Helder Toste, BK 2016
As our plane lands with a thump at Tbilisi International Airport in Georgia, an hour late, I glance excitedly out my window looking to see the Georgia we have spent the last few months learning about. Wide open plains stretch as far as the eye can see, the airport is brand new, and in the distance I see one of, if not the largest, monument to the Grape I have ever seen (Georgia is the oldest wine-producing region in the world).
As we ride off to the hostel in the center of the city, we pull away from the new international terminal of the Tbilisi Airport. The old Soviet-era terminal lies abandoned a few paces away and, in the distance, brand new high rises with gold and bright coloring rise in stark contrast against the concrete Soviet housing projects. We wind through the streets and move towards the interior of Tbilisi where it explodes from its Soviet shell and reveals a truly Georgian center. Great boulevards, roundabouts and modern bridges span the city as Orthodox Churches cling to the tops of hills and the Mtkavi River runs through the middle. Georgian nationalist symbols and monuments to the leaders of Georgia and the city of Tbilisi appear sporadically between the European streets.
As we pull up to our hostel, I see indications that not only a city, but a whole nation is slowly being reborn. After years of shifts in the political landscape by the Soviet Union and later Georgia’s early leaders, today the stage has been set for a true Georgian transformation: the Georgian Dream party’s success in the October 2012 parliamentary elections has upset the incumbent United National Movement, new government buildings have been completed hinting at the internal reforms taking place, and the city appears to be well on its way to rebuilding and recreating itself. As we settle down for the night after travelling for nearly 24 hours, I look forward to the many exciting places we will see, the wonderful people we will encounter, and the insight we will gain about the transformation Georgia is currently experiencing.