A closer look at Kolkheti, through the people who live here and the places that shape their days. Conversations from workshops and gardens sit alongside stories of water, food, landscape and local life.
Take a little time. Meet someone, follow a river, pull up a chair. There is always another way into a place.
01
The gardener · Abasha
“I open the greenhouse before breakfast and check the trays by the door. Those dry first. If it has rained all night, I leave the watering and tie up the taller plants instead. Most mornings a neighbour comes for a few seedlings. We stand there talking, and I carry on working.
In the afternoon I sort the empty pots and wash the trays. I keep the cracked ones for carrying things. When someone tells me their plants have taken, I ask where they put them and how often they watered. I remember those details the next time they come, especially if they are trying something new.”
At first, the water seems to be holding everything still. The trees on the bank continue beneath the surface. A pale strip of sky runs between them. Then a ripple reaches the reeds, and the whole reflection moves.
From the road, a wetland can look like a single stretch of green. Close to the water, it separates into small places: a gap between roots, a narrow channel, a muddy edge where a boat has been pulled ashore. Each turn changes what is visible. There is no distant view to hurry towards; the detail is right beside you.
“I know most of the boats here by the sound of their engines. In the mornings you hear them before you can see who is coming. I have fished with some of these men for twenty years. If somebody is late getting back, one of us calls. We can argue over small things on the shore, but on the water we keep an eye on each other.
There is a man here who always brings more food than he needs. He says his wife has packed it that way, but I think he likes having people stop beside his boat. If we have been out for a long time, he waves us over before we have even tied up. You cannot leave without eating something.”
“The cup I keep for myself has a slightly crooked handle. For some reason it is the one I always reach for. Customers can be much less worried about these things than I am. A woman once brought back a bowl I had made years earlier. She wanted another one to go with it. I had forgotten the bowl completely. It was nice to see it again, with a few scratches on the bottom from being used.
I put it on the shelf beside the new pieces while we talked. The colour had changed a little. She told me she used it for breakfast, and sometimes her cat drank from it when she left it on the table. I liked knowing that. In the workshop I spend a lot of time looking at a rim or a handle. Once a piece goes home with someone, it becomes part of quite a different set of concerns.”
The table is already in use before everyone sits down. Someone moves a bowl to make space. Someone else brings a chair from the next room. A window stands open to the garden, and the conversation carries on while the food arrives.
There is warm ghomi, with cheese softening into it, herbs on a small plate and a bowl of sour plum sauce within reach. None of it needs an announcement. The pleasure is in the familiar combinations: something warm, something sharp, a fresh leaf between mouthfuls.
“I start with the dough we prepared the night before. While the first batch is baking, I weigh out the next one and clear the table. The first customers are usually the same people: a driver, the woman from the shop and a man who buys bread for his mother. I put theirs to one side if they are late.
By midday the room is hot, so we take our tea by the open door while the next batch finishes. Then there are the schoolchildren. They count their coins on the counter and take a long time choosing, even when they buy the same thing every day. Before I leave, I sweep the flour from under the table and check what we need for tomorrow. I usually take home a loaf that has split at the side. It tastes the same.”
