an excellent place to go to see views of the city. Gori actually looked very nice from up there, being in the confluence of two rivers surrounded by hills and mountains. And the buildings aren't that ugly eather, relatively speaking. In addition, I got the fortress totally for myself again, like I did in Mtshketa, which always adds to the atmosphere. No tourists. Then I realized that no wonder there are no tourists here (the museum was empty too), a year a go Gori was occupied by russians and rather badly bombed. People fled and recently came back, maybe tourists will follow...
It was raining in Gori so I decided to head back to Tbilisi already - I think I saw the city already. Go Stalin! I wondered around a bit in a big market near the bus station and then took the bus back to the capital. The bus was totally full, but my co-travelers arranged a seat for me, even though I said I am perfectly fine sitting in the floor. Nothing helped, they got a seat for me and I sat down and felt awkward. At some point I tried to say the man who was standing next to me that I can stand from now on, but no. I had to sit. This was the first time during my hole trip I felt the famous hospitality of local people. And pretty much the last time.
