My aunt wanted to cook one of the chickens in honor of my visit. She asked my uncle to catch the chicken but then the first day she asked the chicken ran away. The next day she asked the chicken started to lay eggs. The next day she asked my father and I went into the city and bought meat that had to be cooked soon. Then finally, one fine day, my uncle remembered to go into the coup before letting the chickens out, and he caught that chicken. Then he beheaded it. He said usually it has a headless fit for a while after he chops off its head, but this time I didn't see it having an epileptic fit, which was disappointing. I wish I could have taken a video of a headless chicken running around. I asked him how he felt in his soul after slaughtering a chicken and he said it felt really good. I didn't take a picture of him holding the headless chicken because it really wasn't that interesting to look at, it was hard to tell where the head should have been because of all the feathers.
Then my aunt feathered the chicken. I never knew this, but apparently all you have to do is put the chicken with all its feathers into water that just boiled and leave it in for a few minutes, very quickly pull it out and also, very quickly pull out all its feathers. I had no idea that the feathers come out so easily. It looked like feathers might be very painful to have because some of them were wedged very deep into the skin of the chicken. I think I might be glad that I don't have feathers.
After this fiasco in the morning my father and I went off to get his documents straightened out in the city. The day before this I met a lady who knows my father. She owns one of the Romanov's era houses (the ones that were built by the workers that came with the tsar's family to build their complex). She rents out her house to the tourists (for only $25 per week, so cheap for a house that's antique!) and my father sometimes does work for her in the yard. This lady asked me how I live with my aunt, she was very curious, she used to be a neighbor of my family, and I don't know what her prerogative was. Maybe she was honestly concerned, maybe she was very curious to talk to me because I'm from another country, also, a LOT of people are sincerely eager to speak with me at least once because of the fact that I'm a daughter that came across the world to meet her father after he left her 19 years ago.
I wasn't sure if she was going to be someone that likes to go around spreading rumors, but I thought, what the hell, I have so much on my mind, and I've got to talk to someone about it. Another thing was that I don't know my family well at all, and I wanted to know what other people say about my aunt and my father. So I told her about how much I like my aunt and her family and about all my grievances with my father. One thing that I was very happy about is that I got to take a shower in her house because I complained about the fact that my aunt's house has no running water, let alone a shower, and that I haven't taken a shower in maybe three or four days at that point. Also, she got very passionate about me helping my father. She said, "you have to do a kind deed. Let it be that your father is a drunk, I also have a husband who's a drunk, but I feel so sorry for him and I help him sometimes. Sometimes I do something for him and then I hate him and say, why did I ever do that?! But then I know that if I didn't I would feel bad, so I love and hate him at the same time."
She really wanted me to help my father by sending him to America. She said, "he'll definitely do anything for your mom if you take him with you, he will help, I know." She also said, "before you leave make sure that you take care of the paperwork so that his house becomes yours, he always said that his house is yours, but you make sure and put it in your name, that's the least he can do for you after doing nothing for all these years." At this point I was still very upset at my father for how he met me and brought me into Abastumani and I felt very heavy on my heart. I was putting off a conversation with him because I was planning not to speak with him for the rest of my trip because I didn't feel like I could handle it. But when she said all that I got really excited and happy and after taking a shower I ran to find him and tell him that I want him to take care of the paper work for the house and that I will definitely send him to America.
So the next day I got dressed up for the occasion because I saw that my dad was shaving and making a big to do about it. I felt very optimistic about him and we spent the day, I thought, very nicely. Later on though I realized a few things that I did not notice while I was out on the day trip with him. He asked me that day to give him my money because he wanted to be able to pay for things because he was ashamed that I would pay when he's with me. I thought, sure why not, I'll do him that kind deed, it didn't seem like much. I also took him to a restaurant and we bought a bunch of stuff at the bazaar.
Later on I realized this was a mistake. We have a saying in Russia, if you let a pig sit at the table, it'll crawl on the table. That's what my dad did. We took care of some documents and the next day I didn't want to have to go into the city with him again, it was a tiring journey. I left $25 with him, not because he needed it, but because it was in his pocket, left over after everything we'd spent. It doesn't sound like much in America, but in Georgia that is a LOT of money, I could have bought my aunt all kinds of groceries on that money, but he came back the next day from his trip without any money and demanded from me to buy him cigarettes. I didn't and he got offended.
It's upsetting because he pretends that it hurts him to have to ask me for money, yet every chance he gets he wants me to spend money on him in the restaurant, and to give him money for his own expenses as thought I'm supposed to support him here, in his own home. He also wants me to pay off his debts. The first day we went into town after I said I'd take him to live with my mom I had to go to the bank. I withdrew some cash and he started smiling at me and said, "listen, can you give me $100, I have to pay off a debt to someone." I said, "no, pay off your own debt." I was SO upset at him for daring to ask me to pay for that.
My father should be doing everything he can to show that he's sorry, and instead he keeps asking for more and more from me. It was even more upsetting that the taxi driver that gave us a ride into town that day was the person he wanted to pay off his debt to. I realized this after my father asked me for the money because the taxi driver took us REALLY far for only some gas money, and I thought he was just being nice, but later I realized that my father promised him that I would pay his debt off to him. He didn't even ask me! And he made this agreement right in front of me, because I don't understand Georgian.
Below is my father's school that he went to. My cousin also went to this school.
This is a waterfall next to the natural springs of sulfur waters that have medicinal powers. The Romanov's medicinal pools. I didn't photograph them, maybe later I'll go inside and do so.
This is a statue of the Tsaritsa Tamara. She was the only female ruler of Georgia, after her, her son took over and ruined Georgia's domains.
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