I may be a heathen but I love the traditional ceremonies, rituals, art and especially the music of historic churches.
Sunday’s Mass at the Oldest Standing Church in Tbilisi
Tbilisi
capital of the country of Georgia
Stalin Keeps A Firm Grip On His Legacy In This Historic Georgian City
Gori, a Georgian city of about 45,000 people, capital of the Shida Katli district of Georgia, is probably best known for being the birthplace of Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953.
Gori was important militarily as far back as the middle ages, and the remains of the 7th-century A.D. Gori fortress on a prominent hilltop in the city is a popular tourist attraction. Yet the city’s most well-known attraction is undoubtedly the Stalin Museum.
Scenes From My Doorway
a lonely grape vine
holds dear its beauty
this cool sunny
morning in Tbilisi.
Another Wonderful Gift of Music, This Time in Tbilisi!
“Without music, life would be a mistake,” said German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
I surely agree. A life-long love of music has played an important part in my post-retirement travel life, providing many new, wonderful opportunities to hear and see live musical performances throughout the world that I would never have had without it.
Many of my most memorable travel experiences have involved music.
From the mad rock sounds of the French band The Inspector Cluzo in Peru; Gregorian chant in an 11th century cathedral in Berlin; impromptu jams by indigenous musicians in Iquitos on the Amazon River; the Amazon Symphony Orchestra itself playing Hayden and Strauss in Manaus, Brazil; to most recently discovering the incredible polyphonic voices at Tbilisi, Georgia’s Holy Trinity Cathedral, and many more, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed a grand variety of world music along my journey.
This week I was looking online for more live music in Tbilisi and discovered to my delight that the internationally renowned Tbilisi Symphony Orchestra was performing this week at the Kakhidze theater, just a six-minute walk from where I live!
‘Chronicle of Georgia’: The Best, Least Visited Tour Site in Tbilisi
Yesterday my friend had the urge at 7:30 a.m. to visit the Chronicle of Georgia, a colossal monument designed by world-renowned contemporary artist Zurab Tsereteli.
My friend roused me from a filmy sleep with a ping on Whatsapp asking if I wanted to join her. She needed to start early because of an online English class she taught in the early afternoon.
I had the monument on my list of places to see in Tbilisi so I agreed to meet her in an hour at the Marshanavili Metro Station.
The monument turned out to be well worth getting up for.
Thinking About Georgia? Consider These 10 Oddities Before You Go
My first week in Georgia was spent in an outlying neighborhood of Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital city.
Knowing little about my latest destination, I booked a hotel room in a section of the city called Isani.
My plan was to stay wherever this hotel was, while learning a little more about Tbilisi, this city of a little more than a million people, then rent an apartment I could actually inspect first to reside in for the next three months.
Finding the Astounding Sound of Tbilisi’s Holy Trinity Choir
On Sunday I went to the impressive Holy Trinity Cathedral in Tbilisi, 11 a.m. mass, hoping to see and hear the renowned polyphonic cathedral choir.
Gone From Istanbul, Been to Barcelona, Now I’m in Georgia
It’s been too long since I last posted. I was in Turkey at the time, which was two countries ago on my continuing journey.
For the past 11 days I’ve been in Georgia — the country, not the state — and before that I spent a week in Barcelona, Spain, where I visited a friend who I first met in 2017 in Medellin, Colombia.