Church service was really good today and the best part was that I didn’t need anyone to translate because there was a guest speaker from American! The topic was about helping others. One of the comments he made to the Georgians was, “Don’t rely on foreign aid and war relief donations before you start taking care of your people. Start helping them today by gathering up clothes you don’t need anymore and donating extra food items from your farms.” I thought that was a very valid point, even for me as an American. Often times I look at homeless people in the US with little to no sympathy thinking, “My tax dollars already go to homeless shelters and welfare for the poor, why am I going to give them any more of my money…the government should be taking care of them!”. While I do believe that the homeless in America have a lot more opportunities than they would in other countries, maybe I should start looking at them through more sensitive eyes instead of with annoyance…
It was also St. George’s Day and the beginning of a week long celebration (I think it lasts a week), so after church we went to the St. George’s Orthodox Church down the street from our church. I wanted to take a quick look at what was happening since I was told that one of the traditions is to buy a lamb to be slaughtered for the atonement of sins, or to receive a blessing for something specific. I saw this same kind of tradition when I lived in Egypt and after the lamb was sacrificed a portion of the meat would go to the priest/church as an offering to be distributed among the poor, and then the rest would be divided between the family who bought the lamb. Here at St. George’s they already had two lambs tied up behind the church but we didn’t stay long enough to witness anything happen.
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| From St George's Day |
Orthodox holidays must be a magnet for the poor because as we were walking around the church I was shocked at how many beggars were scattered throughout the grounds. I decided to go into the church to have a look at the famous golden St. George icon, which is a man on a horse slaying a dragon. People (mostly women) were crowded around the icon kissing it, touching it, lighting candles around it and saying prayers out loud.
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| From St George's Day |
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| From St George's Day |
St. George is very famous throughout Georgia and is the emblem on of the country’s Coat of Arms. He lived Cappadocia and was tortured for his Christian beliefs, like many others during the third century. To this day he is adorned not only by Christians but also people of other beliefs, and is even mentioned in the Koran. November 23rd is considered to be the day of adoration and respect of the Saint.
From St. George’s Church we headed to Turtle Lake, the area of the city we wanted to go to last Sunday but couldn’t because of the Grand Prix. I treated my host family to a very nice, traditional Georgian lunch at a restaurant on top of the Turtle Lake mountain and afterward we went to the man-made lake. Since it was a holiday it was full of families and small children, but of course no one was swimming! Too cold and the water level definitely wasn’t high enough.
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| From St George's Day |
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| From St George's Day |
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| From St George's Day |
We were fighting the clock to be able to see all the sites we planned to before the sun set so we only stayed at the lake for about twenty minutes then went to the “Mama Daviti” Orthodox Church (Father of David). From there you can see a view of almost all of Tbilisi! It was an absolutely beautiful day and the sun was shinning brightly.
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| From St George's Day |
When we were there we witnessed someone trying to walk a sheep around the church three times in order to receive a blessing of health…this was also part of St. George’s Day. The poor sheep didn’t want to corporate so it was more like a dragging, pulling and carrying of the sheep three times around the church!
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From the church we went to my host mom’s sister’s house to have tea, Georgian desserts and ice cream. Yuuummmy! I know my cholesterol level is seriously tipping the charts by now!
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