My current view while writing this :)
I came to Tbilisi early this afternoon. It was very strange leaving Azerbaijan. Believe it or not, I've been there for 9 months now (maybe you can believe that, but I can't) and it was kind of unnerving to leave. I think it was really just the feeling of not having our Safety and Security Officer/ninja bad-ass Ceyhun a phone call away should anything go wrong. And after being so scared of Azerbaijan's borders, given all the fighting that goes on over some of them, it was strange to be intentionally walking right up to one. And police and officials in Azerbaijan can give you trouble just out of boredom, so I didn't really know what to expect. But I am happy to report that in less than 2 hours I was able to leave my friend Connie's house in Qazax (our last region), cross into Georgia, and get to the marshrutkas. This was when it really hit me that I was not in Azerbaijan anymore. I couldn't read anything! If you haven't seen Georgian, it's like elvish from Lord of the Rings. Seriously. And then all the other signs were in Russian which means Cyrillic which means my head was spinning. Luckily, a minute before I had memorized what the Georgian looked like for Tbilisi off a road sign before I crossed the border, so I was able to find the right marşrutka. Of course, stepping onto the marşrutka, I basically returned to Azerbaijan because everyone there was speaking Azerbaijani! Just like home. And I have to give a little shout out to perhaps the nicest marşrutka driver, Əli. I told him I wanted to go to a certain metro stop in Tbilisi, and asked if he could tell me when it was nearby. And what does he do? He takes the sign out of the window telling people where he is going so he can go off route and bring me directly there, even up a ridiculously steep cobbled street. And he even gave me his phone number so if my mom and I want an early morning ride back to the border, he will come back to the same metro station and pick us up on his way. Really sweet.
And now, like I said, I'm just waiting for my mom. Inşallah she will arrive in about 4 hours so that in the morning I can proudly bring her home to Azerbaijan where my host family will be preparing a welcome party for her. Yes, the whole village does know she is coming and yes, they are all SUPER excited (and nervous things won't go perfectly). My host mom dragged me to the bazaar this morning and made me taste all the different fruit before she would buy them and kept asking me what I want. Unfortunately, I am not an Azeri xanım and expert market shopper, so I don't think I was much of a help. But I think we will have a wonderful party tomorrow night even if I couldn't pick the perfect fruit!
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