1. The Kindness of Strangers
The first thing to strike us was the kindness of strangers. The people in Georgia who offered us tea or beer. The people in Turkey who offered us Turkish coffee or demonstrated their “yes we can” approach to problem-solving by moving cars to squeeze our Sprinter into some incredibly tight parking places.
But the top prize for kindness goes to Bilal Baksi, a car salesman at Mercedes in Erzurum, Turkey, who, on realising that our Sprinter was not going to be repaired until the end of the day, kindly invited us to a meal in his house where we had the pleasure of meeting his wife and son and parents. A wonderful, loving family.
The kind Bilal Baksi and family
2. Refugees from War
Over 30,000 Russians opposed to the invasion of Ukraine have fled to Georgia since the war started on 24 February 2022. We seemed to meet a lot of them. At the first restaurant we stopped at in Georgia we met a man, who worked for Proctor and Gamble in Russia, with his partner and young child. Second, we met a hedge fund manager at a waterfall. Third, in another cafe we spoke to two men who sold artists’ materials. In addition, many of the people who were working remotely in the Fabrika Hostel in Tblisi sat on the Russian language table.
Russians at Fabrika Hostel
Of course, this is nothing compared to the estimated two million Ukrainians who have fled to Poland. And it is dwarfed by the four million refugees, mainly Syrians, in Turkey, the country with the most refugees in the world. (A young Turkish woman we met was not enthusiastic about Syrian refugees and felt that they committed crimes).
3. The Influence of China
The 350 kilometre road from Batumi, the commercial capital of Georgia, to Tblisi, the political capital, passes through some high and rugged mountain ranges. The China Road and Bridge Corporation, a state owned enterprise, is building much of the new motorway through these mountains. It is a truly impressive sight in a sparsely populated area.
China Road and Bridge Corpoation
The only competition to China, comes from Turkey’s Department of Road Improvement (KGM), which is building some sections of the new road. Turkey has built impressive motorways throughout the mountains of Turkey and is also now competing with China in Africa.
Significantly, the only evidence of the United States was some signs saying “Do Not Litter, US AID from the American people”. Wherever we have travelled in the world Chinese economic activity has always visibly dwarfed that of the United States.
US AID
