To the People of Kasbegi, and Their Chacha

by Whitney Halperin (United States of America)

Making a local connection Georgia

“To the people of Georgia, and to our wonderful hosts, gaumarjos!” Hannah toasted in the small kitchen room in which we unexpectedly ended up. I took another shot of chacha and felt my throat burn. That shot was probably the sixth shot I had consumed since the couple who had picked us up hitchhiking brought us to the home of the woman’s brother, and that’s not counting the homemade wine we consumed in the cemetery. Luckily, the man had tapped out after half a shot. “I’m driving,” he had said in Russian, our shared language. It was definitely good I was not driving because even with the delicious food they gave us (small khachapuris, potato salad, and some sort of cold chicken dish that sounds like the Russian word for cold—kholodno) because I was feeling the alcohol. Thankfully, I wasn't responsible for the next toast, as my toast had been the second (“To you all,” I had toasted, only to be corrected by the woman, “No, to us all”). We were in Stepantsminda, a small town in Georgia near the Russian border, with the stunning mountain top monastery, commonly known as the Kasbegi monastery. This couple had picked us up and originally planned to take us to Gudauri, a ski resort town, but then they offered to take us to Kasbegi and bring us back to Tbilisi, as they were also returning that night. The main reason we hadn’t planned on going to Kasbegi was fear of not being able to get transportation back to Tbilisi, so with that assuaged, we couldn’t say no. Kasbegi had mountains and valleys, and while our hosts kept saying in the summer it was more beautiful, I was already enchanted. I thought it was better than the snowy mountains we had passed on the drive, where you couldn’t tell how the mountain covered there was so much white everywhere. On top the mountain across the valley stood the monastery. Simple, like most Georgian monasteries, but stunning because of its mountainous surroundings. When we arrived in Stepantsminda, we went to the woman’s brother’s house. While she gathered some supplies, the man took Hannah and me and pointed to a faraway mountain. “That’s Russia,” he said. Supplies gathered, the five of us got into a car. Hannah and I had no clue where we were headed or what was happening—we were along for the ride. We pulled into a cemetery and the men set up the alcohol while the woman went straight to a grave with a woman’s image engraved on it. “My mother,” she told us. Her husband handed her a glass of amber wine, she took a sip, and then poured it out over the grave in a cross. The two men followed in suit, as did we, with our glasses. We went to the next grave. With this one, it was more raw, and the date more recent. “Their brother,” man told us. The three of us paid our respects and then stood back, while the siblings spent some moments together. The man asked us what we thought of the wine, and being taught to never insult anything your host gives you, I said it was good. He smiled, indicating that most likely he had made the wine (amber wine in Georgian was homemade), and said, “Then it’s yours, it’s a gift.” We returned to the house, where there was an abundance of food, as evidence by the abundant leftovers even with two additional people. We had to beg to not eat anymore, and that’s when the toasting began in earnest. First was the warm up shot, then to the departed brother and mother. Then to our hosts, to ourselves, to Georgia, to the US, and to Georgia and US relations. While I didn’t get to go skiing in Gudauri or climb to the monastery in Kasbegi, I experienced a more intimate adventure. I had a small Georgia supra, or feast, and drank wine and chacha. While the monasteries and mountains are stunning, it’s the food and the people who will take your breath away, with their kindness—and their drinking.